Father of Modern Physics: James Clerk Maxwell
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- čas přidán 8. 09. 2024
- James Clerk Maxwell's name is not as well known as Newton or Einstein, yet his discoveries were transformative. The History Guy recalls the life of Scottish Scientist James Clerk Maxwell, whom astronomer Carl Sagan said "has done more to shape our civilization than any ten recent presidents and prime ministers.”
This video was done in collaboration with the channel Arvin Ash: Complex Questions Explained Simply. Check out Arvin's take on Maxwell's equations here: • Why is the speed of li...
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Fantastic video on one of humanity's greatest scientists that not everyone knows about! Thanks for the great collaboration my friend!
Few know of him because you must have a very solid math background to understand the rudiments of his discoveries. Genius is often that way.
@John Pershing Well then.....continue!!
@John Pershing What the hell is an "usher for humanity"? "Electric universe models dont (sic) need to invent or manipulate the physical or mathematical sciences to achieve and (sic) explanation." Okay, then what is the basis of your "electric universe models," and how do they diverge/differ from Maxwell's equations? Surely there MUST be SOME math behind it, Mr. Science. The implication of your vague first retort is that you don't need no stinkin' Maxwell's equations to explain your Safire Sun thing. Basic arithmetic will do? I'm dying to hear this. Let your dogma-free personal insults begin, dude.
Don't forget, he was a devout evangelical Presbyterian. Religious atheists like to forget about scientific history like this.
@@awesomeferret I don't understand your point. Plenty of great physicists are, and were devoutly religious. Prime example is perhaps the greatest physicist of all time - Isaac Newton.
As an engineer, I studied Maxwell’s equations, but I had no idea he was so gifted in so many areas and was so influential.
I have long credited Maxwell with being the father of theoretical physics, and there can be no doubt he invented radio. Electromagnetic waves had existed forever, of course, but we knew little about them and thought of magnetic and electric fields as distinct entities. Maxwell's equations unified them in 1862 and he formally described electromagnetic waves in 1864 but it was another 30 years before legends like Heinrich Hertz and Guglielmo Marconi figured out the practical details. Maxwell also described "amplitude modulation sidebands." Considered a mathematical fiction for decades, they were demonstrated by use of electronic filters that doubled the capacity of expensive long distance telephone circuits from the 1930s into the 1960s. I feel comfortable asserting the world as we know it today would not have existed even yet without the incredible mind of James Clerk Maxwell. Like Jagadish Chandra Bose, he is worth remembering with awe.
Marconi Did Nothing Except Cash In On The Work Of Others, Just Like Steve Jobs. Faraday, Maxwell, Hertz, Tesla & Fessenden Are The Reason Why, Especially Maxwell!
Yay Jagadish Chandra Bose ! Doing microwaves in the nineteenth century! Look him up - another outstanding figure of science . . .
Marconi stole Tesla patents!
@@jackeroo75 Marconi Did Nothing Except Cash In On The Work Of Others, Just Like Steve Jobs. Faraday, Maxwell, Hertz, Tesla & Fessenden Are The Reason Why, Especially Maxwell!
When starting college, I was torn between two subjects: physics and history. I chose physics and went on to teach and do research in physics and applied math, yet I remain an avid amateur historian. Thank you for a great video on one of my intellectual heroes, and for an outstanding channel.
Physics has a hidden history timeline which is sooooo entertaining
Check out Kathy loves physics. She is a physicist and historian.
Humbling, to hear that he was so brilliant but remained a nice guy. We really should know his name.
Like the Bass section in music, he was the foundation that goes unnoticed, unless it's missing.
Said every rhythm section member everywhere.
As a long non-practicing drummer, I know the bass player is the one who REALLY sets the beat!
You are a genius storyteller, Mr. History Guy. I enjoyed this tremendously.
Agree
Agree
Wholeheartedly agree! Great writing and story-telling - an art rare on CZcams.
Amazing episode! Every electrical engineer is taught Maxwell's equations, so he is not as unknown as some might think. I'm the chairman of the IEEE Microwave Theory and Techniques society for Minnesota (Twin Cities) and in which most of our members use Maxwell's equations daily, though computers have greatly reduced the work.
Every Electrical Engineer knows Maxwell. Thank you for another Self-Isolation most excellent story. Edit: I should have said "Grateful to Maxwell.
