How many dimensions does sound or a photon have?

[onesteptwostep]

Do we see sound in the 3rd dimension, the 2nd dimension or in just 1 dimension?

If sound is a vibration of air, and if air is made up of molecules, and if molecules are made up of atoms and quarks in empty space and so forth, how many dimensions do sounds have? What dimension do they occupy? (Do they have height, width, so on?)

Does this question even make sense?

Further on, if the dimensionality of sound could be established, how about photons, or light itself?

 

[Grayman]

All experiences occur in 4 dimensions. X, y , z, and time.

One x, y and/or z might have a constant or unchanging value making it seem like it has less demensions.

 

[Cogitant]

Human sensory perception is limited.
However, physicists theorise that sub-atomic 'particles' are probably powered by even smaller (or at least extra-dimensional) mechanisms...
It is probable that there are far more dimensions to things, looking at it that way.

@ String theory
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/String_theory

 

[Cognisant]

Waves have two dimensions, frequency and amplitude, we visualize waves like ripples on a pond but in the air sound waves are waves of pressure and waves in the electromagnetic spectrum are...

 

[Happy]

Yes, science

 

[Reluctantly]

Waves have two dimensions, frequency and amplitude, we visualize waves like ripples on a pond but in the air sound waves are waves of pressure and waves in the electromagnetic spectrum are...

I think electromagnetic radiation (photons) create vacuum ripples in space. Actually I think that's all they are and why they have no "mass". Such theoretical vacuum ripples could be absorbed by atoms and excite their state and also released to other atoms. And it is the only explanation I've found for why light has no mass, effects all mass, behaves as a wave and a particle, and is also contained in space (it can be compressed and expanded along with space-time).

But I don't know, it's my probably unprovable theory I guess.

 

[Reluctantly]

Actually umm, you know, to understand light, you can just extrapolate from electromagnetics really.

With electromagnetics, a changing magnetic field creates an electric field and vice versa. So if you think about it, an electric field (a battery) with current flowing through it around a circuit, emits a changing magnetic field around that circuit. The emission of this constantly changing magnetic field due to current flow is what we call photons.

In order words, photons are the propagation of matter changing its orientation in space at a certain rate (frequency). It becomes weaker the longer it propagates and it oscillates, like a wave, but it has no mass because it's a reaction between how matter orientates itself in space and not matter itself; nor would it be like a sound wave that pushes out as pressure, since this is a propagation of matter rotating or changing orientation (well there would be some push/pull, but it would balance itself out and be a vibration instead, rather than a force). But more simply, it would be the rate at which matter reacts with other matter, which reaches a theoretical limit of 299 792 458 m/s. And as you might guess from that, higher frequencies have more inherent energy because the oscillation of matter propagating out is faster (E=hf).

Does that make more sense? It's like thinking of matter as being magnets and spinning them so that they all spin against each other.

 

[Cogitant]

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[JR_IsP]

Physics student in here

Nor sound or light have mass. As people said, they're waves, that's it.

Sound waves, for instance, move across 3 dimensions (the 3 we all know), and of course, the time dimension. However, sound is vibration of the air (or any other thing -I can't exactly find the word in english for this, I'm sorry-, the more dense the object, the faster sound moves, that's why you can hear trains by putting your ear next to the railway), while light are vibrations in an electromagnetic field.

Think of light as a wave for now, forget about photons. Since all wave need a thing to travel on (again that word), scientists believed in some "ether" surrounding everything, with no other interactions with matter or energy. Now, a couple of physicists designed a simple experiment to wether prove or deny the existance of the "ether" (I'll leave a spoiler in case you might wanna know how does it work).

Spoiler

The experiment was something like this.

As all waves, light has a determined wavelength (some nm for visible light), and you might wanna see it like this image

Now, when you have two waves with the same wavelength colliding, there will be some places where the wave gets stronger and weaker, dependind on the "phase" of the light,
I mean, wether if the waves collide in the exact point of the wave or not. Some graphic example is this one (this is called interference)

Now we can finally see the experiment. It was a setup of a laser which traveled to a special prism that divided the light in two, each ray was deflected perpendicularly.
At the end of each ray, there was a mirror that deflected the light to the prism,
which also made the two light rays coverge into a screen, which showed the interference pattern. The setup was designed for each light ray travel the very same distance.

[BIMG]https://faculty.etsu.edu/gardnerr/einstein/michelson-morley.jpg[/BIMG]

Now, since the "ether" should have an orientation, there should be a ray traveling faster than the other (it's like walking downhill), and because the wavelength it's constant, the result would show an intereference pattern (light rays would be in different phases), and if you rotate the setup, then another interference pattern should be shown.

However, and since the result were the same each time and in every orientation,
the "ether" shouldn't exist. This experiment was realized several times and with several modifications, each showing the same.

Well, the experiment proved that the "ether" doesn't exists. And then was again the remaining question, where do light travel?

It doesn't need anything! Einstein told us so.

That's why he won the Nobel (not for general relativity, further info, google "photoelectric effect")

But what he also told us later with relativity that light (as any other object with mass) was deviated by gravity, and since this warping not only affects space but also time, you could say that light also travels in the space-time.

Hope you understood

 

[JR_IsP]

In case you might wonder, why light is both a vibration of nothing AND an electromagnetic field?

Well, the electromagnetic field doesn't interact with the mass of the objects, an electrically neutral object would be like some void in the field. Also have in mind that every single atom have a electromagnetic field surrounding it (because of electrons orbiting), so, yeah, don't mess with with science, it will always win

 

[Grayman]

@JR_IsP
Einstein received a nobel prize for proving that a photon is a particle and not "just a wave".

**********

I prefer the bohmian interpretation of quantum mechanics. Also, space-time is often viewed as being 'nothing' and the bending, distoration of 'nothing/space-time' makes no sense so I prefer the method of modeling/viewing space-time as aether as Einstein sometimes did. "https://youtu.be/yH9vAIdMqng" An aether is necessary for a pilot wave to exist which drives the particle in Bohmian mechanics.

You can view the water in this video as the aether/Space-time and the particle as the droplet. This video can help picture how a particle can both act as a wave and particle. "https://youtu.be/nmC0ygr08tE".

 

[JR_IsP]

@JR_IsP
Einstein received a nobel prize for proving that a photon is a particle and not "just a wave".

**********

I prefer the bohmian interpretation of quantum mechanics. Also, space-time is often viewed as being 'nothing' and the bending, distoration of 'nothing/space-time' makes no sense so I prefer the method of modeling/viewing space-time as aether as Einstein sometimes did. "https://youtu.be/yH9vAIdMqng" An aether is necessary for a pilot wave to exist which drives the particle in Bohmian mechanics.

You can view the water in this video as the aether/Space-time and the particle as the droplet. This video can help picture how a particle can both act as a wave and particle. "https://youtu.be/nmC0ygr08tE".

Of course photons are particles, that's why they are in the Standar Model, I just choosed to leave that aside to not make things more difficult than they actually are.

Just remember that water waves aren't exactly as light waves, and in quantum particles behave as particles and waves at the same time (check out the double slit experiment).

But quantum is a different kettle of fish.