Analysis of the AEMS, the Average Electromagnetic Theory Student.

Email exchanges with members of NPL (Natural Philosophy Alliance) have been instructive. I will attempt to analyse the average man who has been somewhat educated in classical electromagnetic theory (“the average EM student”. or AEMS). For a start, he must dismiss Oliver Heaviside’s “Theory H”, that in a transmission line , the field between the lines causes the electric current rather than the current the field;

“Now, in Maxwell’s theory there is the potential energy .... .... They are supposed to be set up by the current in the wire [Theory N] .... .... We reverse this; the current in the wire is set up by the [Poynting Vector] energy transmitted through the medium around it [Theory H] .” An AEMS will of course be very unclear about the Poynting Vector, and happier with the idea of electrons travelling down inside wires.

Theory H. http://www.ivorcatt.co.uk/x41h1.pdf . Slow download

http://www.ivorcatt.co.uk/x41h.pdf . Very slow download.

AEMS will be vague about the ExH Poynting Vector http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poynting_vector ; “In physics, the Poynting vector represents the directional energy flux density (the rate of energy transfer per unit area, in watts per square metre (W·m⁻²)) of an electromagnetic field. It is named after its inventor John Henry Poynting. Oliver Heaviside and Nikolay Umov independently co-invented the Poynting vector.” The AEMS does not know the field pattern, page 138 of http://www.ivorcatt.co.uk/x18j134.pdf , also in Figure 5 of http://www.ivorcatt.org/x121.pdf . It only appeared in one text book throughout the 20^th century.

The AEMS must also dismiss what Professor F. Kip says about how electric power heats a resistor in “Fundamentals of Electricity and Magnetism”, McGraw-Hill, 1962, p326; “The direction of energy flow is perpendicular to the plane E and H ....”; p327; “The Poynting Vector is directed inward at the surface of the resistor.” Unfortunately, AEMS will be unclear about the fact that the E and H fields are at right angles to the conductor, and will not know that Poynting says the energy field travels in the dielectric in a direction parallel with the conductors.

The electromagnetic field, which contains the energy or power, which travelled from battery to resistor guided by two conductors, enters the resistor sideways.

Diametrically opposed to Heaviside and Kip is what the AEMS has learned; “The battery drives electric charge into the wire, which becomes electric current. On reaching the resistor, it forces its way through the resistor, or is dragged or pushed through the resistor by the voltage drop, and causes heat in the process.” This view excludes the Poynting Vector ExH as containing the energy travelling between the conductors at the speed of light, this energy being converted into heat in the terminating resistor.

Compare and contrast.

We have failed to point AEMS to fibre optics and heat from the sun.

What will be the answers of AEMS to the following questions?

Was Maxwell correct to say that light was electromagnetic? Is heat from the sun delivered by the ExH Poynting Vector? Is it guided by wires? Does each of us keep warm by being wired up to the sun, giving a path for the heating electric current?

Is the energy delivered in a fibre optic cable the Poynting Vector ExH travelling at the speed of light?

Is a sinusoidal signal guided by two conductors “low frequency light”? Is the energy involved the ExH Poynting Vector?

Ivor Catt. 19 January 2014

This is what the AEMS is presented with if he makes some attempt to find out about the TEM Wave;

http://www.ece.mcmaster.ca/faculty/nikolova/4FJ4_downloads/lectures/L03_TEMwaves.pdf (McMaster University) is No. 3 Google hit for “tem wave” (out of 50,000 hits), following me at No. 2; “ The TEM Wave; A lost concept ” .

On the home page of McMaster University we read; “It is our pleasure to announce that our Industry Professor, Dr. Hassan Kojori, has been elevated to IEEE Fellow effective Jan 1, 2014, for his "contributions to the design and application of predictive and diagnostic algorithms in power electronics converters". Congratulations!” So McMaster has some credibility in our field.

Hidden among 28 pages of obscure mathematical rubbish, on page 3, is the one useful item; the diagram showing that E, H are at right angles, and also in a very obscure way showing that the field travels in the third dimension, but not clearly at the speed of light.

The AEMS has no chance of getting an understanding of the TEM Wave when subjected to this deluge of rubbish. No wonder he resorts to the idea that the electric current travelling down the wires carries the energy which it gives up when fighting its way through the terminating resistor.

Another interesting fact is that the AEMS thinks that electricity, rather than energy, is what heats up the terminating resistor. This deflects his attention from the Poynting Vector, which is about energy in a field, not electricity.