Every educated (high school?) person in the world knows of Maxwell.
Sadly, not in the US. But our HS kids know who the Kardashians are. Does that count?
@@demef758 And our TAXES usually pay for their "education". Pathetic, isn't it?
Every Physicist too!
I am not an electrical engineer but I am grateful to Maxwell. I am a locomotive electrician. Yes I stand on Maxwells shoulders for a living.
Thank you for doing a video on Maxwell, who surely deserves to be remembered! You might also consider doing one on Oliver Heaviside, who reformulated Maxwell’s Equations into the 4 that are known today. He also invented coaxial cable and theorized the ionosphere.
"The Forgotten Genius of Oliver Heaviside: A Maverick of Electrical Science" ~ Basil Mahon
What might have been, had Maxwell lived into his 70s. Such goodness and productivity, we’re not long for this life.
One small criticism: When you say that “he did this ... without experimental evidence,” he did begin his work on electromagnetism by considering the experiments of Faraday and others.
Every scientist begins by considering the work of previous scientists, that's nothing special. He means that the work he did was all done via pen & paper. He just didn't do his own experiments.
@@g00gleminus96 See also Einstein's thought experiments.
@@g00gleminus96 but not Newton...
Small point, he was Scottish and as such Clerk is pronounced Clark. Yes the English language is a wonderful thing. 😊
And Marischal is pronounced marshal.
Bugger, you both beat me to these pronunciation issues.
I made the same mistake myself when I studied Maxwell in my History of Science course at university.
It's pronounced however your accent causes you to pronounce it. Don't be a prescriptivist. It's a fool's pursuit.
These are names,@@VoidHalo, so, perhaps a little respect?
This man's equations, if applied to the universe, open up knowledge that had been long overlooked by virtue of people's obsession with Einstein.
Thanks for bringing light on this very important man.
Khắc cảnh lê Einstein was more contemporary and public, with more visible directly applied innovations. His insistence that a A-bomb be built(he sent letters to the president urging for it) and his work in making them a reality being a large part of it.
Of course he is more well known.
@Alexander Strickland Yes, it is no wonder that Einstein is better known. That does not make Maxwell any less important. They had similar careers applying pure mathematics to questions of physics, usually leaving experimental confirmation to others.
*WRONG.*
Einstein reconciled Galilean relativity with Maxwell's equations - the result was special relativity. Half of Einstein's first paper on special relativity detailed transforming Maxwell's equations - and Maxwell's equations were the first existing physics equations that worked consistently with special relativity.
So basically, your either/or proposition along with your premise that physicists haven't taken Maxwell's equations into account simply reveals that you've never studied advanced physics or cosmology - or even electrical engineering for that matter - and you don't know what you are talking about.
And that would explain why you just posted the backbone statement of trolls who peddle a phenomenally ridiculous brand of word salad called the electric universe /plasma cosmology and insist that it's physics. It's not, it's the ravings of a psychologist who decided that the theory of the master race was correct all along so he invented all sorts of myths and pseudoscience to go along with his story. It's well documented, and there's absolutely no point in trying to argue otherwise.
The usual trolling cycle to object to the truth that I've just spoken is for either you or a trolling cohort to get outraged and invoke Tesla along with all of the things about Tesla that we ignore or do not know about. Like your Maxwell statement, that too will be completely false.
I personally wish that people would take half of the time they do believing in internet conspiracy stories about Tesla, Maxwell, and Einstein and study actual science.
There are a great number of sources that make it interesting and fun to learn about. Just like The History Guy, only with science.
@@Ni999 you seem like a well read person, so I'll give you one book to challenge your ideas. Read Anthony Peratt's book on plasma. Then get back to me. Good day.
@@khaccanhle1930 I can save you a lot of time right now.
I've worked testing plasma events for quite some time, including for the Department of Energy and have worked in a separate department at Los Alamos National Laboratory, where Anthony has been employed for quite some time.
It's true, his body of work does include plasma cosmology.
It's also true that his work has been misappropriated by the electric universe /plasma cosmology pseudoscience crowd, who pedal complete hogwash.
