A new view of Magnetic Field (by Alfvén's Doctoral Student)

[Infinion]

Bibhas De is one of the past doctoral students of Hannes Alfvén. Of the several different essays, ideas, and scientific papers on his website I would like to focus this thread on his view of "magnetic field"

The essay in question http://www.bibhasde.com/magmass.html is based on a published scientific paper http://www.bibhasde.com/magmasspaper.pdf

His claim: In empty space there exists a colocated and contemporaneous mass of magnetostatic field (a magnetic field that does not change with time, ergo static).

The significance: If a magnetic field has a colocated mass, then there exists an inertial characteristic to a changing magnetic field. Therefore the current view of the speed of information propagation of a magnetic field from it's 'field line' to an observer is not an instantaneous 'action at a distance' when said magnetic field changes, nor the speed of light, but something else that can be experimentally verified.

Summary/quick take of the essay's sections


I. FROM HUANG DI TO PRESENT DAY: A WRONG HAUL?
Bibhas questions whether the basic scientific concept of a magnetic field (which is thought to have been complete at this time) is correct based on three things:
(1). The understanding correctly explains observations made.
(2). The understanding correctly predicts observations yet to be made.
(3). The understanding offers no difficulties over a long period of application.

"A certain idea may serve well for a long time, until some difficulty – even if subjective difficulty – surfaces. Then it is ready for a new assessment. "

II. MATHEMATICAL ENTITY vs REAL ENTITY
Bibhas contrasts the difference between a real entity (something seen, felt, or otherwise sensed) and a mathematical entity (a circle in space, a line of latitude, a magnetic field line)

III. THE PRESENT VIEW
"Magnetic field" is both a theoretical concept and a mathematical definition.
The theoretical concept: When a bar magnetic exerts a force on a compass needle, there exists an "action at a distance" conveyed from the magnet (source) to the needle (observer) through empty space. Therefore there exists around the bar magnet a region of influence, called its magnetic field. This region of influence extends out to infinite distances in all directions. When the needle is placed in various locations around the bar magnet, the orientation of the needle changes. If the orientation at each point is plotted on a piece of paper along with the direction the needle faces, gently curving lines appear to connect the North pole of the magnet to the South pole. These are the conceptual magnetic field lines.

The mathematical definition: A compass needle always aligns itself to be tangential to the field line. The lines are denser where the force of alignment is stronger. Therefore the final mathematical definition is this: The magnetic field at any point is tangential to the magnetic field line at that point, and the strength of the field is proportional to the number of field lines per unit cross-sectional area perpendicular to the field lines there.

IV MAGNETIC FIELD IN THE LABORATORY
Mentions the same magnet and compass experiment to visualize magnetic field. When using iron filings, although it has the appearance that the field lines are now a real thing (iron filings), an appearance is all it is. Magnetic field 'lines' are still mathematical entities.

V MAGNETIC FIELD IN NATURE
Mentions the planetary and solar magnetic fields. Mentions a "property of magnetic field line" and highlights that this real property has been placed on a mathematical entity. It is said that charged particles cannot readily move across a magnetic field line, but are free to move along it. By saying this, magnetic field lines have now become real enties.

Magnetic field lines visualized with compasses, iron filings, in drawings of the observed magnetosphere, and in photographs of the solar photosphere and distant galaxies has conveyed a sense of reality of the magnetic field lines as if they were real ropes or strings in space. Physicists use this imagery in the process of forming their ideas (ideas like magnetic reconnection)

VI. A CHOICE AND ITS CONSEQUENCES

What is the fastest speed at which two objects can influence each other? It is supposedly the speed of light. As long as you are concerned with small distances like between two compass needles on a table, it works fine. But as soon as that distance is as large as the radius of Jupiter's magnetosphere, for example, time of travel becomes a problem. This same problem is what caused Einstein to formulate his view of gravitation, the problem of the speed of propagation of 'action at a distance' between two points A and B.

Like mentioned above, the modern view of magnetic field was conceived when scientific and mathematical foundations were laid in the 19th century, and it was based on an earthly bar magnet on a table. As soon we discovered that the influence of a magnet could exist over such large distances, we needed to reconsider our view of magnetic field.

If an electron is at a location O in the magnetic field of Jupiter's magetosphere, then the electron trajectory is influenced by the planetary magnetic field at that location O. What happens to the electron when Jupiter's magnetic field instantaneously ceases to exist?


