It’s fascinating how much we’re still learning about the universe, even about something as fundamental as light. Did you know that light, the very thing that allows us to see, has a secret identity? And this identity is so elusive that we can’t observe both sides of it at the same time. That’s right, MIT researchers have confirmed that light truly possesses two distinct natures, and they exist in a state of quantum superposition that challenges our everyday understanding of reality.
For centuries, scientists have grappled with the nature of light. We’ve seen it behave like waves, bending and diffracting around obstacles, much like water waves. But then, we’ve also observed it acting like particles, tiny packets of energy called photons, which can knock electrons off metals in what’s known as the photoelectric effect. This duality, the idea that light can be both a wave and a particle, has been a cornerstone of quantum physics.
This concept was famously debated by giants like Albert Einstein and Niels Bohr. Einstein’s work on the photoelectric effect solidified the particle nature of light, while others, building on Thomas Young’s double-slit experiment, demonstrated its wave-like properties. The double-slit experiment is a classic for a reason. When you shine light through two narrow slits, it creates an interference pattern on a screen behind them – a hallmark of wave behavior. But if you fire photons one by one, they still build up that same wave pattern over time, suggesting each individual photon somehow