While they insist that the soulless orthodoxy of big science, worshipping Albert Einstein, have never gathered empirical data, have never opened their eyes to the wonders of Maxwell, Tesla, plasma, and no other end of bald faced lies, Anthony and several other thousands of members of the soulless orthodoxy of big science have been busy formulating theories and conducting experiments and gathering data for decades.
Unlike the big plasma experimental breakthrough by the electric universe /plasma cosmology crowd that blows the lid off of our lies and reveals the real truth - that is actually just a modern recording of an educational film from the 1930s demonstrating plasma effects for beginner physics students of the day - the real physics and cosmology communities have been doing real work.
In fact, instead of making things up using word salad, real science has recently been publishing fairly new data about the heliosphere and the near side of interstellar space. Of special interest to everyone - it dominated the science news for a few weeks last year, perhaps you'd seen it - were the exciting results of plasma measurements made by both Voyager spacecraft.
We were able to gather that data thanks to the excellent work in the design and construction of the two Voyagers decades ago, and their ongoing mission support on earth ever since.
Of course we were able to place them in interstellar and near interstellar space thanks to the trajectory management and very detailed course calculations using gravity assist, a feat considered impossible by the electric universe /plasma cosmology crowd who claim that gravity does not exist and we would know that if we understood Maxwell's equations.
Which by the way, we do. Exceedingly well. And we use them. Daily. We build things on earth using them and we use them across a number of disciplines ranging from solid state physics to actual cosmology to electrical engineering and other disciplines as well.
It's not some hidden knowledge that would blow the lid off of everything if we used them to take a fresh look at the universe.
It's public knowledge that we've been using for well over a century to blow the lid off of what we think we know about the universe.
You wouldn't have GPS navigation without special and general relativity and you wouldn't have had those without Maxwell's equations.
Everyone working on the universe gets it, it's not a secret, it's not something we suppress, and everyone in cosmology, astronomy, and astrophysics do seem to try hard, often succeeding, in getting new results out in the news for everyone and into schools as soon as possible.
Please let me know if you have any other questions.
As a retired EE I find this presentation particularly poignant. The fact that I find inescapable is that the greatest contributions are those who are humble enough to recognize the contributions of those who came before them and pass the baton forward to the next. Thanks for taking on this fairly technical topic.
Wow! Great video, and what an amazing person! Maxwell's brilliance certainly gives the rest of us reason to be humble about our own meager intellects.
Well said! 👍🏼👍🏼
Tesla as well as Einstein Have said we ride on the shoulders of Maxwell! A very profound statement.
Great video, thanks from John, Australia.
I had no idea Maxwell was an obscure figure. As a young Enginerding student his name frequently pops up. 🙂
Think you're getting confused - Robert Maxwell was a robbing thief of a newspaper owner who may or may not have committed suicide. His daughter was one of Jeffrey Epsteins "associates"
Wonderful video, James Clerk Maxwell (as a fellow Scotsman) has a special place in my love of Physics. I aspire to become a tiny fraction of one of the greatest minds to ever live.
I remember my Physics professor talking about how amazing it was that the Maxwell equations survived the revolution in physics of quantum physics.
I studied physics at degree level so appreciate his amazing revolution in our understanding of the forces of nature such as how separate phenomenon like electricity, magnetism and light are all connected.
He was Einstein's hero.
In my view he was second to Einstein followed by Newton.
Great video on history of his life.
He is a famous son of Scotland and well recognised in his home country. Any engineer will know his name. 🏴
Craig Evans As an American engineer and grandson of Scottish immigrants, I named my son Maxwell James. Reflecting the obscurity of James Maxwell among lay people, no one has ever commented on the connection.
...that is really interesting.. True, lay people are ignorant of those that made the modern world possible, those few of us that work in science and engineering would notice immediately and see the respect.
Craig Evans - Anyone interested in science knows about him.
GH1618 This vignette brought home the Great Genius that was Maxwell! I did know of him, but unintentionally discounted him for other reasons. Oh how I now apologize to the Ghost of this Profound Genius! All Hail James Clark Maxwell, Ipoh whom Modern Science is Truly based!
Upon whom ... not Ipoh!
As an OTHS physics teacher I frequently touted Maxwell. Thank you so much for bringing his accomplishments to light! Keep making such great content!!!
Please include Maxwell's beautiful equations. It really helps to see them. Thank you so much for the life and history of this brilliant scientist.