Scenario A: Since the source of the magnetic field is gone, its mathematically defined field at O is also gone instantly. So the electron motion changes instantaneously.
Scenario B: There involves a certain travel time. At the instant the magnetic field disappears, the electron has no knowledge that anything has happened. The "news" of the disappearance has to travel to the electron before it changes its motion. This news can travel only as fast as the velocity of light, c. Thus, a time R/c must pass before the electron trajectory will change. During this period, the electron moves as though nothing has happened.

Scenario A is unphysical, where information travels to the electron at infinite speed.
In Scenario B the electron learns of the disappearance at the speed of light.

Bibhas chooses scenario B as the correct one, but states that there are consequences of this choice.

The consequences: Something remains at O even after Jupiter's source of magnetic field has disappeared, meaning the magnetic field at O is a real thing and not a mathematical entity. At least, something physical has been collocated at O until the news reaches that its source is gone.

How did Einstein solve this same paradox for gravitation? He assumed scenario B, said that the gravitational observer will continue to orbit it's source for a time R/c before going off, and proposed that the real entity emplaced at the observer's location is the modified space around the body, and this distorted space remains until the news reaches that the source is gone, whereby it restores the modified space to normal.

Bibhas De, instead proposing a distortion of space (a new dimension), ascribes a matterless mass to the space to solve the magnetic field paradox. He attempts to do this by exploring the idea from first principles instead of turning it into a preconceived idea.

Bibhas De is examining the idea that magnetic field is a mass and not that magnetic field has a mass

VII. A DEFINITION AND ITS CONSEQUENCES

The most unambiguous definition of mass is: Mass = Momentum/Velocity as a scalar quantity (grams/pounds) whose velocity is less than that of light. Every entity that has mass must fit this definition. Any entity that does not is not 'mass'. An electromagnetic wave has momentum, but since its velocity is the velocity of light, this definition does not apply.

This unambiguous definition of mass is independent of gravitation, and rightly so, an absolute definition of mass cannot depend on gravitation.

Here, Bibhas introduces the paper for this essay, magmasspaper.pdf (linked at the top) and claims that it is proof that according to the above definition, 'magnetic field' in empty space is a mass. The purpose of the paper is to justify, or rather, incite experimentation to find out "how much" the mass is in grams/pounds.

VIII. THE WIND AND THE DANDELION

To state that something has mass requires properties of matter to make it a real entity. The mass suggested for magnetic field is compared to wind. They are both invisible, but visibility is not a requirement to define mass. They both have inherent directionality, but this too is not a requirement. To measure mass requires relative motion between the entity and the measuring apparatus. You cannot measure the mass of magnetic field if the relative velocity is along the field direction, but the same is the case for wind.

He briefly goes into a wind analogy where wind field lines could be defined, would look like the dipolar field lines of a bar magnet, and if made to flow for some sufficiently long distance, a dandelion observer at the other end would experience a propagation delay if the source pumping the air was suddenly shut off.

He states that the wind has both mass and energy, but by the mass-energy relation, the velocity of the wind increases the mass of the air. Ergo, the wind is a mass (as much as a scalar mass can have a vector field character)

IX. LOOK TO A GREAT PHYSICS INTUITIONIST

Hannes Alfvén conceived the Critical Velocity phenomenon in attempts to address certain problems found in astrophysics at the time. The idea says that when a neutral gas moves across a static magnetic field in the presence of a plasma, and when the kinetic energy of its motion is equal to the ionization energy of the neutral gas atoms, the neutral gas undergoes substantial ionization. While the phenomenon is real, there is still no known mechanism for conversion of the kinetic energy of the atoms to the energy of the electron orbit in the atom, even after several experiments and theories to make a simple explanation.

Bibhas De has contented himself by saying that the overall theory is a pastiche of all the theories proposed

If a magnetic field is not a mathematical definition of an 'action-at-distance' force, and if something real is present corresponding to the magnetic field at the location in question, then perhaps this real entity is able to act as the mechanism that contributes energy to the physical process of ionization as per his published paper http://iopscience.iop.org/0305-4470/27/12/006 viewable here.

The Critical Ionization Velocity phenomenon was mentioned as possible evidence that there could be something real, namely a mass, to a magnetic field.

