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To: silmaril
This experiment really doesn't show that gravity is quantized. The title is inappropriate. It is one of many experiments that show that particles are acurately described by waves. The particle here is an uncharged particle in a potential well. It is a bound state, similar to a particle in a box, where the particle is restricted between a mirror and the gravitational field. When particles are confined, they can only have certain energies. The only thing that can be said about gravity from this experiment is that it works as expected to keep the particle from traveling off into space.

When particles are restricted this way there are discrete locations, within the box, where the particle is likely to be found, and other locations where the particle is not likely to ever be found. That's because the energy the particle gains, or loses must be an integral multiple of h, Planck's constant

4 posted on 01/24/2002 9:17:28 AM PST by spunkets
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To: spunkets
Thank you for the clarification. You're right -- the title is extremely misleading.
7 posted on 01/24/2002 9:40:17 AM PST by silmaril
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To: spunkets
I think a further interpretation of this report is that it confirms that gravity works just like other forms of radiant energy in imparting discrete energy levels to particles. That is, that particles can have an energy level 'A' or level 'B', but not 'A.2357', for example. So as you said, gravity is simply another wave phenomenon.
11 posted on 01/24/2002 10:29:05 AM PST by Redbob
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To: spunkets
Lessee . . . 'i' before 'e', except after . . .
12 posted on 01/24/2002 10:51:01 AM PST by worryfree718
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