Was Maxwell's original work deliberately suppressed?
Date: Sunday, April 02, 2006 @ 23:00:45 UTC
Topic: Science


From Tom Bearden's recent correspondence: Dr. Bearden
Just a simple question out of curiosity, not that it will change anything. Do you think those who destroyed Maxwell's work and altered the course of history in doing so did so out of ignorance or so you believe they knew or suspected the potential and altered them with intent? /David
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David,

Maxwell's real "primary theory" was published as James Clerk Maxwell, "A Dynamical Theory of the Electromagnetic Field," Royal Society Transactions, Vol. CLV, 1865, p 459. The paper was read before the Society on Dec. 8, 1864. It is included in The Scientific Papers of James Clerk Maxwell, 2 vols. bound as one, edited by W. D. Niven, Dover, New York, 1952, Vol. 1, p. 526-597. Two errata are given on the unnumbered page prior to page 1 of Vol. 1.



In this 1865 paper Maxwell presents his seminal theory of electromagnetism, containing 20 equations in 20 unknowns. His general equations of the electromagnetic field are given in Part III, General Equations of the Electromagnetic Field, p. 554-564. On p. 561, he lists his 20 variables. On p. 562, he summarizes the different subjects of the 20 equations, being three equations each for magnetic force, electric currents, electromotive force, electric elasticity, electric resistance, total currents; and one equation each for free electricity and continuity. In the paper, Maxwell adopts the approach of first arriving at the laws of induction and then deducing the mechanical attractions and repulsions.

Maxwell himself was pressured intensely to change from his "horrid" quaternion-like mathematics theory (20 equations in 20 unknowns). Hamilton's quaternions were advanced and backed by a gruff, quarrelsome fellow, Tate, who almost no one could get along with. The math of the day was quite simplified. Vector algebra, e.g., had not yet been born, and in fact it got born because of the work (by Heaviside, Gibbs, Hertz and others) to simplify Maxwell's work.

There were less than three dozen "electrodynamicists" in the entire world in the 1880s, even after Maxwell's death in 1879. The electron had not been discovered, and the "atom" was still just a theory. Everyone still believed in the material ether, and also believed that only force fields were real and that potentials were just mathematical conveniences having no physical reality.

Maxwell's own previous electromagnetic theorizing had been very "mechanical" and generally followed Faraday's belief in "lines of force" in space around conductors etc. To Maxwell, these were very material things -- in short, the material ether was a very firm part of his thinking, and also was a firm part of the thinking of Faraday and most others. See Maxwell, James Clerk, "On Faraday's Lines of Force," Transactions of the Cambridge Philosophical Society, Vol. X, Part I., p. TBD, 1855-56. Read Dec. 10, 1855 and Feb. 11, 1856. Also see Maxwell, James Clerk, "On Physical Lines of Force," Philosophical Magazine, Vol. XXI, Mar., Apr., and May 1861; Jan. and Feb. 1862.

In 1868, Maxwell used an electrical derivation of his theory instead of the previous dynamical derivation. See Maxwell, James Clerk, "On a Method of Making a Direct Comparison of Electrostatic with Electromagnetic Force; with a Note on the Electromagnetic Theory of Light," Philosophical Magazine, Vol. CLVIII, 1868.

Eventually Maxwell retired to his estate, and after some years of hard work he produced the first edition of his famous Treatise. See Maxwell, James Clerk, A Treatise on Electricity and Magnetism, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1873. This was just six years before his death.

During this time, the Maxwell theory had not really made very much progress, and though considered of importance, it was not considered anything very spectacular -- much of this being because of its "considered too difficult" mathematics and the residues of the "terrible quaternions". Even Maxwell's own publisher strongly criticized to Maxwell his use of this horrid mathematical style which was so much opposed, as the publisher considered that was cause of the theory meeting with such opposition.

Taken aback, Maxwell himself set upon greatly simplifying his own mathematics, by going back through his Treatise and re-doing it. He had finished doing this for about 80% of the book (the first nine chapters or so) when he died of stomach cancer in 1879.

After his death, a modified second edition was published in 1881. Foreword to the second edition was by Niven, who finished the work past where Maxwell had dramatically rewritten the first nine chapter. Some new matter was added and the former contents rearranged and simplified. The rest of the second edition is therefore largely a reprint from the first edition.

The third edition was published in 1891, volumes 1 and 2. This third edition was then edited by J. J. Thomson and a new third edition was published in 1892, by Oxford University Press (much later this one was published unabridged, Dover Publications, New York, 1954). J. J. Thomson finished the publication of the third edition, and wrote a "Supplementary Volume" with his notes. A summary of Maxwell's equations are given in Vol. II, Chapter IX of the third edition.

