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[MadMojoMonkey]

Are particles actually waves until we observe them?

Particles are waves. Waves are particles.

It depends on how you observe them what you coax out of the observation.


from #67

There is no physical distinction between a particle and a wave in quantum mechanics.

In fact a man named J. J. Thompson won the Nobel prize in physics in 1906 for his work demonstrating that electrons are particles. Then in 1937, his son, G. P. Thompson received the Nobel prize in physics for his work demonstrating that electrons are waves.

I, personally, have recreated experiments that demonstrate both the wavelike and particle-like behavior of photons. I speak with firsthand knowledge that photons are BOTH waves AND particles.

Here is a very brief summary of the experiment I mentioned.

It that experiment I performed 8 variations on a theme.
I separately performed a single slit experiment and a double slit experiment
using separately a red laser and a green filtered incandescent bulb
using separately a photon particle counter and an electromagnetic transducer.

The wave-like cancellation was evident in both detection cases, and in both cases the frequency of the light was able to be shown using wave theory and a bit of trig. with some careful measurements in all cases.

So regardless of the fact that it's a laser, it's true for all light,
it acts in wavelike fashion when propagating over space and time,
the effects of which can be observed whether the detector is carefully designed to only observe waves
or if the detector is carefully designed to only observe particles.