biddie67 wrote:I just watched the little video several times and have some questions:
Why don't you get some kind of dispersal pattern with a single slot if an electron has some wave properties?
You do.
The dispersal pattern is in the probability pattern of where the electron shows up after interfering with itself.
It's just that you can't really visualize that pattern with just one photon.
But one can be sure that that single photon will NOT show up at the pattern minima.
So what happens if the two slits are moved further apart?
The interference pattern is basically the same but becomes narrower.
(However, the falling off of the cyclical pattern with distance is fixed by the width of the slits.)
Or if a 3rd slit is introduced in parallel to the first two?
Then every other maximum is enhanced to correspond the narrowest slit spacing.
If a thousand slits are introduced then every 999th maximum is enhanced
to correspond the narrowest slit spacing and the interference pattern collapses from being
simple sinusoidal to a periodic set of narrow sharp peaks suitable for spectrometry.
Or if a 3rd slit is introduced that is perpendicular to the first two?
You'll have to be more specific. (Note: the little cartoon video
hasn't really treated the up down dimension properly in the first place.)
Or if there are just 2 slits that are perpendicular to each other?
A single slit should produce a single line interference pattern
perpendicular to the slit (unlike in the cartoon),
The basic pattern of 2 slits perpendicular to each other would be an
interference pattern of 2 lines perpendicular to each other with obvious
interference effects only noticeable where the lines intersect each other.
Or is timing of the electrons significant - do you get different patterns if they are emitted in a timing sequence such that the first one has not reached the tracking surface before the 2nd is emitted as compared to a large enough time gap between any two electrons so that there is only one electron in transit at a time?
As noted previously
the photons are really only interfering with themselves such that timing is NOT an issue.
biddie67 wrote:There just doesn't seem like there is enough info in this video to really lock in the described effect.
It just seems possible that it isn't the electron, by itself, that is causing the apparent interference pattern but something else, while the electron is in transit, is affecting the electron that is causing it to seem to have an interference pattern ....
Nobody really understands what is causing the interference pattern; we just have
a miraculous method to accurately predict what the probabilities are going to be.
No one yet has come along with an alternative explanation that can
accurately predict what these probabilities are going to be
much less to predict what is actually going to take place.
[quote="biddie67"]I just watched the little video several times and have some questions:[/quote]
[color=#FF0000]Why don't you get some kind of dispersal pattern with a single slot if an electron has some wave properties?[/color]
You do.
The dispersal pattern is in the probability pattern of where the electron shows up after interfering with itself.
It's just that you can't really visualize that pattern with just one photon.
[color=#0000FF][b]But one can be sure that that single photon will NOT show up at the pattern minima.[/b][/color]
[color=#FF0000]So what happens if the two slits are moved further apart? [/color]
The interference pattern is basically the same but becomes narrower.
(However, the falling off of the cyclical pattern with distance is fixed by the width of the slits.)
[color=#FF0000]Or if a 3rd slit is introduced in parallel to the first two? [/color]
Then every other maximum is enhanced to correspond the narrowest slit spacing.
If a thousand slits are introduced then every 999th maximum is enhanced
to correspond the narrowest slit spacing and the interference pattern collapses from being
simple sinusoidal to a periodic set of narrow sharp peaks suitable for spectrometry.
[color=#FF0000]Or if a 3rd slit is introduced that is perpendicular to the first two?[/color]
You'll have to be more specific. (Note: the little cartoon video
hasn't really treated the up down dimension properly in the first place.)
[color=#FF0000]Or if there are just 2 slits that are perpendicular to each other?[/color]
A single slit should produce a single line interference pattern
perpendicular to the slit (unlike in the cartoon),
The basic pattern of 2 slits perpendicular to each other would be an
interference pattern of 2 lines perpendicular to each other with obvious
interference effects only noticeable where the lines intersect each other.
[color=#FF0000]Or is timing of the electrons significant - do you get different patterns if they are emitted in a timing sequence such that the first one has not reached the tracking surface before the 2nd is emitted as compared to a large enough time gap between any two electrons so that there is only one electron in transit at a time?[/color]
As noted previously [color=#0000FF][b]the photons are really only interfering with themselves[/b][/color] such that timing is NOT an issue.
[quote="biddie67"]There just doesn't seem like there is enough info in this video to really lock in the described effect.
It just seems possible that it isn't the electron, by itself, that is causing the apparent interference pattern but something else, while the electron is in transit, is affecting the electron that is causing it to seem to have an interference pattern ....[/quote]
Nobody really understands what is causing the interference pattern; we just have
a miraculous method to accurately predict what the probabilities are going to be.
No one yet has come along with an alternative explanation that can
accurately predict what these probabilities are going to be
much less to predict what is actually going to take place.