7. SOME ATTEMPTS TO MEASURE THE EARTH'S MOTION RELATIVELY TO AN ETHER BY MEANS OF THE NEW INTERFEROMETER
If the ether is quiescent and fills up the entire cosmos, it is quite logical to put the following question: "What is the speed of earth's motion through the cosmos, that is, through this ether?" This question is not simple at all. The earth moves round the sun at a speed of 30 km/s. However, the sun moves and with itself pulls the earth around the center of the Galaxy, along an almost circular orbit, at a speed of 220 - 230 km/s. Our Galaxy, together with the local group of Galaxies, moves in the direction of another group of Galaxies in constellation of Virgo at a speed of 410 km/s etc.
The residual background radiation, that is the relict radiation which originated at the time of cosmic expansion (the big bang), discovered by Wilson in 1965, makes possible some special readings, which appear to be general for all parts of the cosmos, like some kind of an ether. For an unmoving observer, in relation to that reading system, the distribution of the relic radiation temperature is isotropic in all directions, only in the system connected to dispersed galaxies. The relict radiation corresponds to a temperature of 2.7 K of the absolute black body, which corresponds to the radiation wavelength of about 1.073 mm. When the observer is in motion, the Doppler effect causes the temperature of the residual background radiation to increase in the direction of the observer's motion, and to decrease it in opposite direction. Because of these characteristics, the absolute coordinate system can be connected to the relict radiation, as was the aim with the ether. The speed of motion of the sun in relation to this radiation is about 410 km/s.
For the above presented, we have anticipated a shift of an interference fringes which would correspond to the speed of the earth's motion through the ether greater than 400 km/s, and not 30 km/s.
The attempt to measure the speed of the earth's motion through the ether by means of new interferometer, was made for the first time at the end of January 1994, for the second time in the second half of May 1994, and for third time in the second half of March 1995.
The scheme of the measurement is presented in Fig. 7.1, where:
is a helium - neon laser with a collimator, 
is a beam splitter
- a glass plate placed at a 45° angle in relation to the incoming
laser radiation, 
is a semi-transparent mirror with an attenuator
of the radiation, 
and 
are mirrors, 
is a screen for observation the interference fringes and 
is
an optical table.
The whole system was set up and fastened to a platform, optical bench, which was placed and fastened on the optical table, so that it could rotate through 360°.
The beam splitter reflected about 30% and allowed about 70% of the laser radiation to pass through. This relation is convenient for the sake of the decrease of the disturbance produced by the part of the laser beam which is reflected from the beam splitter to the interior of the interferometer.
Mirror
was a glass plate whose front surface partially
reflected the laser radiation towards , and the back side absorbed
radiation transmitted through the glass plate. In such a way a part of
the laser beam in the interferometer is attenuated.
