Talk:Objects of His Dark Materials

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The article says "Lyra believes that the free floating needle's movements, caused by interaction with dust particles, are similar to the interaction of a Crookes radiometer and photons."

Is it literally the case that Lyra was said to believe that in the books?

I've only seen the movie, not read the books, and I don't recall the movie saying any such thing, but naturally I'm willing to believe the books said so, if someone claims they do.

The main reason I bring it up is that her belief would be an incorrect one; Crookes radiometers do *not* rotate due to interaction with photons, although that was indeed a (very) early theory, still repeated today (as explained in the wikipedia article on that subject).

So my point is, if the author of the phrase in question in the article is *not* quoting the books, but only stating their own misunderstanding of the Crookes radiometer, then that phrase needs to be changed. If, on the other hand, the books *do* state that as Lyra's belief, then no problem, it's true that she believes that, and that phrase in the article is fine.

Although even then, an adjustment of phrasing to make that clear would be helpful, perhaps simply "....similar to [her understanding of] the interaction of a Crookes radiometer and photons"

Dougmerritt (talk) 04:23, 13 June 2008 (UTC)