Re: Let's start a new convention Teaching Magnetism

[Bernard Cleyet <anngeorg@PACBELL.NET>]

I'm a bit lost here -- how does this conflict or confuse G's law?  This
is because I don't follow the "fact" that field goes into and leaves
from a pole.  I thought the idea of pole was it was a place where field
enamated from or disappeared into, not both.

I like the in / out idea, as it describes the direction of the field WRT
the object "creating" them.  Of course one uses the convention that the
direction is the direction an isolated N (out) pole would move.


bc



John Mallinckrodt wrote:

> > I propose (seriously - for once) that we retain the pole concept (for
> > historical, pedagogical reasons) but refer to the poles as the 'In'
> > pole and the 'Out' pole. Then the direction of the field is just the
> > direction of whatever it is that is pointing in or out.
> >
> > ...
> >
> > Anybody see any problems with this convention? It seems much more
> > useful that choosing OTHER opposite words suggested like up/down,
> > light/dark etc.
>
> I have some sympathy for the idea, but I'd point out that just as
> many field lines (or, more properly, lines of magnetic induction) go
> "into a magnetic pole" as come out of it.  You might end up trading a
> more robust connection of pole ID to field direction for some
> significant cognitive dissonance when it comes time to talk about
> Gauss' Law.
>
> John
> --
>    A. John Mallinckrodt        http://www.csupomona.edu/~ajm
>    Professor of Physics      mailto:ajm@csupomona.edu
>    Physics Department         voice:909-869-4054
>    Cal Poly Pompano              fax:909-869-5090
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