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Complete aether dragging can explain the negative outcome of all aether drift experiments (like the Michelson–Morley experiment). However, this theory is considered to be wrong for the following reasons: [1] [11] The Fizeau experiment (1851) indicated only a partial entrainment of light.
The Lorentz ether theory, which was developed mainly between 1892 and 1906 by Lorentz and Poincaré, was based on the aether theory of Augustin-Jean Fresnel, Maxwell's equations and the electron theory of Rudolf Clausius. [B 1] Lorentz's 1895 paper rejected the aether drift theories, and refused to express assumptions about the nature of the ...
As mentioned above, Michelson initially believed that his experiment would confirm Stokes' theory, according to which the aether was fully dragged in the vicinity of the earth (see Aether drag hypothesis). However, complete aether drag contradicts the observed aberration of light and was contradicted by other experiments as well. In addition ...
A range of proposed aether-dragging theories could explain the null result but these were more complex, and tended to use arbitrary-looking coefficients and physical assumptions. Joseph Larmor discussed the aether in terms of a moving magnetic field caused by the acceleration of electrons.
Experiments such as the Michelson–Morley experiment of 1887 (and later other experiments such as the Trouton–Noble experiment in 1903 or the Trouton–Rankine experiment in 1908), presented evidence against the theory of a medium for light propagation known as the luminiferous aether; a theory that had been an established part of science for nearly one hundred years at the time.
Using a water-filled telescope, in 1871 Airy looked for a change in stellar aberration through the refracting water due to the aether drag hypothesis. [20] Like all other attempts to detect aether drift or drag, Airy obtained a negative result. George Biddell Airy did not set out to discover either a stationary or moving aether.
Regarding the relative motion and the mutual influence of matter and aether, there were two theories, neither entirely satisfactory. One was developed by Fresnel (and subsequently Lorentz). This model (stationary aether theory) supposed that light propagates as a transverse wave and aether is partially dragged with a certain coefficient by matter.
The idea that the aether might be completely dragged within or in the vicinity of Earth, by which the negative aether drift experiments could be explained, was refuted by a variety of experiments. Oliver Lodge (1893) found that rapidly whirling steel disks above and below a sensitive common path interferometric arrangement failed to produce a ...