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From: rhi@festival.ed.ac.uk (Rhiannon Macfie)
Subject: Re: See me, hear me, feel me, touch me.
References: <3n651q$qro@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca> <Andy.Bettis-2404951608250001@andyb-mac.isltd.insignia.com> <1995Apr24.124939.1@daffy.millersv <jandaD7v56L.6JM@netcom.com> <9505010008.AA001en@abarnett.demon.co.uk> <D7z1up.G5u@jack.sns.com> <3otqpp$78b@cabell <s0877891.1.2FCDDEA0@let.rug.nl>
Message-ID: <D9JoIC.F7I@festival.ed.ac.uk>
Sender: news@festival.ed.ac.uk (remote news read deamon)
Organization: Edinburgh University
Date: Fri, 2 Jun 1995 12:10:59 GMT
Lines: 53

In article <s0877891.1.2FCDDEA0@let.rug.nl>, s0877891@let.rug.nl (J.H. Bohnen) writes:
|> In article <3otqpp$78b@cabell.vcu.edu> mus5cbh@cabell.vcu.edu (Corbett B. Hammond) writes:
|> >mvalley@jack.sns.com (Michael Valley) writes:
|> >>Ade The Shade (adrian@abarnett.demon.co.uk) wrote:
|> >>:  >ask me to prove there is a God.  Who do you know there is a God.  I would also
|> >>:  >ask, can you prove there is such a thing as magnatism?
|> 
|> >>: Well, you could go and buy a "magnat", and an iron nail. Bring the
|> >>: two together and see what happens. Does this help?
|> 
|> >>This really does not PROVE magnetism. How do you know that magnetism caused
|> >>the magnet to attract the iron nail? Maybe it was an invisible elf that
|> >>brought the two together? I think this is what the original poster tried to 
|> >>touch on... You can see the effects of magnetism, but can you see magnetism?
|> 
|> >  The force of magnetism can be proven.  On a lodestone are
|> >tiny little charged particles.  A lodestone is a charged little
|> >sliver of some earthy material.  What material, I'm not sure,
|> >but we'll overlook this minor point.
|> >  These charged particles will attract other oppositely charged
|> >particles, particularly those in iron, and repel similarly
|> >charged particles, those in most other magnets.  This effect
|> >can be proved theoretically, since we are not at a point in
|> >technological advancement where we can observe atoms by
|> >themselves.
|> >  Hope this has cleared things up just a bit, and we'll see you
|> >another time.

Hang on. Does this `prove' magnetism any more than the nail? 

Mind you, all it really is is a definition. Magnetism could be *defined* to be
`that force which attracts iron nails to magnets' - not very scientific but a
good working definition - and it could still be caused by your little elf. No
definition of magnetism really tells us how it works: talking of the exchange of
W and Z bosons in electroweak interactions still gets us no closer to what it
really is..

BEEP BEEP BEEP!!!

TANGENT DETECTOR ACTIVATED!!

TANGENT ALERT! TANGENT ALERT!

BEEEEEEEEEPP!!

  ......................................................................
 !                                   !                                  !
 !         If you're not             !         Rhiannon Macfie          !
 !      part of the solution,        !   email Rhiannon.Macfie@ed.ac.uk !
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