I love QED! That was recommended to me by the professor who caused me to change majors from EE to physics. I just looked for it on my bookshelves but I must have misplaced it somewhere in the intervening two decades.

I understand what you're saying, and don't disagree that the quantum electrodynamics treatment is a theoretical model that can describe optical phenomena, but I guess I'm a little nonplussed when you compare tidal theory to optical theory.

Newton's theory of tides was incorrect; it does not accurately predict tidal phenomena[0]. Using classical EM field theory with refractive indices and ratios of c is not incorrect; it gives accurate predictions of optical phenomena at the macroscopic scale. It's certainly incomplete, but not inaccurate.

I think the disconnect might be that when studying physics, it gets drilled into you over and over that no model is right or wrong, just applicable or inapplicable to a given situation. For example, here's a passage in Griffiths' Introduction to Electrodynamics:

"In fact, when you stop to think about it, the electric field inside matter must be fantastically complicated, on the microscopic level. If you happen to be very near an electron, the field is gigantic, whereas a short distance away it may be small or point in a totally different direction. Moreover, an instant later, as the atoms move about, the field will have altered entirely. This true microscopic field would be utterly impossible to calculate, nor would it be of much interest if you could. Just as, for macroscopic purposes, we regard water as a continuous field, ignoring its molecular structure, so also we can ignore the microscopic bumps and wrinkles in the electric field inside matter, and concentrate on the macroscopic field. This is defined as the average field over regions large enough to contain many thousands of atoms (so that the uninteresting microscopic fluctuations are smoothed over), and yet small enough to ensure that we do not wash out any significant large-scale variations in the field. Ordinarily, the macroscopic field is what people mean when they speak of "the" field inside matter. (In case the introduction of the macroscopic field sounds suspicious to you, let me point out that you do exactly the same averaging whenever you speak of "the" field inside matter.)"

So I guess I'm saying that the physical intuition and mental models used to work with classical EM field theory are different fom those used to work with quantum theories is just part of what it means to be a physicist.

Anyway, I'm glad you're so excited about physics! If you liked QED, you might be interested in Schroedinger's "What is Life?", where he takes his experience from quantum physics to speculate on how the information-theoretical requirements of genetic inheritance in reproduction implies the existence of some sort of "aperiodic crystal" that encodes genetic information, decades before Crick & Watson discovered DNA. It's written for the layman, although it's not as readable as Feynman (although he's in a class of his own when it comes to scientific explanations).

Also, thanks for your original comment, because it gave me an opportunity to pull out some of my old textbooks and leaf through them for a while.

[0] My mental model of tidal phenomena corresponded to Newton's theory, so I found it fascinating how incomplete and inaccurate it is, prompting a long diversion down a Wikipedia rabbit-hole, to the point that I'm now considering giving a short lecture on tides at my birthday party in a couple weeks.