Died at 48, makes you wonder what else he would have gone on to avhieve !. Same with Turing dying early.
Way ahead of poor Mr Turing, an order of magnitude greater, up there with Newton.
Fraid most genius physicists do their best work young, but who knows, if he'd shuffled of in his 70's he might have discovered relativity.
You’re right… but Alan Turing was unfairly persecuted by the ridiculous anti-homosexuality laws of his time. We will never know whether or not Turing’s sad and untimely death was suicide, accident, or murder.
Einstein found that Maxwell's equations demanded that light has a fixed speed in a vacuum. Special Relativity is the examination of what that implies for objects moving close to that speed. It is a bit of a rebuke to us how much these men could accomplish in such short lifetimes.
He used them in his theory of special relativity.
He eliminated the aether from the calculations without explaining how he got away with it...
That alone limited the transfer of information to lightspeed, effectively disconnecting the universe.
Einstein himself acknowledged this near his life's end, questioning the validity of his own theory.
Something deemed sacrilegious today...
The ether was eliminated by the Michelson-Morley experiment long before Einstein. Michelson and Morley won one of the first Nobel Prizes in Physics for their work. This was the first Nobel Prize to go to an American. I don't believe Einstein ever doubted that light speed was the limit of information transfer; the problem of quantum entanglement rather led him to doubt quantum mechanics instead. How quantum entanglement can be consistent with an upper limit on information transfer is still debated, as much by philosophers as by physicists.
@@rabbi120348
Very knowledgeable. Thank you.
Michelson and Morley won, yes. By failing efforts to prove the "ether" exists... Their intent and goal BTW.
Demonstrating only, that whatever that medium is, it's not a stationary transverse wave carrying medium.
It does not prove such a medium, does not exist.
It's possible that the sea of neutrinos that permeates the universe, are connected magnetically, carrying *both* transverse lightwaves *and* the say 32 orders of magnitude faster than light longitudinal waves that would transfer information at the speed of say... gravity?
Think about it. That reconnects everything, at the sub atomic scale. Similar to if not related to, chemistry's London force. Weak Dipole Magnetics.
Spiral galaxies motion, symmetry and behavior could be explained.
The quantum mystery or what the mechanism of gravity is, could be solved, with technology capable of detecting an measuring magnetic interactions at that scale!
Those are as elusive as dark matter has proven to be... There's something goin on but it's pretty clear... We've no clear idea what that is!
We'd have to trip over that one however, seein as everybody seems content with math and models.
I suspect the practical physicists of the National Labs system would love to chime in, if they could. And I also think if academia knew what they do?
They'd be pissed.
But I'm a nobody with no formal education sooooo. Maybe someday we'll find out?
Regardless.
Have a great evening!
✌💨
@@TheScmtnrider The smarter you are the more you feel like an idiot. Oh well.
@@bobraible
Not my fault.
8th grade was my last graduation.
That's ok tho. I'm 60 and now retired on my own property. Steelhead stream, acres of redwoods, lots of wildlife, with a cabin in the middle... My only daughter is 30, and married to a scientist, her HS sweetheart btw, is about to give me my first Granddaughter.
All in all, I did ok deviating from the norm. But I'm still not a victim of concensus. I need to understand and see clear evidence before I conclude squat.
That's how I *know* our sun decisively drives climate and weather, and Co² is plant food.
I know gravitational cosmology is the Swiss cheese of theorhetical physics, and that Plasma Cosmology seamlessly fits every modern observation that the Lambda Cold Dark Matter model requires a bandaid to explain.
And I've seen scores and scores of papers fail to prove the existence of dark matter or energy, resorting to axions, normal matter!
But like the Co² warming "science"?
I've yet to see the scientific method applied by designing studies and experiments specifically to disprove those theories by actually testing hypotheses!
Zip!
There comes a point where beating a horse no longer has an effect. Those horses are dead!
Math is not science!
It's a tool to describe, period. As are computer models.
Facts that fly in the face of the deification of Sir Albert Einstein, Sir Arthur Eddington and Hockeystick Michael Mann.
Don't tell Neal deGrassy Tyson tho. He might tell Cox and Nye.
Oh and the sun triggers earthquakes as well.
spaceweathernews.com/spf/
That's a published, peer reviewed and cited paper, published by a friend of mine.