However, Maxwell had gone (in his work for the second edition) to some pains to reduce the quaternion expressions himself, so as not to require the students to know the calculus of quaternions (so stated on p. 257). We note that Maxwell did not finish the second edition, but died before that. He actually had no hand at all in the third edition as to any changes. The Second edition was later finished by Niven by simply adding the remaining material from the previous first edition approved by Maxwell. The printing of the first nine chapters of the third edition was already underway when J. J. Thomson was assigned to finish the editing of the manuscript.

Quoting Paul Nahin, "Oliver Heaviside," Scientific American, 262(6), June 1990, p. 124:

"Maxwell had predicted that an oscillating electric field in space would generate a magnetic field oscillating at the same frequency, which, in turn, would induce an electric field and so on. This "electromagnetic" wave would necessarily propagate at the speed of light, itself a species of electromagnetic radiation."


Quote p. 124: "Maxwell died at 48 in 1879, nine years before the German genius Heinrich Hertz verified his prediction by detecting electromagnetic waves in space. Almost immediately thereafter Oliver J. Lodge (later Sir Oliver) - who was to be one of Heaviside's most ardent supporters - detected electromagnetic waves in metal wire. Only then did Maxwell's theory become widely accepted as the standard."

Quote p. 124: "Heaviside vastly simplified Maxwell's 20 equations in 20 variables by squeezing their essence into two equations written in two variables (the variables described the magnetic and electric field vectors). Much of the theoretical work was done in parallel with Hertz, who graciously noted in his book on electric waves that "Mr. Heaviside has the priority." ... "For some years the reformulated equations were called the Hertz-Heaviside equations, and later the young Einstein referred to them as the Maxwell-Hertz equations. Today only Maxwell's name is mentioned." ..."Together with Josiah Williard Gibbs of Yale University, Heaviside taught vectors to the world's physicists."

Summarizing on p. 124: "Heaviside vastly simplified Maxwell's 20 equations in 20 variables by squeezing their essence into two equations written in two variables (the variables described the magnetic and electric field vectors)."

We also point out that Heaviside never attended university, and was self-taught. He was brilliant, but hated quaternions and potentials. For potentials, he stated that they should "be murdered from the theory". Today, in modern quantum theory we know that it is the potentials that have the primary reality, and the force fields are merely constructed from them (by their interaction in and with charged matter).

So, as one can see, Maxwell had been dead quite a few years prior to the dramatic reduction of his equations and theory and the emergence of vector analysis. Maxwell's theory did not gain prominence until Hertz and Lodge had experimentally detected electromagnetic waves.

The much-reduced Heaviside-Gibbs-Hertz limited version of Maxwell's theory, with the added Lorentz symmetrization and arbitrary discarding of all asymmetrical Maxwellian systems, has since been taught as "Maxwell's theory". It is Heaviside's equations and Heaviside's notations, as further limited by Lorentz.

In 1892 Lorentz added the coup de grace to even this much-reduced Heaviside vector theory with simple equations and much fewer potentials. Lorentz arbitrarily symmetrized the equations to make them simpler yet, so that closed algebraic solutions could usually be found and one would not have to use numerical methods so widely. He did it merely to simplify the equations to NEW equations having much easier solutions! That he changed the potentials was considered of no consequence, so long as no NET translation force field emerged (even though two new force fields were arbitrarily introduced).

Contrast this to the "argument" that a man standing between two elephants pushing against each other and against him, is no different than the man standing between two fleas pushing against each other and against him. To anyone who believes that, he can stand between the elephants and we will stand between the fleas -- and then we will compare notes on whether or not our systems are "the same". Opposing forces equal and opposite comprise a stress potential, and two systems with differing stress potentials are most certainly not "the same thing".

Indeed, the two free fields that symmetrization introduced, represent free "EM energy from the vacuum" introduced into the system, and then "locked up" in it as stress potential. It deliberately is not allowed to translate electrons, but only to change the physical stress of the system. In short, it is a very convenient way to "lock up" and not use that extra EM field energy from the vacuum that was generated and used in the two equal and opposite new fields.

At the time, by his symmetrization of the Heaviside-Maxwell equations, Lorentz had just (unknowingly and unrecognized to anyone else) discarded all nature's permissible asymmetrical Maxwellian systems -- the very ones that contained the entire class of Maxwellian systems capable of freely receiving energy from the vacuum, creating a NET translation force field in its charged matter system, and using it to push current through loads and power them freely....

Read the rest of it here: http://www.cheniere.org/correspondence/030706.htm









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