I’ll give you an example that will help. Most of us are pretty familiar with the stovetops that have those metal coils on them, and many of you may have some right now. If you set the stovetop’s setting to "high" those coils tend to glow red. That means that there's enough energy being emitted that the glow from the coils has a short enough wavelength for us to see it enter into the visible light spectrum, and thus it looks red.
If you set it to medium or low, the coils look black, no “light” whatsoever, but we know it’s still hot, right? All it means is that the energy of the light being emitted is of a longer wavelength than what we can see. It is still glowing, just the light is in the infrared range.
Well, that applies to all of us. We all glow at various levels based on our heat signatures, and there are many creatures, most of them cold-blooded like snakes, fish, and frogs, that can see into the infrared spectrum.
However, there have been some unusual cases where it’s possible for humans to see flashes of light due to infrared stimulation. These are situations that are usually involving a beam of coherent infrared light shot through a laser, and a single point on the retina registers the energy of two incoming photos as one and sees it as a green flash of light, but these are not real-world applications.
I noted above that it’s cold-blooded animals that have typically evolved with the ability to see infrared, and not warm-blooded ones. That makes quite a bit of sense, because you’d think that with warm-blooded animals, the animal’s body gives off heat and would interfere with the animal’s vision.
So, even though there isn’t any inherent examples of humans seeing in the infrared spectrum, it’s not impossible to imagine such a capability. And hopefully, this gives a little insight into what the whole thermal imaging concept really means.
More science to come in Heirs of Prophecy, that much I do promise.
About the Author
I am an Army brat, a polyglot, and the first person in my family born in the United States. This heavily influenced my youth by instilling in me a love of reading and a burning curiosity about the world and all of the things within it. As an adult, my love of travel and adventure has driven me to explore many exotic locations, and these places sometimes creep into the stories I write.
I hope you’ve found this story entertaining.
- Mike Rothman
You can find my blog at: www.michaelarothman.com
Facebook at: www.facebook.com/MichaelARothman
And on Twitter: @MichaelARothman
Agent of Prophecy Page 25