99.7% confidence (University of Ohio)
And here.
quakewatch.net
The paradigm shift is upon us. 👍
About time he gets a video!
I'm amazed at the idea that Maxwell is not famous. I suppose I was lucky at school, I thought everyone knew about him. Great video, thanks.
This was outstanding. Thank you.
@ 10:14, the bronze statue of James Clerk Maxwell on 22-26 George Street in Edinburgh was sculpted by Alexander Stoddart and cast by the Black Isle Bronze Foundry in Nairn, Scotland. Maxwell is shown holding his color top, a spinning disc with sectors of colored paper which he used to investigate the physiology of color vision. A small plaque on the east side of the statue's pedestal shows Maxwell's Four Equations of Electromagnetism.
Speachless to the mind of this gentleman, We are better for his thoughts.
I love that closing quote.
Funny thing is that I wasn't aware that Maxwell wasn't famous or common knowledge.
Of course, in reality he is.
Agreed. Being in the science field, I've known about Maxwell since I was a kid. I took it for granted most people knew about him, kind of alongside Faraday. You can't tell me most people haven't heard of Faraday either, right?
@@jeffk8019 I would go so far as to say that the majority of people in the U.S. have no idea whatever who Faraday was.
@@@wholeNwon You're kidding, right? BTW- I'm American and Faraday and Maxwell are known and honored by Americans as they should be.
@@jeffk8019 Unfortunately I'm not. Believe me, you're an exception. Did you ever watch a "Jay Walk"? I recall having been in a meeting at a friend's office. There was a break for casual conversation. At one point in time, part of the discussion was on military matters. He asked a young (about 28 yo) which side won the U.S. Civil War. She said, "the Germans". He repeated and rephrased the question. She had not misunderstood. Another young person present at a similar meeting thought that the Japanese were justified in attacking Pearl Harbor because we had dropped nuclear bombs on them! Both were college graduates and employed in high-paying jobs. I was having a wide-ranging conversation with a 26 yo who was about to start a doctoral program. He had never heard of quarks and had no idea what entanglement meant. Rutherford? Planck? Nope. He knew of Darwin but not Wallace; Newton but not Leibnitz.
Amazing story, presented expertly. Love the way you express your words.
Thank you for another lesson. You can take a subject that I’m not interested in and make it interesting. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be a student in one of you classes. You make even uninteresting history interesting. Thanks again and God bless.
Ammo Dog AMEN!
Hails from Scotland, I've been a fan of your videos for a while, this one brought me alot of joy, you did a great job of covering the Dafty's life haha
Excellent episode THG. I'd literally just started watching the Arvin Ash, (I'm a subscriber to his channel), when your notification came up. Naturally, I had to put Arvin on hold while I watch my main man, THG.
Thank you sir.
I forgive you Ian. haha.
Maxwell's Laws are a very beautiful application of differential equations, and when I tutor the subject I often use them as examples.
Don't know how I missed this one since I watched so many of your videos and enjoy them all. It was outstanding.
In the UK, the name "Clerk" - and the administrative job as well - is pronounced "Clark", BTW!
So, is Jeremy Clarkson the son of a clerk?
This is true but often the name was given to anyone who had even the most modest of ability to write. Oddly enough many people in the Medieval period had a very good grasp of the workings of the law, especially as it related to their work such as farming. This, despite, not being able to read. The law would be explained to them, especially if they had infringed it, and they would then in turn explain it to others.
And even more irritatingly, not only do we pronounce the "e" in "Clerk" as an "a", in Mary Dewar's name we pronounce the "a" as an "e" ... "Due-wer".
How is my last name pronounced?
@@clark9992: Sandor Clegane's favorite C word!
Please do a video on Oliver Heaviside, who was the self-taught mathematician-physicist who turned Maxwell's unwieldy equations into the elegant four we call Maxwell's equations. Heaviside was co-formulator of vector calculus, and was, to put it mildly, an odd man who was continually at odds with the mathematical and science establishment.
However, ha achieve astonishing things. Not just that vector calculus reformulation of Maxwell's equations (which are not quite equivalent), but a huge mount of work that had a direct impact on electrical engineering and telecommunications.
Heaviside pioneered the use of complex numbers in the analysis of electrical circuits. He developed transmission line theory, took out the first patent on co-axial cable. He invented the terms impedance, conductance, permeability, permittivity and a dozen others in common use today.
