In reply to Jones Beene's message of Mon, 2 Jun 2014 10:05:10 -0700: Hi, [snip] >However, experience rules – and if there is found to be no longer wl than >this in physics– then the relative disproportion can be explained possibly >via some higher power law. For instance the square of 137 is an approximate >value for this ratio (should we want to bring in the fine structure >constant).
Experience does rule, but it has to be appropriate experience. Knowledge of how to bake a cake isn't going to help much when you are building a house. If this is a new reaction, as you are proposing, then knowledge based on existing reactions may not be appropriate. I short, just because we don't currently observe something, that doesn't necessarily mean that it can't happen. It's possible that the required circumstances are just rare in nature, and thus would require special intervention on our part to bring them about. I.e. they would need to be contrived. E.g. how many internal combustion engines occur naturally? ;) (Billions actually, if you count muscles, or are they electric motors? :) BTW the fact that no longer wavelength is observed could have other reasons:- 1) The differences between energy levels in the nucleus may simply not be that small. 2) There may be a link between the probability of emission and the wavelength, such that emission of longer wavelengths becomes progressively less likely as the wavelength increases. This could make emission of UV very rare, and thus difficult to detect. This also ties in with the size ratio, and Dave's comment about antennae emitting poorly when the size is mismatched. Though the following is clearly an "argument from authority", consider the fact that since others have looked for UV radiation, they clearly didn't think it was impossible a priori. Regards, Robin van Spaandonk http://rvanspaa.freehostia.com/project.html
