What is a magnetic field exactly?

[derek w]

thanks -questionposter- for your thought provoking reply.I will do as you say and look into quantum field theory.

[questionposter]

This is nonsense, word salad. You need to learn some physics.

 

DUDE, stop going around to random topics and saying that. After all this time you STILL do that...

[CaptainPanic]

!

Moderator Note

DrRocket, it would be most appreciated if you respect the standard rules of politeness.
If you don't have the patience to explain someone why their post is actually wordsalad in your view, using polite words, then it might be a nice idea not to post at all.

Also, it is obvious that many people need to "learn some physics". It is probably the primary reason why those people come to this forum. As long as they interact and learn, we welcome those people.

questionposter, please just report a post if you think it breaks the rules, instead of replying yourself...

[derek w]

I see that i can have 2 ways of thinking about this.

 

(1) A particle e.g. a photon can be thought of as a force carrying particle which has a property of duality,it can be a particle and a wave.

or:-

(2)The vacuum has the property of duality,the vacuum can be distorted,that distortion can be condensed so it appears as a point like particle,or that distortion can be spread out so it appears as a field/wave.That distortion being the creation(separation) and annihilation(togetherness) of matter/anti-matter.

Edited March 21, 2012 by derek w

[ydoaPs]

I'll let Feyman handle the OP:

 

Edited March 21, 2012 by ydoaPs

[questionposter]

I see that i can have 2 ways of thinking about this.

 

(1) A particle e.g. a photon can be thought of as a force carrying particle which has a property of duality,it can be a particle and a wave.

or:-

(2)The vacuum has the property of duality,the vacuum can be distorted,that distortion can be condensed so it appears as a point like particle,or that distortion can be spread out so it appears as a field/wave.That distortion being the creation(separation) and annihilation(togetherness) of matter/anti-matter.

 

Particles such as photons exist as waves, and forces are thought to be carried via gauge bosons, and particles exchange these gauge bosons which are thought to exist as virtual particles when traveling in between particles to be exchanged which can be physically described using imaginary numbers.

Edited March 22, 2012 by questionposter

[derek w]

The reason I have trouble with thinking in terms of particles,is that if particles are travelling through a nothingness,then there should be no limit to the speed at which they can travel.

Therefore I come back to thinking in terms of waves travelling through a medium,with a finite speed c.

And as you suggest I will look into quantum field theory,it seems sensible.

 

Does a gauge boson not have to be thought of as a wave function that transfers energy from one field of energy to another field of energy?

Where the term "field of energy" is another way of describing a particle.

Edited March 22, 2012 by derek w

[questionposter]

The reason I have trouble with thinking in terms of particles,is that if particles are travelling through a nothingness,then there should be no limit to the speed at which they can travel.

Therefore I come back to thinking in terms of waves travelling through a medium,with a finite speed c.

And as you suggest I will look into quantum field theory,it seems sensible.

 

Does a gauge boson not have to be thought of as a wave function that transfers energy from one field of energy to another field of energy?

Where the term "field of energy" is another way of describing a particle.

 

Loosely speaking, force carrier particles are thought to "snap back" to their parent particle, like a rubber band. It's hard to describe in terms other than mathematics.

[derek w]

So should I be thinking of the wave function of a particle as a wave that expands out from an epicentre to a limit then rebounds back to an energy spike at the epicentre,oscillating in and out?

[pantheory]

I think the mainstream answer goes something like this. Magnetism is supposedly one of the fundamental forces of nature accordingly like the Strong Force and Weak Force. In today's physics these forces are supposedly carried by particles. For magnetism these particles are thought to be virtual photons which by contact accordingly transfer their force. The Zero Point Field (ZPF) is thought to be the source of these virtual photons and their production accordingly results in a magnetic field which can effect susceptible materials such as iron, which is the strongest reacting natural element.

 

In classical mechanics Maxwell proposed his equations of magnetism based upon an aether model, a field of physical particulates which accordingly flowed in the ZPF causing the magnetic effect. The magnetic lines of force were not accordingly flow lines but instead lines of least resistance to an actual field flow which accordingly effected the physical orientations of electrons producing their related waves resulting in the vector forces supposedly causing magnetism. Over a long history there have been a number of mechanical field explanations for both magnetism and gravity stemming from the mechanical actions produced by the ZPF. Here is one such paper.