He's known for the Heaviside step function, and was also the first person to use what is now called the Dirac Delta Function. The layer that reflects radio waves in the ionosphere, now known as the Kenelly-Heaviside layer was predicted by him.
Whilst he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society,, his relationship with that body was uneasy to put it mildly. He was very reclusive, awkward and in later life furnished his house with granite blocks and painted his nails red.
He came from a much more humble background than did Maxwell, although by coincidence his aunt married Charles Wheatstone (of bridge fame).
Well worth exploring one of the odder characters from electrical engineering who played a key role in that field, but is largely unknown as he was so out of step with the establishment. You could ask 100 physics or electrical engineering students about Maxwell's equations, and I doubt more than one or two would be able to name Oliver Heaviside as the person responsible for their current form (which is also the form they are shown on Maxwell's statue). He deserves to be remembered I feel.
Thank you for things I didn't know about Heaviside.
A million likes! Along with Boltzmann, he is the father of modern physics (and a nice guy!). I'd love to see more of these - Boltzmann (for sure, since he is really the father of statistical thermodynamics, and worked with Maxwell to derive the Maxwell-Boltzmann dist), Heaviside (who is responsible for turning Maxwell's equations into the form we know now, introduced electrical permittivity and magnetic permeability and was screwed over for being an engineer and misanthrope) and PAM Dirac. These people SHOULD be household names. One thing I like about Maxwell is that he took a very "mechanistic" approach to understanding physics. His development of electromagnitism is based on a thought model of gears turning against each other in space.
I am related to the Maxwells. I am the 19th cousin to the last Lord of the castle Caerlaverock, in Dumfrieshire, Scotland. Thank you for, not only this one, but, for all that you and the Mrs do! 🇺🇸
Rather distantly related then!
Amusing.
I knew of Maxwell through the science and engineering texts I read as a child and youth. I always marveled at his work. Still do.
Thank you for doing this video about my great great great grandfather.... Because his name is sort of forgotten... Happy to be a Maxwell,.
Also I would like to say that his son was also an inventor and his son after that my grandfather and he actually patented a lot of products for modern industrial machines.
I have to admit that the History Guy is the best video on CZcams. I truly enjoy before going to sleep at night just listening to him.
Awesome! Thank you! As an amateur radio operator, I am a beneficiary and an appreciator of Professor Maxwell's great work.
73, de AK2QJ
JCM is the goat. He and many others that followed give me great strength of physics and curiosity. Ty
I have heard of James Maxwell, on the TV show "The Big Bang Theory". Ironic that a medium that Maxwell had unknowingly laid the principles for, would be the one that would make him so well known.
There's nothing ironic about it. Irony is contradictory. The word you meant was coincidental.
This was good memory of the show on your part. Season 4 Episode 3 has Sheldon and Amy arguing in the cafeteria about Maxwell. After they break up Sheldon begins collecting cats and naming them after other physicists.
Hence the zazzles.
@@wholeNwon I'm 60 years old and no I hadn't heard of him before that.
@@VoidHalo Would it be ironic that I mistook coincidence for irony?
@@allanlank I'm much older and realize that my comment was unkind in that it didn't acknowledge the vast differences in backgrounds people may have. I'll therefore delete it.
it was most beautiful.... bravo Bravo sir ..... great video and well spoken...
Thank you. As an Electronic Engineer, I love science history.
Loved the quote at the end. Great video. Thanks so much.
Another great video. Thank you. I am an electrical engineer who knows well Maxwell's equations but knew not so well his story.
Maxwell's Equations are arguably the start of the Modern electrified world.
Thanks, I love the history of science. A very amazing, observant man!
Fantastic video. There are a lot Videos on CZcams about Maxwell but this one really speaks to those who are not so mathematical. Excellent work. Thank you!
Great presentation. I learnt more from watching your short presentation than from a tv documentary about Maxwell. Thanks
I was so pleased to see two of my favorite channels collaborate like this! Thank you both :)
Well done! The best short presentation of Maxwell I have seen. Thank you!
My goodness that was well done. You're like a mixture of the most kickass history professor of all time and Paul Harvey. And I'm a broadcaster so you know what that means to me. When I want to learn something new and enjoy a well-crafted yarn, I watch The History Guy.
