Leong Jia Qian A0159928J Short Essay Assignment UNL2206 Nature’s Threads

According to Einstein, Faraday’s and Maxwell’s discovery of the electromagnetic

theory was the “greatest alteration (…) in our conception of the structure of reality since the

foundation of theoretical physics by Newton” (Hirshfeld 2006:212). Drawing from a guided

study on Maxwell’s treatises as well as biographies of Faraday and Maxwell, I will provide a

chronological account of models of thought that led to the development of the

electromagnetic theory as we know it today, and conclude with an evaluation of the impact

that Faraday’s ideas had on Maxwell’s work and divergences among the ideas of the two

scientists.

In 1831, Faraday discovered electromagnetic induction, thus establishing a connection

between electricity and magnetism. Up until then, Newton’s mechanical idea of “action-at-a-

distance” was widely accepted as the concept underpinning electric and magnetic forces as

two distinct forces. The link between electricity and magnetism was first hinted when Oersted

switched on a current and happened to see the needle of a nearby compass jerk (Mahon

2012:178). Subsequently, it has been proven that an electric current could induce a

perpendicular force on a magnetic object, though the reverse could not be proven yet.

It is worthy of note that Faraday received no formal training in mathematics and was

largely an experimentalist. As such, most of his theories were based on intuition. His lack of

mathematical background was apparent when Faraday imagined induction to occur in curved

lines, while the Coulomb’s law refers to a Newtonian force acting along the straight line

between bodies (Simpson 2009:33). One of Faraday’s underpinning concepts of induction was

that of magnetic lines of force which were said to occupy space within and around a magnet

(Hirshfeld 2006:127). The arrangement of iron filings around a magnet led to Faraday to
Leong Jia Qian A0159928J Short Essay Assignment UNL2206 Nature’s Threads

believe that lines of forces existed (Hirshfeld 2006:127). The term “field”, however, was not

coined until 1849.

In advancing his “lines of force” theory, Faraday dismisses the “particle-atom” concept

in explaining forces (Simpson 2009:160). According to Faraday, space is aether-free and

“suffused with electric, magnetic, and gravitational lines of force” (Hirshfeld 2006:167). He

thus suggests the existence of an intervening medium which transmits the static electric force,

focusing on effects of various interposed substances (“dielectrics”) (Simpson 2009:33). As

such, Faraday views electric “charge” as a polarisation of the intervening medium rather than

as a substance of any sort (Simpson 2009:33).

The proposal of physical lines of force shifts the focus from material entities (particles,

magnets, electric circuits, planets) to regions around them. Forces are thought to act in the

surrounding space while the object is now inert (Hirshfeld 2006:169-170). Faraday’s field of

force lines entails a pre-existing potential for force to occur. By symmetry and Faraday’s belief

that the diverse phenomena of nature can be traced to a few fundamental laws and actions,

Faraday expands his “lines of force” theory to electric charges and gravity. Faraday thus

suspects that force occurs “not when some impulse shoots instantaneously from a seat of

power to a remote object (“action at a distance theory”), but when the object encounters the

lines of force that inevitably surround all magnetic, electrical, and gravitating bodies”

(Hirshfeld 2006:128).

While Faraday’s ideas were revolutionary, they had no underlying mathematical

structure, as appreciable by the scientific community, and were thus not widely accepted.

However, the intense speculations and debates about magnetism spurred Maxwell to work

on Faraday’s ideas and eventually express them in concise mathematical equations. To

appreciate the difference in the approaches that Faraday and Maxwell took towards

explaining electromagnetism, one should note that, unlike Faraday, Maxwell received a

holistic education at Edinburgh, and was thus well-versed in a range of subjects, from

Mathematics to Philosophy.

By Maxwell’s time, the concept of “action-at-a-distance” had been widely accepted as

explanations to electricity and magnetism. However, Maxwell targets this very concept and

sought to translate Faraday’s intuitive concept of the field into mathematical terms,

eventually becoming the first to use field equations to represent physical processes. While

discovering these equations, Maxwell tried to avoid “old traditions about forces acting at a

distance” and instead dealt with the subject without prejudice. Even as a “consummate

mathematician”, Maxwell understood “power of math to mislead when not anchored in

experiment or observation” (Hirshfeld 2006:128). As such, Maxwell was glad to be able to

encounter science in its purest form in Faraday’s works, “untainted” by mathematical

manipulation (Hirshfeld 2006:181-182).

In 1855, Maxwell published his first paper “On Faraday’s Lines of Force”, grounded in

geometrical figures. The paper arose directly from Maxwell’s reading of Faraday’s

experiments in electricity and magnetism. By imagining the flow of an ideal fluid1, Maxwell

saw Faraday’s lines of forces through a mathematical lens (Simpson 2009:xii) and sought to

understand the geometry of the “strange curvilinear continuum” that the lines of forces seem

to delineate (Simpson 2009:xvi). In this paper, Maxwell conceptualises lines of force not as

mere lines, but as fine flexible tubes filled with entirely imaginary, massless fluid (Simpson

2009:58). However, not possessing any mass meant that no Physics was involved. Although

1
Incompressible with freely moving parts
Leong Jia Qian A0159928J Short Essay Assignment UNL2206 Nature’s Threads

Maxwell is nowhere near discovering the theory of electromagnetism, he has learnt to think

mathematically about Faraday’s lines of force while keeping to the laws of Newtonian fluid.

