Why do people say light, radio, microwave, Infrared and gamma waves so on are electromagnetic waves?
What are electromagnetic waves? And why is light or radio so on electromagnetic? Why do light waves or radio waves have no mass and cannot be measured?
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Answer: Electro magnetic waves are waves in the electro/magnetic field, much like water waves are waves in water.
Electromagnetic waves can vibrate fast or slow, like some big water waves use a long time rolling in on a beach while smaller waves hits more often.
We have given different frequencies in the e/m field different names, because different frequencies interact with stuff in different ways. Radio waves are long waves, but the can easily move through walls. Visible light is shorter waves, but cannot move through most walls, except things like glass.
A radio transmitter is basically just a lamp, but it emmits long waves that our eyes cannot see, but a radio can.
Some animals see more electromagnetic waves with their eyes than humans, and if they could speak they would talk about colors that we cannot even imagine.
Measuring e/m waves is pretty easy, since an e/m field will try to move any magnetic or an electric particle caught in the field. Thats how our eyes see, or a radio plays music.
Many forces in the universe have no mass. They are not physical in that sense. They are waves of fields that move through the universe. An E/m wave can sometimes look like it is one small object, because there is a lower, minimum amount of energy a wave can have, this wave cannot be split in two. We call this minimum packet of e/m a photon.
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