You stretch my mind sir, thank you. Your content is enjoyed and appreciated.
Outstanding!
There is a filk song, "Maxwell's Golden Hammer," that is, more or less, an explanation of Maxwell's equations set to the tune of The Beatles' "Maxwell's Silver Hammer." I don't know who wrote/performed it, but it's a lot of fun. Check with members of the filk community to find it. It's not available online, as far as I know, because parody, alas, is no longer considered fair use.
Thanks for this and for the shout out to Arvin Ash.
Don't forget the contributions of Oliver Heaviside - the father of vector calculus! Groups, rings, Fields, Abstract Algebra!!! He was an old man when he came up with this after doing pioneering work on telegraph theory.
Thank you James Clerk Maxwell. As a welding engineer, I use your principles every day making our lives easier.
We see farther because we are standing on the shoulders of giants.
If only that where true for all.
we know we stand on the shoulders on giants because of their dandruff on our shoes.
"If I can't see far, it's because giants are standing on my shoulders." I think this was a Feynman quip but hope someone will correct me, if not. My memory isn't what it used to be.
This may have actually been a dig by Newton against one of his rivals - Robert Hook who was rather short :-)!
If only we knew what we were looking at . I believe Einstein benefited from this vision . Light , magnetism, and elitricity , all energy and all the same thing . He took it one step further and claimed that energy was equal to mass to the speed of light squared . Just one more step and we will have everything figured out .
One day we will understand that everything is made from light .
It is the first thing that God created , and from that he created all .
It should be noted that what is nowadays called "Maxwell's equations" is actually the work of Oliver Heaviside. Maxwell's original formulation consisted of 20 equations in 20 variables, and were quite impractical to use. Heaviside used vector calculus (another area that he improved upon) to obtain the four equations that are now widely known as Maxwell's equations. I recommend reading about Heaviside, he made huge contributions to a number of fields (e.g., he invented the coaxial cable and coined a lot of the terms which are used in electromagnetic theory), which is even more astounding since he was self-taught! I would very much like another episode focused on him. 🙂
Such great minds, I can’t even imagine how was the process of even thinking and deducing this theories and equations. Even today with all the information, internet, calculators, and programs that do all the work for us, is so hard. What a pity he died so young.
From an Engineer who loves physics, thanks for your knowledge
Just come straight from Arvin's channel. Great collaboration this.
Thank you so much for making history interesting to listen to!
Your videos ought to be used in classrooms! Maybe then, children would remember the history that they learn!
One can dream, can’t one?
I studied at King's College for many years (Physics with Astrophysics, colour computer vision, and imaging radar systems) and Maxwell is still well remembered there - the student Physics society is even named after him.
One of the bright points of being isolated during Covid is watching your videos. I'm 60 and from the days history was still an important class taught in school, it always being one of my favorite subjects. As I watch each video, I am taught history in such a thoughtful, entertaining way. At the end of each, I smile and think, how nice it is to learn something new - and then look for another... Thank you.
A physics history video. This is a good day.
Thanks for bringing James Clerk Maxwell's name to public attention. He certainly deserves to stand with Newton and Einstein in the pantheon of genius. Incidentally "Clerk" is pronounced "Clark".
It sure is. I live in "Berk's County" Pennsylvania. If I change my GPS to use a British voice, it starts pronouncing it "Bark's County".
Another great video... Reminded me of Paul Harvey's closing line... "And now you know the rest of the story!". 👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼
Great video about a great physicist and mathematician.
As a subscriber that has followed you for some years, This is probably the finest example of your genius. I have posted this video on my FB page. Its that important. "History that deserves to be remembered" Thanx for all your hard work, and Mrs. History Guy for hers. Our Mothers, Daughters,Sisters,Wives our better angels deserve to be acknowledged. Keep up the good work.
The license plate on my Tesla is MAXWELL. Love this channel.
Maxwell and Tesla would not have got on one little bit...
Thank you for helping me keep sane during this isolation period...