By keeping to the purely geometrical idea of the motion of an imaginary fluid, Maxwell sought

to “attain generality and precision, and to avoid the dangers arising from a premature theory

professing to explain the cause of the phenomena” (Simpson 2009:58). He was however not

satisfied as this explanation did not relate electricity and magnetism into one coherent

concept.

In 1861, Maxwell published his second paper, “On Physical Lines of Force”, grounded

in physical possibilities. Here he denounces the geometrical “massless fluid” in his first paper,

and instead shows how space might be filled with a connected physical medium that in

obedience to Newton’s laws would account mechanically for electromagnetism (Simpson

2009:xii). Maxwell tries to imagine how electromagnetic phenomena may be represented by

an imaginary system of “molecular vortices” (Hirshfeld 2006:168-169). At this point,

Maxwell’s explanations are still in the realm of imagination; he fantasises a system of entities

that “have mass, obey Newton’s laws of motion, and might thus in principle exist” (Simpson

2009:139-140). He ironically suggests the “invention of wheels and gears to fill the vacuum”,

but only as a metaphor 2 (Simpson 2009:139-140). While he sees things through the

mathematical lens, Maxwell went to great lengths to avoid using analytic Mathematics, such

as algebra and calculus, as he deemed it an “uncompromising use of formal mathematics”

(Simpson 2009:139-140). In sum, Maxwell examines the magnetic phenomena from a

2
Maxwell does not seriously intend that the devices he conjures up would in fact be found to exist in the form
he is describing
Leong Jia Qian A0159928J Short Essay Assignment UNL2206 Nature’s Threads

mechanical viewpoint (Simpson 2009:144-146) and suggests the possible physical existence

of the electromagnetic field and of a new fluid with mass.

In 1865, Maxwell published his final paper of the series, “A Dynamical Theory of the

Electromagnetic field”, grounded in overall energies rather than in specific Newtonian forces.

The field thus emerges as an “energy-bearing continuum” (Simpson 2009:xvi). In his

revolutionary synthesis of the phenomena of electricity and magnetism, abstract

mathematical construction replaces the visual anchor of a physical analogy, manifesting in a

“set of equations that completely define properties of electromagnetic fields arising from

electric charges, currents, and magnets” (Hirshfeld 2006:190). Maxwell adopts the Lagrange

mathematical methods, which treats the system being analysed like a “black box” i.e.

calculating outputs without knowledge of the internal mechanism (Manon 2012:120-122). As

such, Maxwell’s equations do not reveal what an electromagnetic field is, but only show how

its mathematical properties are computed and give rise to observable phenomena (Hirshfeld

2006:190). The essence of Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory is embodied in four equations

which connect six main quantities, arising from pairs of symmetry (Manon 2012:120-122). He

also resolved the contradiction between Ampère’s Law and the local conservation of electric

charge by introducing the displacement current. He is thus able to conclude that, just as a

changing magnetic field produces an electric current, the reverse is true as well.

In conclusion, Faraday’s ideas formed the basis of Maxwell’s earlier works. Maxwell

recognised that Faraday’s description was intrinsically mathematical, although the

appropriate mathematics had not quite been invented yet. Maxwell thus combined physical

models and mathematical representations to make Faraday’s theory more accessible to the

scientific community and drew the links between his theory and other results in the physics
Leong Jia Qian A0159928J Short Essay Assignment UNL2206 Nature’s Threads

of electricity & magnetism. Maxwell ‘translated’ Faraday’s experimentally-based ‘lines of

force’ into pure mathematical representation, reducing Faraday’s ideas into its abstract

essentials. However, their ideas and approach diverged significantly especially in Maxwell’s

third paper, probably due to the difference in formation they had received. Faraday, who had

no mathematical background, stuck by physical experiments in search of evidence under the

presumption that lines of forces were made of matter, while Maxwell made use of analogical

models to come up with a mathematical conceptualisation of the phenomena. Maxwell’s two-

pronged approach, incorporating the mathematical and the physical, would then lead to the

electromagnetic theory that remains undisputed till today.

References

Hirshfeld, Alan. The Electric Life of Michael Faraday. New York: Walker & Company, 2006.

Mahon, Basil. The Man Who Changed Everything: The Life of James Clerk Maxwell. Chichester:

Wiley, 2012.

Simpson, Thomas K. Maxwell on the Electromagnetic Field a Guided Study. New Brunswick,

NJ: Rutgers University Press, 2009.