But a much more important point to note, was that Hannes Alfvén was the first to raise issues about the physical nature of magnetic field. He evolved the concept of frozen-in magnetic field lines (field lines in a conducting fluid appear to move along with the fluid, like kelp stems undulating in ocean waves). But again, when it appeared that the field lines were something actual, physicists made a mess of the early concept (using this idea in the process of forming magnetic reconnection).

Alfvén warned people against seeing magnetic field lines as material lines, but the whole thing became too obscure and murky to lead to any great insights. Ergo there is a pending question as to whether Alfvén’s ideas clued us in on the reality of magnetic field lines. While he by no question possessed the capacity to come to an ultimate conclusion, opposition at each visionary step by the mainstream saw to its discontinuation.

X. LOOK TO THE RAGTAG PIONEERS
(presupposition from the works of others that could point to Bibhas's idea that magnetic field is a mass)

Bibhas looks at the cross-field antenna which is capable of synthesizing an EM wave composed of time-varying, but non-propagating electric and magnetic fields. Ergo if you take the limit of very slow time-variation (slow down time so that it is no longer varying), the static magnetic field component is a real thing.

Also Bo Lehnert – a protege of Hannes Alfven – proposed that a photon has a small, but nonzero, rest mass. What is a photon at rest? An iota of electromagnetic energy. Ergo if this iota of energy is a mass, then magnetic field is a mass

XI. IF HISTORY WERE ANY GUIDE...
(it is recommended that you read the original section for this)

http://www.bibhasde.com/magessence.jpg

XII. WHY TRANSEINSTEINIAN?

According to the traditional mass-energy relation, when you add an amount of energy to a mass, this mass increases by an amount (heating a cup of water, compressing a string, charging a battery, etc.). Mass and energy are two distinct entities of physics: an EM wave traveling in space is pure EM energy and has no mass. In contrast, a static magnetic field in empty space has no co-located energy. What is referred to as "magnetic energy" resides in the material source of B field -- a bar magnet, an inductance solenoid, etc -- as stored mechanical energy).

Ergo, a static magnetic field in empty space is pure mass, and an EM wave in empty space is pure energy (pure in the sense that is not part mass and part energy)

Further still, this means that the connection between mass and energy is time variation
Mass + time variation = Energy
Energy - time variation = Mass

Between static magnetic field and EM wave magnetic field, there are a continuum of states where the field is part mass and part energy.

This is Bibhas De's TransEinsteinian consideration of the mass-energy relation. Why does he make this relation? Because he claims that his proposed mass of magnetostatic field and the conventional energy of magnetostatic field do not satisfy Einstein's mass-energy relation. There is a discrepancy of a factor of 2 which is unresolved.

http://www.bibhasde.com/magfldmass.jpg

XIII. THE UNIVERSE IN JUST TWO SYMBOLS
Bibhas De claims that the ultimate nature of the universe can be contained in two symbols: magnetic field B, and time variation d/dt (not time).
XIV. CONSIDERATIONS IN EXPERIMENTAL VERIFIABILITY

When a piece of metal is magnetized, its mass increases. But as per the mass-energy relation, the increase in mass is in the metal. If Bibhas De claims that there is also a mass in the empty space surrounding the metal, there must be an experimentally verifiable way to measure this mass.

Bibhas proposes that the density of the mass in empty space is extremely small: 8.85^(-12) x B^2 kg/m^3, and so in order to measure this, he describes an experiment involving weighing a solenoid both when a current is passing through it, and when there is no current.

XV. A PROPOSED EXPERIMENT

the proposed experiment

XVI. IMAGINATION AT ITS LOGICAL EXTREME

as a consequence of his new view of magnetic field, he has a theory of free-standing source-free magnetic field structures, obtained as a solution of maxwell's equations (and further essays similar to this one). A structure that could be likened to a photon at rest.

XVII. A GRANDE LATTE, ANYONE?
XVIII. THE TOMB: BE AFRAID!
XIX. THE ADVENTURE OF THE ENGINEER'S DIGIT

XX. THE STRANGE CASE OF THE SURVEYOR'S PARADOX

When a measurement fails in a specific case does it mean all other measurements are meaningless?

XXI. CLOSING THOUGHTS
physicist + natural philosopher = Bibhas De



------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Anyways, I think Bibhas De as well as proponents of the EU could both benefit from coming together. I think we have everything to benefit from considering several of his ideas, including this one, because it attempts to derive meaning from first principals.

