Prior to Einstein, physicists believed that light waves, like water waves, were ripples in a medium: instead of the ocean, they posited the existence of the luminiferious aether, some form of ...

THIS book is a more elaborated presentation of the views as the nature of æther set forth by the author in a pamphlet published in 1898. The æther is “regarded as possessing properties such: s might ...

Reader Nick Canning says the aether theory was “ascientific”(28 January, p 54). However, this theory was one of the most fruitful in the history of science. It was useful during the development of ...

Yet the theory of aether endured. In the 17th and 18th centuries, thinkers dusted off, revised, and reintroduced the concept of aether in another influential but ultimately flawed attempt to explain ...

You may think physics has changed over the past 200 years, but it hasn’t. Today, theoretical physicists can’t understand why the universe is expanding at an observed rate that doesn’t quite mesh with ...

As the 19th century came to a close, physicists were feeling pretty satisfied with the state of their science. The great edifice of physical theory seemed complete. A few minor experiments remained to ...

Letter from Augustin Fresnel to Fraņcois Arago, on the influence of the movement of the earth on some phenomena of optics -- On the aberration of light / by G.G. Stokes -- On the relative motion ...

To answer all Mr. Bonacina's points (NATURE, May 5, p. 300) is not possible in a single letter. I agree with him that no rigid boundary can be drawn between the provinces of the older physics and ...

Until the late 19th century, scientists around the world believed that the vast space between the universe's stars and planets was filled with a mythical and mysterious substance called aether. Aether ...