James Clerk Maxwell

 Ok as the first tribute (of many) this poem is about the greatest physicist of the 19th century namely James Clerk Maxwell. Whilst his main contribution was in unifying electromagnetism (the first unification theory) he also developed the Kinetic theory of gases and the theory of colour. When he was 17 he deduced that the rings around Saturn could not be solid but had to consist of small bits of rock. For this he was awarded the Adams prize essay.

 Anyway his main achievement is of course summarising Faraday's work on electromagnetism into 4 equations and then he realised that applying some mathematical transformations using quaternions that electromagnetic waves had to exist. He missed a trick though in that it was thought like all waves there had to be a medium for which the waves had to be propagating through. It wasn't until Einstein came along when it was realised that the so called Ether was not necessary. Indeed electromagnetic waves are self generating in that an oscillating electric field generates an oscillating magnetic field which in turn generates an oscillating electric field so the wave self propagates without any underlying media. Also whilst Maxwell used quaternions it wasn't until Heaviside reformulated them in terms of vector calculus that the structure of Maxwell's equations became apparent. 

Whilst Maxwell's equations are seen as part of classical physics, they are relativistically invariant and are still used today in many fields such as antenna engineering which is my specialist field of study. Furthermore despite the alleged importance of quantum mechanics in understanding the two slit experiment there is no quantum mechanical explanation of the two slit experiment. Indeed it is difficult to see how there could be as Schrodinger's equation is a scalar equation whereas Maxwell's equations involve vector quantities such as Electric and Magnetic fields. There is no concept of the near field from Schrodinger's equation I will expand on these points later. In the mean time here is a verbal summary of the four Maxwell equations 

1) The electic field of a source is proportional to the total charge enclosed by a surface surrounding that source 

2) There is no magnetic charge 

3) If I wiggle a magnetic in front of a conductor there will be an electric current associated with it and the faster the magnetic is wiggled then the greater the electric current will be 

4) An electric current passing through a wire generates a magnetic field 

Put 3 and 4 together and you end up with a wave equation the velocity of which is the same as the speed of light so light is in fact an electromagnetic wave. Truly magical 

Anyway here is the poem hope you enjoy it 

                             James Clerk Maxwell

 

Four basic facts all combine,

To show how fields intertwine.

Static or Dynamic,

It really is magic.

 

A wiggly field generates another,

Which in turn regenerates the other.

With this great insight,

We now understand light.