The topic of whether light is a wave or a particle or is both a wave and a particle has been under debate for several years. Some scientists argue that it is exclusively a wave while others say that it is a particle. However, there are those who also say that it is both a particle and a wave. For example, in the year 1700, Newton’s corpuscular theory stated that light was a group of particles, however, during the same period, other scientists thought otherwise, positing that light could just as well be a wave (wave theory). Essentially, we are aware that light travels in a straight line, which therefore, made it quite easy for Newton to come up with his corpuscular theory. However, this theory cannot explain the wave-like phenomena of light, such as interference and diffraction. On the other, hand the wave theory also fails to account for the concept of the photoelectric effect, displayed by light. In my view, based on the reasons that I have discussed in this paper, I think the light is both a particle and a wave.
The reasons as to why the light is a particle are that : it travels in a straight line, forms sharp shadows and its beams are mainly localized in space. On the other hand, the reasons why it is a wave are because two crossing beams cannot collide and the fact that light rays only travel at only one speed. These ideas are based on the theories that exist, which were proposed by great scientists, who carefully studied light. The idea of light being a particle was brought up by Sir Isaac Newton, who thought that light could be a particle because of its ability to form sharp and bright shadows it created. On the other side, the wave theory was proposed by Grimaldi and Huygens, mainly because of light had the diffraction ability, which was the original behavior of waves. Later, after the wave theory was proposed, Fresnel and Young, also proved that light had another property of interference, another action of waves. Additionally, Maxwell in the year 1864, he proved that indeed light was an electromagnetic wave.
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By getting me to understand the reasons as to why the light is both a wave and a particle, this topic has increased my desire to further my research in this field, which can lead to the discovery of some of the solutions to the problems that the world is facing right now, especially the challenge of efficiently converting light energy into useful power energy to preserve the environment from excessive pollution.
In conclusion, light is both a particle and a wave because it included both properties of waves and particles.
