OFFTOPIC: physics question

[\0xDynamite]

>>>> Sorry for this little diversion,
>>>> If light travels at a. different speed for different colors in order
>>>> to account for the rainbow of a prism, how fast is the. speed of light
>>>> then?
>>>
>>> The speed of light is a physical constant.  The frequency (or
>>> wavelength) of a photon determines its energy and therefore, to the
>>> human eye, its color.
>>
>> If light's speed is a physical constant, then light wouldn't separate
>> into colors within a prism.
>
> Because light's speed is a physical constant, light separates into
> colors when passing through a prism.
>
> The higher the frequency of a photon, the higher its energy.  Since more
> energetic photons can not speed up, and less energetic photons can not
> slow down, they behave AS IF they had more or less 'mass.'

That's a fascinating view that I haven't heard proposed before.
You're proposing that they DO NOT change speed, as commonly explained.
The separated light would presumably lose mass, because it is now only
*part* of the original.

> Higher and lower energy photons deflect slightly more or less when
> forced to change direction in a refractive medium, in a way analogous to
> heavier and lighter moving objects acted on by, for instance, the wind...

That's a more parsimonious explanation -- that they have more or less
energy, not speed.  But I think, in fact, that this is where there is
a tradeoff in the energy vs. information/data equation of the
universe.  Information (or data) is the opposite side of energy.
Color is data, more than illumination (at least in a rainbow, where it
is questionable whether it would illuminate anything).

I think you answered part of my question, which was partly didactic to
force science to get more rigor in its explanation.  I think I will
have to content myself with this because I know that rainbows and the
sky being blue will NEVER be explainable by science.

Mark