Re: electricity

[brian whatcott <inet@INTELLISYS.NET>]

You wrote, "Albert Einstein ... said "energy cannot be
created or destroyed"...  I don't think Einstein said this at all.

 You are probably aware of the equation which he made famous.
This describes the convertibility of mass and energy.
 The amount of energy represented by a few pounds of fissile matter
was so extreme that a deputation was sent to a war time President
to secure his support for the research and production of a new
powerful bomb which could convert some portion of a material into
an explosive energy release.

So the question is not whether Einstein's view was trustworthy,
but rather is YOUR view trustworthy?

I want to get a feel for your position on this topic.
 You have a meaning that you associate with the term 'electricity':
of a form of energy that is vital to our interests, that serves
our purposes, upon which we certainly depend. Like money, perhaps?

You can see that it can be quite difficult to narrow the topic
of interest. Here's one approach (Oxford Dictionary of Science)

Electricity: "Any effect resulting from the existance of stationary
or moving electric charges."

This has a problem it's true. It's like your saying, "I used 'useful'
to describe energy's usefulness."
The definition is somewhat circular. It describes a thing to be clarified
in its own terms, like "Red is the color that is full of redness."

So it is helpful to step back from talking about words, to talking about
observations. Observations are the sausage meat that goes into the
science mincer and a theory backed by observation is what comes out.

It may look like people just dream up new ideas out of the blue.
But they don't. They dream up theories that connect observations,
that make sense in some way.

 You might try this approach:

electricity is the term used in connection
with observations of the following kinds:

A comb run through the hair can pick up paper chips.
A magnet moved close to a coil of wire makes a meter jump.
Combs or  coils of wire can make a fat spark jump through the air.
 A copper wire and a zinc scrap dipped in a weak acid solution of water
can make a compass turn that's placed near a connecting wire.

Brian


At 19:26 8/9/01 -0400, Justin Meredith wrote:
> for one, it was Albert Einstein who said "energy cannot be created or
> destroyed". i assume he is a trustworthy person on this subject.
>
> second, i think we can all agree that "useful" does not mean "harness". i
> used "useful" to describe energy's usefulness, or our dependence on it.
>
> there is A LOT about life and physics in general that we don't know. i don't
> see why it is bizarre to spit out theories and ideas about unproven
> subjects, does that upset you? jeeez. i'm sorry.
>
> Justin
>
>
>       At 02:23 PM 8/9/01 -0400, Meredith, Justin wrote:
>       >well i use the word "harness" because energy is not
>       >created. nothing can
>       >live or exist without energy, so i guess that is how i
>       >would define "useful".
brian whatcott <inet@intellisys.net>  Altus OK
                Eureka!