POV-Ray : Newsgroups : povray.off-topic : I just so love Feynman : Re: I just so love Feynman Server Time
3 Sep 2024 15:15:33 EDT (-0400)
  Re: I just so love Feynman  
From: Darren New
Date: 5 Nov 2010 12:08:21
Message: <4cd42bf5$1@news.povray.org>
Warp wrote:
> Darren New <dne### [at] sanrrcom> wrote:
>> Warp wrote:
>>>   Btw, I have never quite understood the reason why objects can't go
>>> inside each other (given that objects are actually practically empty
>>> space with staggeringly tiny corpuscules here and there, at relatively
>>> enormous distances from each other).
> 
>> Electrons are emitting and absorbing virtual photons in huge numbers all the 
>> time. (It's the same thing keeping the electrons in "orbit" around the protons.)
> 
>> The photons go between the nearby electrons in your arm and in the chair, 
>> changing the motion of both electrons such that they do not continue getting 
>> closer to each other.
> 
>   I didn't understand that at all.

Your ass is supported by beams of light? :-)

Basically, all electrons are constantly emitting and re-absorbing photons. 
When two electrons get close enough, they start emitting photons that the 
other electron absorbs. This changes the motion of the electrons such that 
they won't get too close to each other.

-- 
Darren New, San Diego CA, USA (PST)
   Serving Suggestion:
     "Don't serve this any more. It's awful."


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