Wednesday, 15 April 2020

How do I understand Electromagnetism


Earlier today I asked about the differences and connections between electric fields and magnetic fields explained to me intuitively, and I was given the answer "It's complicated and you need to study on your own", with a link to a wikipedia page on tensors (I hardly understood any of it) and a video of Richard Feynman being a condescending jackass. This is not enough of a response for me.


I want to clear up, first of all, that when I ask for an intuitive explanation, I do not mean "explain it with a clever analogy", which is always what physicists assume I mean. An example of an intuitive explanation of an electric field is the following:



"Some particles have an electric charge, either + or -. When there are 2 particles with the same charge, they repel each other. Opposite charges attract. However, since there are lots of charged particles in the world, any one charge is effected by multiple other charges at once. Because of this, we use a model called an electric field, which describes the net force a charge will experience at any point in space due to the electric charges of particles in its surroundings. We can also describe a single particle or group of particles as having an electric field. This electric field is the effect that the particle or group of particles has on other charges in its surroundings."


See? No rubber band analogies, but also no equations with variables and symbols you don't learn about in an intro to physics course. And whenever a vocab word is introduced (like electric field), it is defined, instead of me providing a link to a wikipedia article that uses such cryptic lingo that I would need a bachelor's degree in physics in order to follow in the first place.


Yes, I am bitter.


And I understand that there are questions that can't be easily answered like this. I understand I may need to due research on my own. But where the hell do I start? I've been linked to Wikipedia a couple of times, and that just made things more confusing. And I don't have any intentions of shelling out the money to get a second degree just so I can get an answer.


What do I do? Where do I go to understand it? Are there any sites for this? Any books?




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