Re: The conceptual change process

[David Bowman <dbowman@tiger.gtc.georgetown.ky.us>]

Bill Beaty, thinking he might disagree with me about analogys between
springs and capacitors, wrote:

> Actually, I might disagree, depending on how the term "charge" is used. 
>
> Do we agree that the energy of a compressed steel spring is stored in
> chemical (metallic) bonds of the material?  But metallic bonds are
> e-fields and patterns of charge.  In my mind, capacitors and springs are
> very similar because, at the microscopic level, compressing a spring
> stores energy in stretched e-fields.  (Classical view obviously, since QM
> applies to metallic bonds but not so much to "charged" capacitors.")
> ...

I'm not opposed to your analogy.  It is clearly a different analogy than
one that I had pointed out in my previous post.   I merely pointed out
the *usual* analogy as a point of information.  I'm aware that other
analogies can be drawn and sometimes are.  This goes for Brian's comments
below.

> Instead I thought I would settle for belaboring David Bowman 
> (a rare pleasure indeed!) for so confidently associating particular 
> mechanical model features with electronic ones - a grave mistake, in
> my humble view. If charging capacitors can rouse a few engineers or
> physicists from their placid demeanor, the idea of a 1 to 1 mapping on
> some mechanical vs electrical model can rouse a vocal subset of people
> from the dead: the usual conclusion - after internecine war has been 
> concluded - is that there are several coherent mechanical mappings 
> onto an electrical model - and leave it at that!

Again, I didn't mean to imply that only one functional analogy could or must
be drawn.  I only described the *usual* one.

David Bowman
dbowman@gtc.georgetown.ky.us