Xref: utzoo sci.misc:813 sci.physics:2852
Path: utzoo!mnetor!uunet!seismo!sundc!pitstop!sun!concertina!fiddler
From: fiddler%concertina@Sun.COM (Steve Hix)
Newsgroups: sci.misc,sci.physics
Subject: Re: differences between sound and light waves?
Message-ID: <41379@sun.uucp>
Date: 9 Feb 88 01:04:41 GMT
References: <413@prlb2.UUCP> <4110@aw.sei.cmu.edu> <6917@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>
Sender: news@sun.uucp
Lines: 26
Keywords: macroscopic behaviour

In article <6917@agate.BERKELEY.EDU>, csm@garnet.berkeley.edu writes:
> In article <4110@aw.sei.cmu.edu> firth@bd.sei.cmu.edu.UUCP (Robert Firth) writes:
>>In article <413@prlb2.UUCP> ronse@prlb2.UUCP (Christian Ronse) writes:
> 	...
>>(b) We can perceive the pitch of sound accurately, but have very imperfect
>>    colour perception.  For instance, we can't tell many colour "chords"
>>    from pure monochromatic light.
> 
> Some of us are more adept at naming colours than chords.
> 
>>(e) Finally, of course, we can generate sounds as well as perceive them; we
>>    can't generate colours.
> 
> Well, I hope you weren't blushing when you wrote that.
> 
> A stick breaking under foot generates a (sonic) shock wave (chaotic behavior
> due to parts of the stick moving faster than the speed of sound ?) -- I
> don't think there is analogous light behaviour in the everyday world
> (aurora borealis?).

Cerenkov light? The energetic particles causing the cerenkov glow
underwater are initially moving faster than the speed of light in
water, aren't they?  (Maybe that was just in that old movie I
thought I slept through...)

	seh