ICANT; Message 6 writes:
. . .
The antiparticle of the electron is called the positron, which is identical to the electron except that it carries electrical and other charges of the opposite sign. When an electron collides with a positron, they may either scatter off each other or be totally annihilated, producing a pair (or more) of gamma ray photons. Electrons, which belong to the first generation of the lepton particle family,[9] participate in gravitational, electromagnetic and weak interactions.
Source
Do you refute that they can just scatter off each other?
So electrons and positrons are the same thing on one is positive and the other is negative.
In the top of the thunderstorm there are positive charged electrons (positrons).
. . .
lyx2no writes:
I don’t really see how lightning being due to electron-positron annihilation can be debated. The best I can expect is for ICANT to recant. But if there is an argument to be made I love to see it.
What is there that I need to recant?
Electrons and positrons do not always annihilate each other.
A positive and a negative charge is required to create a lightning bolt.
You appear to have the same misconception about electricity as was common over 250 years ago. Please pardon the review of basic early-secondary-school science that follows, but it appears to be necessary. The intent is purely to inform and to eliminate confusion.
Static electricity (electrically charging a substance by rubbing it with another substance) had been known since antiquity and attempts were made to understand it and to explain it. One thing that was noticed was that charging a glass rod by rubbing it with silk ("vitreous electricity") produced a different kind of charge than charging resin (or rubber) by rubbing it with fur ("resinous electricity"). Although both vitreous and resinous electricity behaved similarly, their effects were the exact opposite of each other and they would even cancel each other out. It seemed obvious that they were two different kinds of "electrical fluid".
Circa 1750, Benjamin Franklin proposed that they were instead the same thing, only in the one case there was more "electrical fluid" and in the other there was less. Vitreous electricity was considered to have more "electrical fluid" and so was termed "positive" and resinous electricity was considered to have less and so was termed "negative". About 150 years later, it was discovered that that "electrical fluid" was electrons and that they were negatively charged, so the assignment of "positive" and "negative" was reveresed from what it should have been. Shortly after that, in 1909, the nucleus was discovered and that the nucleus contains most of the atom's mass and
all of its positive charge.
(Atomic theory - Wikipedia)
Within the nucleus, it's the protons that carry the positive charge. But it's also the number of protons that determines what element the atom is -- if you add or remove protons to or from an atom's nucleus, you change that atom into a different element. Therefore, protons remain with the atom and are not redistributed. Rather, it's the electrons that can be added to and removed from the atom and that can be redistributed.
It's the electrons that are the charge carriers in electricity and in electrical phenomena, including lightning.
An electrically neutral atom has the same number of electrons as it has protons; equal amounts of positive and negative charge renders it electrically neutral in that it has no net electrical charge. An atom that does have an electric charge, be it positive or negative, is an
ion. The process of changing an atom into an ion is called
ionization. Ionization occurs when electrons are either added to or removed from an atom. A
negative ion results from added electrons, whereas a
positive ion results from removing electrons. Regions of negative electrical charge are created by concentrations of negative ions, while
regions of positive electrical charge are created by concentrations of positive ions.
So you see, ICANT, even though they may be produced in small quantities by lightning discharges,
positrons have nothing to do with the production of lightning. Positively charged regions are created
not by anti-matter, but rather by concentrations of
positive ions, which are atoms that are missing their full complement of electrons. It's electricity after all, not anti-matter physics.
ICANT writes:
lyx2no;Message 11 writes:
{ADDING IN FROM THE ORIGINALLY QUOTED SOURCE: The source you need to supply would be one the mentioned electron-positrons annihilation being involved in lightning creation.} I'll take a guess that you couldn't find one.
Correct
Actually I could not find an accurate discription of what takes place.
I know you have to have a postive and a negative to get lightning.
There seems to be confusion as to the how.
I find no information how the top of the cloud gets a positive charge.
So if you would like to explain ligntning that would be great.
The basic explanation of lightning is ionization followed by electrical discharge. Ionization establishes regions of positive and negative electrical charge which are separated from each other until the difference in electrical potential (AKA "voltage") exceeds the ability of the intervening material to insulate those regions from each other, or until some path of conductance (or at least of less resistence) is established.
Simply electricity. No anti-matter need be applied.
Regardless of
how that ionization happens, it does nonetheless happen (as you yourself insist, though you also insisted that it was not ionizaton but rather the accumulation of significant quantities of anti-matter). So given that ionization does indeed happen and that lightning results from the discharge between two ionized regions, what more do you need to know?
Of course, it would be interesting to learn how that ionization occurs (and how it occurs differently until different conditions) as well as the exact physics of a lightning strike. Of course, that is also a different question which has nothing to do with whether anti-matter is involved.
May I suggest a couple reading assignments?
Wikipedia article on Lightning:
Lightning - WikipediaWikipedia article on Static Electricity:
Static electricity - Wikipedia
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Captain! Ye canna mix matter and anti-matter cold!(LCDR Montgomery Scott,
The Naked Time)
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