Aether and Gravitation

by William George Hooper

Now what I wish to call the reader's special attention to is, that the pressure in each and every case of the aetherial elastic envelopes which surround the central nucleus, is always directed away from the central point, and here it seems to me is the solution of the difficulty which Newton failed to solve. For when a luminous corpuscle enters any medium, assuming it to do so, it would have to overcome the pressure due to the increased elasticity of the denser aetherial envelopes, and as the two motions, viz. that of the incident ray, and the pressure due to the elasticity of the elastic envelope, would be in opposition to each other, the result would be that the luminous corpuscle, if it entered the medium at all, would be retarded and not accelerated as suggested by Newton, and such a result is perfectly in harmony with experiment. So that by our theory of an atomic and gravitating Aether, it seems to me that it now becomes possible to reconcile the two theories.

There is another difficulty that the emission theory had to contend with, and that was, how was it possible for the same surface of any substance to reflect and refract a corpuscle at one and the same time? Newton overcame this difficulty by suggesting, from the results of his observations on certain coloured rings, that each particle had what he called certain phases or fits, of easy reflection or refraction, so that at certain times they would be refracted, and at other times they would be reflected.

Boscovitch has suggested that the fits were due to the fact that each luminous corpuscle possessed polarity; which, by rotating, alternately offered their different sides to the refractive and reflecting surfaces, so that sometimes they would be reflected or repelled, and at other times attracted or refracted.

A similar hypothesis has also been suggested by Biot. Now if such a hypothesis will satisfactorily account for the fact that the same medium will reflect or refract the luminous corpuscles, as the case may be, then in our aetherial atom we have the very conditions which would satisfy both Boscovitch and Biot's hypothesis. For one of the properties that we suggested regarding our aetherial atom was, that it possessed rotation like our own earth, and that it also possessed polarity.

The harmonizing of the two theories, therefore, seems to rest upon the atomicity or non-atomicity of the Aether.

It is absolutely certain that the electro-magnetic theory of light demands the recognition of some form of atomicity for the Aether. For if light be really an electro-magnetic phenomena, as has been proved by Maxwell and experimentally demonstrated by Hertz, then, in view of the fact that the atomicity of electricity is coming within the scope of direct experiment as asserted by Dr. Larmor, unless we accept atomicity of the Aether in some way, we shall be in the unphilosophical position of having the Aether of space not being composed of atoms, while the electricity associated with that Aether in some unknown way is composed of atoms. In other words, we shall have a non-atomic body composed of atoms, which conclusion is absurd. Therefore, from the electro-magnetic theory of light, we are again compelled to postulate atoms of some kind for the Aether.

If there are electrical atoms in association with the Aether, then they must be of two kinds, positive and negative, as it is impossible to find positive electricity disassociated from negative. Therefore, from the electro-magnetic theory of light we get further evidence of the polarity of the aetherial atom, by which Newton's fits of easy reflection or refraction may be physically conceived.

I am convinced, that with the hypothesis of an atomic and gravitative Aether as suggested by Young in his Fourth Hypothesis, all three theories of light in relation to the phenomena of reflection and refraction can be harmonized. I wish only to point out the direction in which to look for the solution, and must leave it to scientists to work out the problem.

Art. 73. The Solar Spectrum.--When a ray or beam of solar light is passed through a prism, it is broken up or decomposed into its constituent parts. This is called dispersion, and conclusively proves that the light from the sun is not a simple, but a compound colour. We have illustrations of this decomposition of pure white light in the rainbow, where the colours of the sunlight are revealed against the sky with clearness and precision. A simple experiment to prove that the solar light is a compound one may be made by boring a small hole in a shutter, and then allowing the sunlight that passes through the hole to fall upon a prism, such as the pendant of a candelabrum. When this is done, then on the opposite wall of the room will be seen, not one colour, but seven colours, ranged in the following order: Red, Orange, Yellow, Green, Blue, Indigo, Violet. This is termed the Visible Spectrum.

It may be asked, What is the cause of the various colours in the spectrum? We have already seen that light is due to a wave motion of the Aether, and it can be demonstrated that the various colours of light are due to different wave lengths. Colour is to light what pitch is to sound. As has been shown in [Art. 62], the pitch of a note depends upon the number of air waves which strike upon the tympanum of the ear in a given time. The more rapid the vibration, the higher the note. The more rapidly a sounding body vibrates, the shorter will be the length of each wave. If a violinist wants to produce a note of higher pitch, he presses his finger on the string, thereby shortening it, and by so doing increases the rapidity of vibration, and raises the pitch of the note. Now the colours of the spectrum are to the eye what the notes are to the ear. The aetherial waves which produce the red colour are slower in their vibrations, and are longer than those which produce the orange colour. Those which produce the orange colour are of slower vibrations, and longer than those which produce the yellow colour, and so on through all the other colours; until we get to the violet and to the ultra-violet, or invisible violet rays, which are the most rapid in their vibrations, and consequently their wave lengths are the shortest of the whole group. It has been ascertained that it takes about 39,000 waves of red light to measure an inch if placed end to end. Now light has a velocity of 186,000 miles per second. If this is reduced to inches, we find that there are 11,784,960,000 in that distance. Let us therefore multiply this number by 39,000, and we shall then find how many waves of red light must enter the eye to produce the sensation of red colour. That number is 459,613,440,000,000, so that all these waves enter the eye in one second of time, and must strike the retina of the eye in order to produce the sensation of redness. In the same way, the number of waves that must strike the retina of the eye to produce the sensation of violet can be determined. It takes about 57,500 waves of violet to measure an inch, so that a violet wave is only 1/57000 part of an inch in length. All the other colours of the spectrum which lie between the violet and the red waves gradually get longer and longer in their wave lengths, and slower and slower in their vibrations, until at the red end of the spectrum and beyond it we have the longest waves, which are from 1/39000 part of an inch in length to 1/10000 part of an inch.