Re: electric charge

[William Beaty <billb@ESKIMO.COM>]

On Fri, 21 Dec 2001, Joe Heafner wrote:

> Hi.
>
> Another hopefully simple question. Is electric charge a
> fundamental dimension or is it not? I've seen some texts
> treat it as a dimension and some that do not. Which is it?


I've encountered people who think that electric current is "real", and
that electric charge is just an abstract concept.   Very weird.  (The flow
rate of a substance is more real than the substance which flows?!!!)  I
strongly suspect that their strange attitude is caused by SI units.  These
same people insist that students must understand amperes, but they often
see no need to teach about electric charge.

We could clear things up by focussing on the word "fundamental."  Where
measurement standards are concerned, "fundamental" doesn't mean
"conceptually fundamental."  Just because electric current is easier for
an international standards organization to measure, that doesn't mean that
it is more "real" than the charge which flows within conductors.


I even wrote a bit about this on my misconceptions page in 1996:

  http://www.amasci.com/emotor/fund.txt



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