• The earth is flat.
  
  
• The sun moves around Earth.

• The speed of light is constant relative to all observers. Increasing an observer's velocity toward a light source does not increase the speed of the light (i.e. photons) relative to the observer.
  
  
• Light is not propagated through a medium.
  
  
• A moving clock runs slower than when it is at rest relative to the observer.

     Indeed, experimental evidence has led many to believe that the last three statements are true. This web site shows that the beliefs are probably a "harmony of illusions" (a descriptive term from Ludwick Fleck's Genesis and Development of a Scientific Fact). Each illusion reinforces the others. The illusion that the speed of light is constant relative to all observers became a postulate of special relativity theory which seemed to explain certain perplexing phenomena including the observed increase in mass of particles moving at high speeds in particle accelerators. The theory is in harmony with the results of Michelson and Morley which appeared to show that light is not propagated through a medium. And the theory correctly predicts that clocks moving relative to an observer should be observed to run slower than clocks at rest relative to the observer. The theory's consistency with experimental evidence led to the widespread, popular, but false belief that special relativity theory has been proven. In the past the Ptolemaic theory of heavenly bodies moving around earth was also well established because it was consistent with the observations and evidence of that era. The Quantum Medium View shows why the last three beliefs above are probably as false as the first two beliefs held by our ancestors.

     False beliefs are often created, or believed, or taught by bright people which makes others inclined to believe them. The history of medicine provides examples of theories and treatments that were practiced by skilled physicians even though the treatments were later shown to be harmful -- radium, mercury, and blood letting cures for example. Doesn't history show how easy it is to believe false ideas about things we understand poorly? And isn't Montaigne correct in saying, "Nothing is so firmly believed as that which we least know." Via science we may know much, but we do not know what photons are or how they move through the cosmos, and we do not understand many other fundamental aspects of nature. This web site pertains to light, space, time, mass, inertia, gravity, and the degree to which science understands these aspects of nature.