 

http://arxiv.org/html/physics/9908024

Edited March 24, 2012 by pantheory

[elas]

Dr Rocket you say "a field is not made of anything".I would disagree and say it is made of energy,in the same way that a wave of energy traverses the surface of water,by the rising and falling of the water against the force of gravity,water does not traverse the surface,only energy is transferred from one place to another.

In a magnetic field the energy is transferred by the creation and annihilation of matter/anti-matter virtual particles,the virtual particles would not move,but just act as a medium for the transfer of energy.

 

Hope this helps-

 

Extract from 'Concepts of Mass' by Max Jammer (year 2000)

 

"It is evident from many recent writings...that a serious misconception still persist, not only in the popular press but also in the minds of some scientists. The idea that matter and energy are interconvertible is due to a misunderstanding of Einstein's equation E = m[c squared]. This equation does not state that that a mass m can be coverted into an energy E, but that an object of mass m contains simultaneously an energy E".

 

A reference is made to - C R Eddy, "A Relative Miscoception", Science 104, 303-304 (1946)

Edited April 8, 2012 by elas

[derek w]

If I have 2 atoms atom(a) and atom(b) separated by a distance 300,000,000 metres.If atom(a) emits a photon which travels as a wave with a frequency of 10^14 to atom(b) and is absorbed.Then atom(a) decreases in mass and atom(b) increases in mass.

 

If a photon is a virtual particle and travels as a wave of matter and anti-matter popping in and out of existence,at a rate of 10^14 times per second in 10^14 points over a distance of 300,000,000 metres between atom(a) and atom(b).Then the mass appears in 10^14 different places.But once it is absorbed by atom(b) the mass appears 10^14 times per second in the same place atom(b).Therefore the mass of atom(b) increases.And the photon is both a photon and anti-photon at the same time.

Edited April 11, 2012 by derek w

[granpa]

the electric field is a vector field.

the magnetic field however is actually a tensor field which in 3 spatial dimensions reducing to a psuedovector.

[IM Egdall]

Hope this helps-

 

Extract from 'Concepts of Mass' by Max Jammer (year 2000)

 

"It is evident from many recent writings...that a serious misconception still persist, not only in the popular press but also in the minds of some scientists. The idea that matter and energy are interconvertible is due to a misunderstanding of Einstein's equation E = m[c squared]. This equation does not state that that a mass m can be coverted into an energy E, but that an object of mass m contains simultaneously an energy E".

 

 

So when an electron and positron interact, they can annihilate each other and give off energy in the form of photons. The mass of the electron and positron are converted to photons per E=mc2. Is this too simplistic? If we are to think of the electron and positron as having mass and energy simultaneusly, then the mass is destroyed in the interaction and the energy released.

 

Is this a correct interpretation of the physics?

Edited April 13, 2012 by IM Egdall

[swansont]

So when an electron and positron interact, they can annihilate each other and give off energy in the form of photons. The mass of the electron and positron are converted to photons per E=mc2. Is this too simplistic? If we are to think of the electron and positron as having mass and energy simultaneusly, then the mass is destroyed in the interaction and the energy released.

 

Is this a correct interpretation of the physics?

 

The energy that was in the form of mass is converted to the energy of the photons.

[juanrga]

According to what I've read about magnetic fields, all they're described as are imaginary lines around the magnet that depict the area where the magnet has effects upon. What exactly is a magnetic field? And how is the attraction caused?

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Merged post follows:

Consecutive posts merged

Okay, since no one's replying to this thinking this as something amateurish, let me rephrase it.

I need someone to explain how the attraction is caused by magnets. What is the 'field'?

We think of magnetic fields as imaginary lines of force (let's say I think of it that way). How is this force caused around the magnet?

 

There is not magnetic fields per se but electromagnetic fields.

 

An electromagnetic field is a physical system, which is macroscopically characterized by its properties such as energy, momentum... A electromagnetic field spread over space. From a microscopic point of view an electromagnetic field is an infinite collection of quantum harmonic oscillators.

[rktpro]

Learning through analogy would be interesting. Here is one example.

Suppose you have a big ball in your hand and a friend of yours stand 1m apart from you. You can certainly hit him. Now he moves to 10m. Now too, you can hit him but the impact wouldn't be that strong. Now he stands at 100m. Now you can't hit him. He is out of your reach. The reach you have is your field. It is not made up of something. It is an idea and used in mathematical form in science.

