The Properties and the Nature of Light: The Study of Newton’s Work and the Teaching of Optics

Abstract

The history of science shows that for each scientific issue there may be more than one models that are simultaneously accepted by the scientific community. One such case concerns the wave and corpuscular models of light. Newton claimed that he had proved some properties of light based on a set of minimal assumptions, without any commitments to any one of the two models. This set of assumptions constitutes the geometrical model of light as a set of rays propagating in space. We discuss this model and the historical reasons for which it had the head-primacy amongst the relevant models. We argue that this model is indispensable in structuring the curriculum in Optics and attempt to validate it epistemologically. Finally, we discuss an approach for alleviating the implicit assumptions that students make on the nature of light and the subsequent interference of geometrical optics in teaching the properties of light related to its wave-like nature.

A Teaching-Learning Sequence of Colour Informed by History and Philosophy of Science

“…We agree with Raftopoulos et al (2005) in considering that Newton's approach in Opticks (Newton, 1704), which does not explicitly commit to a wave or a corpuscular nature of light, does not introduce unnecessary obstacles for a teaching and learning didactic sequence on optics framed for elementary pre-service teachers. Thus, it becomes more suitable for teaching and learning informed by constructivism, that is, the simpler approach to the phenomena first and only then the necessary details.…”

“…its speed, wavelength, pressure and discrete nature, are all far removed from the range of perception of the human senses, the range of an individual's experience.^This premise led us to focus on geometrical optics for it is independent of the nature of light. As Raftopoulos et al (2005) said, Bthe constructivist conception of learning allows students to start from simpler models of reality, which are elicited from the students themselves, and gradually approach the full complexity of the domain under study^(p. 668). P2: BOptical phenomena are commonly observed in media (air, water) which often greatly modify the behaviour of light from that in vacuum.^P4: BLanguage brings problems of a psychological nature^and P5: BHumans spontaneously explain phenomena in terms of cause and effectT hese three premises were identified as factors that keep optical conceptions essentially in the Aristotelian realm.…”

“…But educators must keep in mind, if they are to teach colours in the framework of geometric optic, which is and ought to be the first approach to the teaching of optics (Raftopoulos, Kalyfommatou, & Constantinou, 2005), that this claim cannot be proven by experiment.…”

“…The major difference between TLS2 and TLS1 (Table 2) is that we do not refer to the undulatory nature of light and work on a strictly geometric optical approach (Galili & Hazan, 2000;Raftopoulos et al, 2005).…”

Models of the Universe: Children’s Experiences and Evidence from the History of Science

“…heat and temperature (Wiser & Carey 1983), historical development of arithmetical thinking (Damerow 1996), other has compared ontological findings of the locally studied historical fields with evidence from the reviewed literature concerning students' conceptions, e.g. nature of light (Raftopoulos et al 2005), mechanism of vision (Dedes 2005). In most of this body of research the main focus is on the analysis of the historical evidence.…”