The conventional story is as follows.

Maxwell followed in the wake of a physical, non-mathematical Faraday, who thought in terms of tubes of flux in space. Faraday had a space in which resided electric flux and magnetic flux. His space had physical reality and physical properties, these properties making it able to accommodate his fluxes.

Maxwell set out to make Faraday's ideas more rigorous and scientific (a) by firming up the physical model for space, or the aether, and (b) by placing a mathematical structure over them.

He constructed a mechanical model for the aether, with large rotating wheels and small idler wheels, on the lines of a gear box run riot in complexity. Using this model, he constructed his Equations of Electromagnetism.

However, the reported' failure of the Michelson-Morley experiment and the birth of Relativity led to the removal of the physical model upon which Maxwell constructed his equations

All of this flows along swimmingly until we assemble the next disastrous pair of observations.

In 1949 Einstein wrote 4;

Here we reach the point where Einstein says that the foundation of relativity is Maxwell's equations excluding, of course, its now defunct physical origin, the aether; that is, space with physical properties.

Now add my own discovery that Maxwell's equations are devoid of any information except that on the physical properties of space.

Here we have closed the loop in the argument, and the whole crazy structure underlying `modern physics' collapses.

To sum up. Einstein says that relativity, which he believes to have been based on the disappearance of a space with physical properties, is based on Maxwell's equations, which are now found to contain only information about the physical attributes of that disappearing spaces

By analogy, it would be possible to proclaim a new theory of mechanics which lacked the concept of mass, but which contained both velocity (v) and moment (mv) within it, and which preferably included lots of fancy maths involving momentum and velocity. Then, unknown to any one among the awed observers, the new theory could be made to function, produce results, and correlate with reality. The necessary parameter m, like the rabbit in the hat, could go about its business, staying all the time firmly hidden inside the hat, the hat being in our case the term momentum and a fog of mathematics.

Can we not chase this obscurantist 'modem physics' out of our universities, and start to prepare for a 21st century of real scientific progress?

1. For the exact nuances here, read Polanyi M., Personal Knowledge, R.K.P., 1958, pp9-13. Catt, L, Electromagnetic Theory Vol. 1, C.A.M. Publishing, 1979, p108

2. Jeans, J., The Mysterious Universe, C.U.P.,1931 P.85

3. Cullwick, E.G., Electromagnetism and Relativity, Longmans, 1959, p.ix. See also Whittaker, E.T., A History of the Theories of Aether and Electricity, Nelson, 1951, p255.

4. Ed. Schilpp, P.A., Albert Einstein, PhilosopherScientist, Library of Living Philosopher, 1949,p62.

5. Catt, I, The Hidden Message in Maxwell's Equations , EWW, Nov'85 .

[Derived from a panel in a Wireless World article.]

Integral Eds = - d(phi)/dt, as a statement of Faraday's Law of Induction, is one such faulty equation. - Michael S. Gibson.

Please note, in amelioration of Gibson's assertion, that he is writing about physical laws - prescriptive statements. Also, he is writing about fundamental laws in physics. In contrast, should a mountain get steeper higher up in a certain way, it is perfectly valid to make the descriptive statement dh/dx = kh should that happen to be true for that particular mountain. Also, this could even be a prescriptive statement should it be a necessary result of the wind or ice shaping the mountain. However, in such a situation, we are not dealing with a relativistic universe; in the case of erosion, we are within a universe of discourse where we can conceive of "instantaneous" action at a distance. Gibson refers to the deeper level of physics, with fundamentals, where there is no instantaneous action at a distance.

Ivor Catt