Re: Let's start a new convention Teaching Magnetism

[Herbert H Gottlieb <herbgottlieb@JUNO.COM>]

On Tue, 08 Jul 2003 11:53:05 -0400 Ludwik Kowalski
<kowalskil@MAIL.MONTCLAIR.EDU> writes:
> Would the HEAD/TAIL pair be better? It does refer
> to an arrow pointing along the field direction.

This would be very confusing to
those in boats who may have the urge
to go to the head from time to time.








> On Tuesday, Jul 8, 2003, at 11:27 US/Eastern, 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.


Herb Gottlieb from New York City
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