Feel free to explore some of his other ideas here http://www.bibhasde.com/physicsindex.html

[justcurious]

The proposed experiment seems simple enough. Is it still in "proposed" status?
Seems to me, it might be worth the effort to actually do the experiment instead of just proposing it, wouldn't it add a lot more credibility to the idea?

[Infinion]

The proposed experiment seems simple enough. Is it still in "proposed" status?
Seems to me, it might be worth the effort to actually do the experiment instead of just proposing it, wouldn't it add a lot more credibility to the idea?

Yeah, It was proposed in 2006 and the experiment still hasn't been attempted 7 years later. Dunno, lack of attention/support?

I'm doing some googling to see roughly how much a project like this would cost

Strong neodymium magnets are cheap, $25-$75 worth of several different magnet sizes/geometries should be more than enough for this experiment (via http://www.kjmagnetics.com/categories.asp ). Size shouldn't matter as long as the magnetometer is properly positioned along the magnet's plane of rotation.

Bibhas says the drive shaft directly connecting the magnet and the motor should be long enough that the magnetic field in the motor doesn't factor into the experiment. I buy my metal shafts from Metal Supermarkets https://www.metalsupermarkets.com/ and alternatively Online Metals https://www.onlinemetals.com/index.cfm
a 4 foot long round bar costs $10

A variable speed motor should be pretty cheap considering there aren't any real mechanical loads involved with rotation. For the most part a cheap DC PM motor can be used with a voltage regulator (search DC motor speed controller on ebay or amazon ) or I suppose you could just set up a variac with a single phase AC motor. No idea what rotational speeds Bibhas had in mind so that would definately need to be clarified with him (he's not hard to get ahold of, and I'm sure he'd be more than willing to cooperate) before anything.

If a sensitive, fast-reponse magnetometer is required with a voltage output signal, the best bet would be a magnetometer/gaussmeter probe that connects to an oscilloscope channel. As far as I've seen these seem ridiculously expensive, from $400 to $1500+ I suppose you could get a cheap 3-axis surface mount magnetometer on a PCB for under $20, but not sure if that would work accordingly well, especially with the voltage signals.

Laser emitters won't be expensive but there will be a cost associated with the mount for it. The laser mount needs to be adjustable and constrained to one degree of freedom parallel to the magnet's plane of rotation. No idea what that would cost atm.

A light detector / photodetector that connects to an oscilloscope looks like it would cost between $70 and $300

As far as buying oscilloscopes goes, http://www.picotech.com/applications/os ... orial.html is an excellent guide to understanding what is actually required of digital oscilloscopes to operate properly. I'm biased towards these kinds of oscilloscopes http://www.picotech.com/picoscope2000.html

So yeah, this is could easily be a $1000-$2000 project, it's really the oscilloscope probes that are knocking the price way up, the other components really aren't that bad

[justcurious]

I was looking for oscilloscopes myself, was wanting to do my own experiments with plasma vacuum tubes etc.
I expected them to be a lot more expensive, some decent ones seem to be available for 2-3 hundred dollars.
I was surprised to find so many fancy digital scopes nowadays. I only ever used the standard old (analog?) scopes of 20 years ago (college lab stuff), which I would think get the job done. But I probably wouldn't even know a crappy one from a good one.

I suppose the investment is not very high, if you're really confident it will work out.
Papers, math, will get you so far. Tesla had to build machines, only then did people believe him.
If you really believe in what you are researching and discovering, I suggest there is nothing better than a machine or device to demonstrate it, something along the lines of "the proof is in the pudding".

I'm sorry to hear this sad story. It seems so typical nowadays of society, politics, corporations, and now even the scientific institutions... the stupids rise to the top and the bright people get trampled on.

Good luck!

[Corpuscles]

Infinion

Thanks so much for posting this extremely interesting essay.

Gee, it will take me some time to digest, but my gut feel is the "experiment" has a Michelson and Morely feel to it... I don't think it will produce a result.?

Babhas De claims he has proven it. I am yet to read his published paper (being fully aware I'll need time to struggle through the math. But he says he has.

If he is contactable (as you say) perhaps you could ask him the status of the experiment before launching into the project yourself.

Better yet , ask him to guest appear in this thread!!!!

Wow! His CV very very impressive and despite his emotional overblown critique (for good darned reason) of MS hegemony of science...seems like a good bloke !

