THE 

 LONDON, EDINBURGH and DUBLIN 



PHILOSOPHICAL MAGAZINE 



AND 



JOURNAL OF SCIENCE. 



[SIXTH SERIES^ 



MARCH19U. > q 



XLIV. Interference Experiments in a Highly Rarefied Gas. 

 By F. P. Kerschbaum, Ph.D. [Leipzig), B.A. {Cains 

 College, Cambridge)*. 



[Plate VI.] 



Introduction. 



HHHE assumption of a discontinuity of some kind in the 

 A processes of the elementary radiation seems to be 

 inevitable. This Planck f has shown in his successful attempt 

 to explain temperature radiation. Quite generally such an 

 assumption follows from the fact that very probably Hamil- 

 ton's equations, according to which physical processes can 

 be represented by differential equations, i. e. continuously, 

 do not hold in certain cases. The doubt about the general 

 validity of Hamilton's equations is justified by the fact that 

 a consequence of these equations, the law of equipartition of 

 energy, is not in accordance with experimental results J. 

 Moreover, Jeans § was able to show that Hamilton's equations, 

 combined with the theory of probability, lead to Rayleigh's 

 radiation formula, which is contradicted by experiments. 

 The introduction of discontinuous radiation processes is, in 

 fact, accomplished both in the radiation hypothesis of Planck 



* Communicated by Prof. Sir J. J. Thomson, O.M., F.R.S. 



t M. Planck, Ami. d. Phys. iv. p. 553 (1901), and Theorie tier 

 Warmest rah lung. Leipzig 1 , 1912. 



X Comp. the recent work of Nernst and his pupils on atomic heat. 

 e. g. Z.f. EM. Chem. xvii. p. 272 (1911). 



§ Jeans, Phil. Mag. xviii. p. 209 (1909). 



Phil. Mag. S. 6. Vol. 21. No. 159. March 1914. 2 E 





