Re: EM Radiation Without a Source

[Leigh Palmer <palmer@SFU.CA>]

At 7:15 AM -0800 11/30/00, Ed Schweber wrote:
> Hi all:
>
>    I was having a discussion with a friend of mine who is an industrial
> physicist and neither of us were current enough on our theory to answer the
> following:
>
>     Do Maxwell's equations preclude the existence of electromagnetic
> radiation that at some time in the past has not originated from an
> accelerating charge (besides any vacuum fluctuations)? Could EM have been
> created at the big bang without having first been "radiated" from a source.
> Our guess was that this should have been possible.
>
>    Thanks's for any input.
>
> Ed Schweber
> Solomon Schechter Day School
> West Orange, NJ
> http://www.physicsweb.com

Ed, this note has been on my "to do" list for a few days now. That is
because I consider it to be among the best questions which have appeared
here. My principal problem is in deciding what sort of a question it is.
On the face of it, it appears to be a physical question, but there are
metaphysical, epistemological, and even theological aspects to it.

Lets deal with the metaphysical part first. Maxwell's equations of
electrodynamics constitute a scientific theory. A scientific theory is
merely a description of natural phenomena; it does not have the status
of Truth [sic] and it often has very explicit limitations. In this case
Maxwell's electrodynamics is a theory with a limited realm of validity.
It is a classical theory which cannot be expected to describe natural
phenomena in the limit of the atomically small. (That lesson is
exemplified in the well known ultraviolet catastrophe number two.)

Thus metaphysics allows us to answer the first question. Since Maxwell's
electrodynamics is incapable of describing atomic scale processes
correctly, and particularly it cannot describe the process by which
electromagnetic radiation is produced in atomic processes, it cannot
preclude the existence of electromagnetic radiation that at some time in
the past has not originated from an accelerating charge.

I had planned to say more about this, but my failure to discover the
name of the counterpart of eschatology that pertains to origins stymied
me. I rest assured than no one is terribly disappointed.

Leigh

P.S. I just received a phone call from my son, the philosopher. He
informs me that the branch of theology that deals with origins is called
"theogony". I won't dwell on this topic, however.