PHIL 221 Lecture Notes - Lecture 7: Luminiferous Aether, Experimentum Crucis, Logical Truth
Document Summary
There was a debate in the 18th century about the composition of light. It was proposed that light is made of particles traveling in a straight line from the source to our eyes. This theory was very successful for more then a century. The reason is because it was used to prove many optical illusions such as the refraction of light in water. There was another theory about light which was presented by huygens. This theory stated that light is made of waves that travel in an all persuasive medium called the luminiferous aether. They also explained refraction using their own theory. We can not observe the nature of light directly which makes it hard to see which theory is correct. However both theories predict the same experimental law of refraction (snell"s law) One disagreement the theories had was the speed of water in water compared to in air.
