Light: Waves or Bullets

Series: In OF SCIENCE AND SCIENTISTS

Genre: Television

Year Published: 1958

Creator: Philippe Lecorbeiller Edwin C. Kemble WGBH-TV Lowell Institute Cooperative Broadcasting Council

Format: 16mm

Description: Watch a searchlight as it pierces heavy night clouds. Notice that you don’t see the beam of light, merely where it comes from: the face of the searchlight, reflections from the clouds or duct blocking the beam. In other words, the light beam itself is invisible. Beginning with a similar demonstration, Edwin C. Kemble shows the difficulty science has had in providing a wholly satisfactory theory of light. He uses a stroboscopically lighted tank to illustrate wave theory and high-voltage discharges to suggest the violence necessary to generate radiant energy with short wavelengths. The violent damage done by X-rays, gamma rays and ultra violet radiation leads Kemble to the corpuscular explanation of light. By an examination of cloud-chamber photographs, visibly recording action in the unseen world of atomic particles, Kemble reconciles the two theories. The yield of this revolutionary work is dramatic: no less than the discovery of a universal property of all forms of existence.

Metadata Source:Educational film guide. Supplements (1959-62)