From: utzoo!decvax!cca!BollenG.ES@PARC-MAXC@sri-unix
Newsgroups: net.space
Title: Re: Equivalence of Mass and Energy
Article-I.D.: sri-unix.2582
Posted: Mon Aug  9 16:08:44 1982
Received: Tue Aug 10 04:09:53 1982

It's very difficult to discuss issues in quantum physics via pontification, and
even more difficult when one neglects to define one's terms.  I found Floyd's
four-point message not only unnecessarily high and mighty, but equally
difficult to understand.

When fusion takes place, all of the constituent atoms must be in high kinetic 
states in order to get close enough together to fuse.  The end products of the
fusion must then also be in high energy states.  The end products of this
reaction are He, plus some very fast moving neutrinos.  The neutrinos shoot off
into oblivion, carrying some of the mass of the constituent 4 Hydrogen atoms,
while the exited He sits and radiates photons until it gets down to its
ground-state energy.  So, the mass of the final product is equal to the sum-mass
of the constituents minus the equivalent energy that leaves with the radiated
photons, minus the relativistic mass of the neutrinos that are also produced in
the fusion.  It is neither accurate nor complete to simply say that the mass of the
Helium is exactly the mass of the 4 Hydrogens.  


The above may add a bit of clarity to the first of floyd's four axioms, the other
three seem to me to be even less meaningful than the first.  So i won't comment
unless queried..... but may i suggest that for a complete discussion of these and
myriad other physical phenom's (as well as some very entertaining reading) that
the physics text to look at would be Feynman's Lectures in Freshman Physics.

Feynman was a Pontiff extraordinaire!

		Gregfish.