rationalskepticism.org

LjSpike wrote:

Cito di Pense wrote:

LjSpike wrote:
Thats interesting to know then, that amplitude in electromagnetic waves isn't a literal height.

There's no material medium that is being displaced. That's why the 'luminiferous ether' view of electromagnetic wave transmission went away.

Mhm. I simply was inquiring as to if it was a physical dimension amplitude as I'm just naively constructed an undoubtedly heavily flawed explanation of the photoelectric effect using wave theory. The only point I'm truly fully stuck on is amplitude effecting electrons emitted per second, which in and of itself seems to go against the fact that photoelectrons are emitted with no delay...

What's the intensity of the radiation? Some measure of the flux of energy normalized on a unit area. More photons per second per unit area, more photoelectrons. If something is varying in time or space (like your photoelectric example -- something resulting in more -- or fewer -- electrons emitted per second) then you can refer to the amplitude of the variation, and refer it to some base. Measurement units like MKS or CGS can be referred to as 'dimensions' of a problem, but only the distance units (meters or centimeters) reference an explicitly 'spatial' dimension.

You could vary the 'amplitude' of the incoming radiation by orienting the incoming beam obliquely. This affects the flux, too.