The Feynman Lectures on Physics, Volume I by Richard Feynman & Robert B. Leighton & Matthew Sands

Author:Richard Feynman & Robert B. Leighton & Matthew Sands
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi

Fig. 29–4. The energy flowing within the cone is independent of the distance at which it is measured.

This means that the energy that the source can deliver decreases as we get farther away; in fact, it varies inversely as the square of the distance. But that has a very simple interpretation: if we wanted to pick up all the energy we could from the wave in a certain cone at a distance (Fig. 29–4), and we do the same at another distance , we find that the amount of energy per unit area at any one place goes inversely as the square of , but the area of the surface intercepted by the cone goes directly as the square of . So the energy that we can take out of the wave within a given conical angle is the same, no matter how far away we are! In particular, the total energy that we could take out of the whole wave by putting absorbing oscillators all around is a certain fixed amount. So the fact that the amplitude of varies as is the same as saying that there is an energy flux which is never lost, an energy which goes on and on, spreading over a greater and greater effective area. Thus we see that after a charge has oscillated, it has lost some energy which it can never recover; the energy keeps going farther and farther away without diminution. So if we are far enough away that our basic approximation is good enough, the charge cannot recover the energy which has been, as we say, radiated away. Of course the energy still exists somewhere, and is available to be picked up by other systems. We shall study this energy “loss” further in Chapter 32.

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