Question

Explain the results of the Michelson-Morley experiment if the ether had been a reality? What significance...

Explain the results of the Michelson-Morley experiment if the ether had been a reality? What significance would this have had to the speed of light?

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Answer #1

The Michelson Morely experiment was conducted to prove the existance of a uniformly pervasive ether medium. As the experiment was a failure we can conclude that the universe is vaccuum but not ehter.

Now if it were a reality, then that means for the propagation of light a medium is required. That means speed of light will be different for different media. This will effect the validity of second law of speacial theory of relativity which is to say that the speed of light is same across and is a universal constant. Speed of light would also depend on the direction of earth's motion.

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