But that's NOT a definition.

Alan
WN4HOG

--
Windsurfing Club: http://www.ibscc.org


"Al - KA5JGV" wrote in
I like that definition, Tom. Instead of struggling with what every tiny
thing is, just model it, apply it to your needs, and life (and radio
waves)
goes on.

Al KA5JGV

Roy Lewallen wrote:
Cecil Moore wrote:

Roy Lewallen wrote:

"Things on a very small scale behave like nothing that you have any
direct experience about. They do not behave like waves, they do not
behave like particles, they do not behave like clouds, or billiard
balls, or weights on springs, or like anything that you have ever
seen. . . Historically, the electron, for example, was thought to
behave like a particle, and then it was found that in many resepects
it behaved like a wave. So it really behaves like neither. Now we
have given up. We say: 'It is like *neither*'"

OTOH, quantum physics predicts the outcomes perfectly and has never been
proven wrong so it doesn't matter what we call photons. If you really
want to understand this stuff, you need to read a good book on string
theory. May I suggest _The_Tenth_Dimension_, by Jeremy Bernstein or
catch the two NOVAs that were on tonight.

Is that where we'll learn all about virtual photons, the fourth
dimension, and their application to measuring voltage?

Yes, six of the dimensions are thought to support the fabric of space,
the æther, if you will. String theory has yielded a unified field theory
including massless gravitons.

The point is that just because photons do not behave like pure waves
or pure particles, doesn't mean they are useless. It just means that
we don't yet have a one word handle to describe their true nature.
--
73, Cecil http://www.qsl.net/w5dxp



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Alan wrote:
But that's NOT a definition.

From the IEEE Dictionary: "radio wave - An electromagnetic
wave of radio frequency."
--
73, Cecil http://www.qsl.net/w5dxp



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I've been expecting one of the gurus in the ng would be saying Real Radio
Hams build their own theories.

Lionel Carter


"W7TI" wrote in message
...
On 28 Oct 2003 16:18:17 -0800, (jj) wrote:

Does anyone have a good description for what a radio
wave really is?

__________________________________________________ _______

The short answer is "no". Many people confuse the measurement of things
with having an understanding of them.

Scientists are very good at measuring things; less good at understanding
what they measure. For example, gravity is measurable down to a gnat's
eyelash, but nobody knows what it really "is".

--
Bill, W7TI

Sounds good to me. Thanks!
Alan
WN4HOG

--
Windsurfing Club: http://www.ibscc.org


"Cecil Moore" wrote in message
...
Alan wrote:
But that's NOT a definition.

From the IEEE Dictionary: "radio wave - An electromagnetic
wave of radio frequency."
--
73, Cecil http://www.qsl.net/w5dxp



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On Wed, 29 Oct 2003 17:18:39 -0000, "Lionel Carter"
wrote:

I've been expecting one of the gurus in the ng would be saying Real Radio
Hams build their own theories.

Lionel Carter

Hi Lionel,

Some of the "explanations" couched in Quantum nonsense have
accomplished that end none the less.

73's
Richard Clark, KB7QHC

From the page 9 of the Introduction to "QED" Feynman says,
"You're not going to be able to understand it... You see my
Physics students don't understand it either. That is because
I don't understand it. Nobody does!"

Good luck with analogies to things we seem to "understand".

--
Peter K1PO
Indialantic By-the-Sea, FL.


Makes me feel better :-)
but....

I just picked up "Advanced Electromagnetism and Vacuum Physics" by Patrick
Cornille (Advanced Electromagnetic Systems, France) published by World
Scientific Publishing Co. 2003 while browsing Strand Book Store in NYC (sale
$32) and the following Preface introduction caught my interest:

"The electromagnetic theory is the most important theory in physics, first
because the electromagnetic force is the only force that can be easily
manipulated by man with wellknown applications, secondly an extension of this
theory in the future may explain all the fundamental forces known to day in
nature.
A large volume of literature has appeared since the latter days of World war
II, written by researchers expanding the basic principles of electromagnetic
theory and applying Maxwell's equations to many important practical problems.
However, it is my opinion that the electromagnetic theory is not complete and
fully understood. A simple example proven these claims is given in this book
when the Helmholtz theorem is analyzed. We proved from a mathematical point of
view that Maxwell's equations are not complete since a scalar polarization must
be taken into account in the equations.
It is worth insisting that Maxwell, when he formulated out his theory, was
mainly guided by the experimental work performed by the physicists of his time.
He tried to give an hydrodynamics understanding of his theory, which is still
favored by certain physicists. Even today, Maxwell's equations are given as
granted, their validity being justified by experiments. Actually, there is no
demonstration of Maxwell's equations from first principles since the mechanical
approach used by Maxwell was rapidly abandoned in favor of a novel
nonmechanical entity: the electromagnetic field. While the Maxwell's equations
can obviously be obtained from a variational principle where they are derived
from an action appropriately chosen in order to recover them. In spite of the
success of the Maxwell theory in our present technology, we believe that the
last word on Maxwell's equations has not been said yet. The reason is that
Maxwell's equations raise a number of fundamental questions which have not been
answered in a satisfactory manner to date:
- One of these questions deals with the existence of a medium sustaining
transverse electromagnetic waves.
- Another question concerns the fact that Maxwell's equations are not Galilean
invariant.
- The question of covariance is also strongly related to the electromagnetic
induction phenomena, which is difficult to understand within the framework of
the special relativity theory.
- The discrete nature of the electric charge, where no physical concept has
been proposed to explain its quantization, remains one of the deepest mysteries
of physics.
- There is also the reason why the Lorentz force does not come from the
Maxwell's equations, but is additional to them. The reader is reminded that
classical electrodynamics demands a connection between the Maxwell's equations
and the Lorentz force.
In view of a prevalent trend towards a hydrodynamic description of matter and
radiation, we propose in this book another hydrodynamic wave model for the
existence and the propagation of matter and radiation in the vacuum where
equations of electrodynamics can be derived from simple fundamental principles.
We shall answer the above questions. " etc.

Hoping to find answers to some of the puzzling questions relating to antennas
and propagation, I am looking forward to time when I can immerse myself deeply
into this new stuff (and get more confused?)

Maybe this will intrigue some of youze guyz and help in sheding some light on
our neandertal brains?

73 Yuri, K3BU

I just picked up "Advanced Electromagnetism and Vacuum Physics" by Patrick
Cornille (Advanced Electromagnetic Systems, France) published by World
Scientific Publishing Co. 2003 while browsing Strand Book Store in NYC
(sale
$32) and the following Preface introduction caught my interest:

Good deal. Amazon wants $96 new, and $91 used. (VERY gently, I hope!)

I just picked up "Advanced Electromagnetism and Vacuum Physics" by Patrick
Cornille (Advanced Electromagnetic Systems, France) published by World
Scientific Publishing Co. 2003 while browsing Strand Book Store in NYC
(sale
$32) and the following Preface introduction caught my interest:

Good deal. Amazon wants $96 new, and $91 used. (VERY gently, I hope!)


There was one more left on the shelf as I remember. If anyone wants, I might be
able to check it out at this "World's Largest Used Bookstore". I giured it was
worth for the third I wanted to read in the book :-)

Yuri

I guess for now I will accept that a radio wave is a force field (or
energy field, if you like), and leave it at that (still seems to imply
action-at-a-distance). When I was in school, if this question were
asked, the professor would right down Maxwell's Equations on the
blackboard and state that they explain everything. I suppose that's
about as good as anything.

Thanks for the responses.

JJ