Comic Strips

11196 readers

5106 users here now

Comic Strips is a community for those who love comic stories.

The rules are simple:

The post can be a single image, an image gallery, or a link to a specific comic hosted on another site (the author's website, for instance).
The comic must be a complete story.
If it is an external link, it must be to a specific story, not to the root of the site.
You may post comics from others or your own.
If you are posting a comic of your own, a maximum of one per week is allowed (I know, your comics are great, but this rule helps avoid spam).
The comic can be in any language, but if it's not in English, OP must include an English translation in the post's 'body' field (note: you don't need to select a specific language when posting a comic).
Politeness.
Adult content is not allowed. This community aims to be fun for people of all ages.

Web of links

[email protected]: "I use Arch btw"
[email protected]: memes (you don't say!)

founded 1 year ago

MODERATORS

lawrence

377

Doppler Effect (xkcd.com)

submitted 2 months ago by [email protected] to c/comicstrips

17 comments fedilink hide all child comments

The Doppler effect is a mysterious wavelength-shifting phenomenon which seems to primarily affect sirens, which is why the 🚨 emoji is red.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] NocturnalMorning 3 points 2 months ago (1 children)

This comic has triggered me. We do not know why the doppler effect is a thing for light(that I am aware). Is it a wave, is it a particle, both? Only when you observe it? Photons are weird.

[–] [email protected] 22 points 2 months ago (1 children)

Doppler effect is a thing for any waves. Light, sound, anything

[–] [email protected] 8 points 2 months ago (1 children)

My understanding: light can best be described as an excitation of the electromagnetic field of spacetime. This excitation has a frequency, like an oscillation. Therefore light appears like a wave and we observe the Doppler effect. However, when interacting with other excitations, the "wave" collapses and behaves like a point like particle.

This applies not only to light, but to all known particles, e.g. the protons in your body. The only difference to photons are additional spacetime fields that are involved (like the Higgs field).

The weirdest part to me, is the collapse of the imaginary wave function and how it leads to ideas like "Many Worlds".

[–] NocturnalMorning 4 points 2 months ago (2 children)

I always thought the observation collapse of the wave function thing was a little handwavey. I really don't have a resolution for it though, or an alternative.

[–] Serinus 6 points 2 months ago

For anyone not familiar, look up the double wave experiment.

It's not a thing that should happen, but it clearly does.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 2 months ago

Neither does anyone really, it's a mystery physics has been trying to solve for the past 97 years.