28 JAN 2012 by ideonexus
The Wonder of X-Rays Affecting a Photographic Plate
But in its [the corpuscular theory of radiation] relation to the wave theory there is one extraordinary and, at present, insoluble problem. It is not known how the energy of the electron in the X-ray bulb is transferred by a wave motion to an electron in the photographic plate or in any other substance on which the X-rays fall. It is as if one dropped a plank into the sea from the height of 100 ft. and found that the spreading ripple was able, after travelling 1000 miles and becoming infinite...Bragg compares it to a wave traveling 100 feet to knock a board out of a ship.