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DAYTON C. MILLER
ni. PROFESSOR DAYTON C. MILLER (CASE SCHOOL OF APPLIED SCIENCE)
The experiments on which I shall report today seem to lead to conclusions which are in contradiction to the common interpretation of the Michelson-Morley experiment. To make the story complete, I shall start with the conclusion of the experiments performed by Michelson and Morley in 1887, in Cleveland, which were interpreted as giving no indication of an ether drift. Dr. Lorentz, in 1895, proposed the first explanation for this unexpected result by assuming that the motion of translation of a solid through the ether might produce a contraction in the direction of the motion, with extension transversely, the amount of which is proportional to the square of the ratio of the velocities of translation and of light, and which might have a magnitude such as to annul the effect of the ether drift in the Michelson-Morley interferometer. The optical dimensions of this instrument were determined by the base of sandstone on which the mirrors were supported. If the contraction depends upon the physical properties of the solid, it was suggested that pine timber would suffer greater compression than sandstone, while steel might be compressed in a lesser degree. If the compression annuls the expected effect in one apparatus, it might in another apparatus give place to an effect other than zero, perhaps with the contrary sign.
At the International Congress of Physics, held in Paris in 1900, Lord Kelvin gave an address in which he considered theories of the ether. He remarked that “the only cloud in the clear sky of the theory was the null result of the Michelson-Morley experiment.” Professor Morley and the writer were present, and in conversation Lord Kelvin expressed the conviction that the experiment should be repeated with a more sensitive apparatus. The writer, in collaboration with Professor Morley, constructed an interferometer about four times as sensitive as the one used in the first experiment, having a light-path of 214 feet, equal to about 130,000,000 wavelengths. In this instrument a relative velocity of the earth and ether equal to the earth’s orbital velocity would be indicated by a displacement of the interference fringes equal to 1.1 fringes. This is the size of the instrument which has been used ever since. The optical
CONFERENCE ON MICHELSON-MORLEY EXPERIMENT 353
parts were all new, and nothing was used from the original apparatus excepting the mercury tank and its wooden float.
Such an instrument with a base made of planks of pine wood was used at Cleveland, in 1902, 1903, and 1904, for the purpose of directly testing the Lorentz-FitzGerald effect, but the changes in the wooden frame due to the variations in humidity and temperature made it difficult to obtain accurate observations. A new supporting frame was designed by Professor F. H. Neff, of the department of civil engineering of the Case School of Applied Science, the purpose being to secure both symmetry and rigidity. This frame, or base, was made of structural steel and was so arranged that the optical dimensions could be made to depend upon distance-pieces of wood, or upon the steel frame itself. Observations were made with this apparatus in 1904. The procedure was based upon the effect to be expected from the combination of the diurnal and annual motions of the earth, together with the presumed motion of the solar system toward the constellation Hercules with a velocity of 19 km/sec. On the dates chosen for the observations there were two times of the day when the resultant of these motions would lie in the plane of the interferometer, about 11:30 a.m. and 9:00 p.m. The calculated azimuths of the motion would be different for these two times. The observations at these two times were, therefore, combined in such a way that the presumed azimuth for the morning observations coincided with that for the evening. The observations for the two times of day gave results having positive magnitudes but nearly opposite phases; when these were combined, the result was nearly zero. The result, therefore, was opposed to the theory then under consideration; but according to the ideas which will be set forth later in this address it now seems that the superposition of the two sets of observations of different phases was based upon an erroneous hypothesis and that the positive results then obtained are in accordance with a new hypothesis as to the solar motion. Our report of these experiments published in the Philosophical Magazine for May, 1905, concludes with the following statement: “Some have thought that this experiment only proves that the ether in a certain basement room is carried along with it. We desire therefore to place the apparatus on a hill to see if an effect can be there detected/’
As an important factor I may mention the state of mind in