Maxwell had the rarest ability to see invisible things precisely as they are. This goes way beyond intellectual brilliance. When he described Saturn rings mathematically, they turned out to be EXACTLY what he predicted, as discovered only much later. When he described human vision mathematically, it was later found that the three detectors in the human eye for red, green, and purple colors were indeed physically there and worked exactly as he described them. The most magical of all was his mathematical description of electromagnetism, which was EXACTLY correct, every bit of it, as discovered much later. His claim that light is an electromagnetic wave is like shooting in complete darkness and hitting the center of an apple on a human head one mile away while knowing that. He was not just a genius; he was a prophet. He discovered things in exact detail from tiny, almost nonexistent hints. I cannot put him before Newton, but I do put him before Einstein, and I am sure that Einstein would have agreed with me on this. Maxwell's vision enabled all post-Newton physics.
Dr. David Goren
Fascinating video about one of our national heroes. I should point out though that, being a Scot, the Clerk in his name should be pronounced the same as Clark.
Thank you sir. ❤
I attended the unveiling/inauguration of the Royal Society's statue of Clerk-Maxwell in Edinburgh. There were very few people there. Even today, few people give it a second glance. It's a shame that he isn't better recognised for his many achievements.
May I suggest an episode. One on Einstein and Hilbert, as well as the story of Einstein and Schwarzchild are both fascinating and a little controversial. The history of general relativity is quite fascinating and a bit of a rollercoaster ride from Einsteins first inspiration with the so called equivalence principle, his struggle to get on top of the math required to develop his theory, his very interesting and controversial collaboration with Hilbert, the fascinating and totally unexpected arrival of an exact solution to his equations from a soldier in the trenches of WW1, to the first confirmation of the theory by Eddington in the observation of a lunar eclipse in South Africa. It is a truly fascinating story whether you understand the math or not.
The quote at the end is quite touching
As always, your videos inform, amaze, and delight me. Thank you, sir.
Wow, great vid. Maybe, the best one yet!
Kev Hay I would strongly agree.
7:30 "later simplified into 4 partial differential equations". It should be noted, that work was done by Oliver Heaviside; he put those 20 equations into the common form you see today.
Please have a look at Maxwells engagement in education as well: He taught industrial workers about the theory of electricity. Thus giving two examples: 1) How science can be interesting as well as liberating. 2) How the economy could have developed in a more inclusive instead of a confrontational path.
{ That might be quite interesting from a historical aspect: How come that the humanistic approaches, well developed in the 19th century, were "rolled over" by confrontational concepts like nationalism, fascism, communism? }
So many fields (not only the electromagnetic field) we can still learn from this man. Thank for this video - and Maxwell might well be worth another one emphasizing his humanistic background.
Excellent, excellent presentation. Sir, you are getting REALLY good at this! Your next assignment could be Oliver Heaviside, who simplified Maxwell's equations from 20 into 4.
I was aware of Maxwell, but not the breadth of his work. Thank you History Guy!
Thank you, Mr. History Guy!!
Thank you for introducing me to a new learning resource.
Just... WOW! I’ve read about Einstein and a tiny bit about Faraday, but James Clerk Maxwell is a giant. He should have volumes written about him. And then I must find out about Alvin Ash. Thank you.
Don't leave out Einstein's long-time collaborator, Jagadish Chandra Bose. I do agree, though, that Maxwell was the foundation for so much of modern physics. Newton gave us mathematical physics; Maxwell gave us the secrets of the universe we live in.
That was a great story. Thank you for bringing it to us. I have degrees in mathematics and physical science. Perhaps appreciated it more then someone who doesn't have the background in math and physics. Thank you again.
Like 50 times more
Wow. Thanks for that. As an Electrical Engineer I knew the man and his equations, but I never really knew his story.
At Engineering School, 25 years ago, I was fascinated by Maxwell's equations and Eletromagnetism. I decided to work with Telecommunication and became a Radio Frequency Engineer, deploying cellular networks. Maxwell revolutionized our world and deserve to be celebrated as one of the most important human beings ever.
Thank you for sending this one out history guy I thoroughly appreciated it and I was completely unaware of James Clerk Maxwell I became interested in physics about 10 years ago when I stumbled across the book Dancing Wu Li Masters by Gary zukav👍👍🤜🤛🦅🇺🇸
A man and a mind who's contributions to humanity deserve to be remembered and recognized. Can you imagine what ideas and theories he would have advanced had he lived longer? I don't understand why he and his work isn't discussed in school if only as an introduction to young people who may be inspired to pursue science and physics.
Thanks H.G. 👍🏻✌🏻