This is an experiment that I am doing for a grade. I understand how light bends in general, but is there a through explanation?
technically light doesn t bend ,from the light bending experiment we see that the light is bending;but it isn t .because of total internal reflection the light ray is trapped inside the water stream the light is actually reflecting at the surface of water stream
You've taken a little shortcut in the wording that seems to be the root of the argument. When you turn on your flashlight or headlight, the light will be seen to be leaving at c. I assume you have an Acme Lightspeed Measuring Device, bought from the company Wile E. Coyote uses for his contraptions in the Roadrunner cartoons. The outside observer will use his Acme contraption to measure the speed of the light beam, and it'll also measure c. You don't get to use the Galilean boosts intuited in your multistage rocket analogy. Keep in mind that speed is a matter of displacement in space over time. Neither distance nor time is fixed for both observers. Simultaneity died with the special theory of relativity. Lorentzian boosts keep things sane, if not completely intuitive.
The light doesnt bend. The only things that bend light are gravity or refraction gradients. The light is (partly) confined to the stream of water by total internal reflection, just like in an optical fiber