[IM Egdall]

The energy that was in the form of mass is converted to the energy of the photons.

 

You statement is how I always understood it.

 

Maybe this is quibbling with the words, but "energy in the form of mass" does not sound exactly like "an object of mass m contains simultaneously an energy E".

[derek w]

Yes and under the right conditions the energy of the photons can be converted back into an electron and positron.

 

The point I was trying to get at, is MASS a measure of how much energy is trapped in one place?For a period of time.

Edited April 18, 2012 by derek w

[questionposter]

The point I was trying to get at, is MASS a measure of how much energy is trapped in one place?For a period of time.

 

It can be, because mass and energy are the same thing. I can mathematically convert a rock to energy to see how much energy is trapped in it.

Edited April 19, 2012 by questionposter

[joigus]

 

On 3/15/2012 at 6:19 PM, derek w said:

You say i can't think of energy as a substance.I do not agree with you 100%

Well, it would depend on what you mean by 'substance,' but considering what most people mean when they say that word, I agree 100 % with Swansont. Energy is not a substance for many different reasons. AAMOF, the concept of 'substance' in physics is long gone. Particles appear and disappear. Energy is not conserved in cosmology. On the other hand, energy conservation is limited by Heisenberg's uncertainty principle. Besides, energy is only conserved when there is time translation (Noether's theorem.) As most cosmological models are time-dependent (galaxy-co-moving universal time,) energy is not conserved in cosmology. And to wrap it up, vacuum energy, calculated with QFT, gives a value 10¹²⁰ times larger than it should from cosmological observation (problem of the dark energy.) What kind of a substance is that? I'd say that, at the very least, considering it a substance is very iffy.

 

On 3/16/2012 at 11:03 AM, derek w said:

I was thinking of matter/anti-matter as being distortions of space not pressure.

Think otherwise. Matter-antimatter has to do with gauge charge. Electric charge (and all other gauge charges too) has nothing to do with distortions of space. Gravitation does. Electric charge requires an 'internal space' or additional direction to space with very different translation rules (gauge connection,) not related to a metric. It is in that spirit that Einstein took Kaluza-Klein theory as a way to attempt to formulate a unified field theory. Both Einstein and Schrödinger tried to work out a geometric theory of the electromagnetic field. At about the time that Yang and Mills formulated a generalization of the electromagnetic field that could work for elementary particles, people started to give up on the attempt to formulate gauge fields as space-time distorsions.

 

On 3/16/2012 at 11:03 AM, derek w said:

zero energy = zero force

That's not correct. The numeric value of energy means nothing outside of the particular parametrization you're using to solve your problem, except in gravity, where it must be zero when summing up geometric and material terms, vacuum energy, if it means anything at all. It's spatial gradients or spatial variations of energy which imply force in general, not value of energy. In classical gravity it also makes sense to define an 'absolute' value of energy, as your potential must go to zero at infinity.

Sorry, this went quite a way off topic.

Edited May 17, 2020 by joigus
Apologies

[joigus]

4 hours ago, joigus said:

energy conservation is limited by Heisenberg's uncertainty principle.

Just to correct myself, at the risk of going further off-topic, energy determination is limited by Heisenberg's uncertainty principle.

[martillo]

The problem is how to define a Field of a Force over an elementary Particle in a formal way. I think I have a right definition.

For a general concept valid for Electric and Magnetic Fields it would be:

"The Field is the mathematical abstraction that represent the Force that would eventually act over an elementary Particle of unity charge (q=1) and unity velocity (v=1) if it would exist in a specific position of the space."

 

To complete the concept I consider the elementary Particles as sources of the Forces. So, elementary Particles exist in the space and each one being a source of Forces that act over the other Particles.

I think the concept of Forces is strongly related to the concept of Particles. I don't understand how Forces could exist between Waves. Waves present interference between themselves but Forces? I don't know how that could be...

 

 

Edited August 1, 2020 by martillo

[martillo]

Brilliant definition.

Right conclusion.

Not any like.

Just silence.

I don't care.

I'm costumed.

In my daily life is the same.

It has been the same all time.

 

 

[swansont]

1 hour ago, Atommix said:

invisibility is empty  space like a vacuum held between two vectors or a wave between two electrons it has nothing conserved and shut tight locked in by its vacuum.  A true nothing is a magnetic field. 

Counterpoint: no