Silver and white surface both reflect all wavelengh of visible light. But why silver look silver and white look white?
2007-12-15 01:28:50 · 4 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
Is that because of smooth or rough surface? If so, why there are something smooth but white?
2007-12-15 01:30:01 · update #1
You are right about the smooth surface versus the rough surface.
A white surface is bumpy and rough at a microscopic level. This causes light that hits it to scatter in all directions. Because the light is scattered like that you can only see the sum total of the light, which is white.
A silvery surface is smoother at a miscroscopic level, and that allows light to reflect off of it directly. Since all the light bounces off in the same direction you are able to see your image in a mirror. The light is not scrambled so the image stays the same after it bounces off the mirror.
2007-12-15 01:57:04 · answer #1 · answered by Peet 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Peet is almost right. A porcelain plate is smooth but white.
It is not just a matter of being smooth, but also of being homogenous or not on the scale of the wavelength of light. The china plate has small crystallites of different refractive index pointing in different directions, and light is scattered whenever it hits a boundary between two surfaces of different refractive index (think of how powdered salt looks white although large salt crystals are quite clear. Also think of milk).
The technical terms are "specular (i.e. mirror-like) reflection" and "diffuse reflection".
2007-12-15 11:11:48 · answer #2 · answered by Facts Matter 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Normally in white light there are 7 colours VIBGYOR and the light in the VIBGYOR which is reflected is seen by us as the colour of the object and as the white surface reflects all the colour's rays (i.e. VIBGYOR) combined therefore it forms white light which is reflected so as it reflects white light its colour is seen as white. I think so that in the silver surface very very negligible light is absorbed and because of that not the white light but because of the absorbtion some type of silver light mus be reflected because of which we see it as a silver surface.
2007-12-15 09:44:45 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Because of the component of the material.
2007-12-15 09:38:54 · answer #4 · answered by Santiago 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