[xris]

I can never understand the term field.A field of what exactly, as if the word defines the characteristics of what we are trying to understand.Any field is filled with something. It has a no substance. We have tried gravitons but they failed examination so particles are excluded.We understand that only certain material are observed with magnetic ability but the molecular reasoning is far from understood.As an amateure observer I find science is not admitting its failure to really convey what it actually knows about magnetism.Maybe someone could tell me what actually exists in this magnetic field?

[Sparky]

This is what I have been looking for.... Now if I can understand it!

[Sparky]

I have begun the reading of links above. Here are some excerpts and comments for consideration:

He works all the time with strong magnets, and has to move them around in his laboratory. He said that, long before he read about my theory, he had a strange feeling that he was moving something more than just the visible physical object!

If you have ever had a CT scan, You know that there is something physical hitting your body. Now I don't know if it was the magnetic field or the sound, or both...

http://www.bibhasde.com/magmass.html#intuitionist

If magnetic field were a mass, this would be the first time ever that we know of an instance where our body occupies the same space with another mass!

errrr, would radiation be joint occupation?

static magnetic field

Michael Faraday (1791-1867)
"I cannot conceive curved lines of force without the conditions of a physical existence in that intermediate space."

James Clerk Maxwell (1831-1879)
"…we cannot help thinking that in every place where we find these lines of force, some physical state or action must exist in sufficient energy to produce the actual phenomena."

What is more, a new voice has now been added. In June 2006 I received from Romanian physicist Ionel Dinu a manuscript that opens with the above two quotes from Faraday and Maxwell (This is the first time I learned about these quotes). Dinu explains that magnetic field lines cannot be just fictitious geometric lines, but that something real exists where the lines are. In his view, the field lines are a manifestation of the flow of the pervasive ether. Dinu faced rejection from the physics establishment, but fortunately for him and for science, his paper is being published (Ionel Dinu, "What’s behind Faraday’s Magnetic Lines of Force", Electric Spacecraft Journal, Issue No. 41, August 2006, pages 24-30.)

Ionel Dinu " Aether is that missing chapter in our book of natural philosophy which can lead us to understanding physical phenomena to a degree of completeness and consistency never dreamt of by human civilization."

J. A. Stratton."There appears to be an inertial character associated with electromagnetic fields."

an EM wave magnetic field is pure energy.

I suggest that an EM wave is more of a carrier of energy, not pure energy.
It propagates through the semi solid aether, and energizes matter that it hits.

So, static magnetic field in empty space at O is pure mass, and an EM wave in empty space at O is pure energy.

Static magfield is potential/carrier of energy. If there is such a thing! Static Fields, for me now, are not static, but a low flow of mass.

Terminology is important. If there is a Field around a magnet, it is not static.

Ideas?

[justcurious]

I thought that Hannes Alfven did a u-turn on his earlier concept "frozen in magnetic fields" in plasma and that in fact this was an incorrect assumption. Didn't his doctoral student know this?
It looks like Bibhas is talking about something that is not new (hundreds of years old), the concept of an Aether.
Bibhas paper is not viewable unless you pay money, I guess I will never read it. Oh well, it was an interesting idea. I guess this is the end of my inquiry.

[Sparky]

I am under the impression that the "frozen in field" was abandoned by Alfven. Will go from there, and toward a physical field that propagates through an aether. Will assume a solid/fluid aether and see if anything fits or not.

The only particle aether that I know of is that of MJV's, which also is a particle "mag. field". Need to chase down his website and see if his hypothesis has evolved.
I guess that I need to make a list of criteria for the model....

[nick c]

Yes, Aflven abandoned the concept of frozen in magnetic fields.

http://plasma.colorado.edu/phys7810/art ... s_1976.pdf

Later Alfven and Falthammar [1963, 1971]strongly warned against a general use of the frozen-in concept. It is increasingly evident that this concept belongs in the pseudo-plasma formalism which is useful only in special cases.

.

[Sparky]

J. A. Stratton."There appears to be an inertial character associated with electromagnetic fields."

an EM wave magnetic field is pure energy.

"Inertial character"? Something to think about?
I suggest that an EM wave is more of a carrier of energy, not pure energy.
It propagates through the semi solid aether, and energizes matter that it hits.

So, static magnetic field in empty space at O is pure mass, and an EM wave in empty space at O is pure energy.

Static magfield is potential/carrier of energy. If there is such a thing! Static Fields, for me now, are not static, but a low flow of mass.

The paper provides proofthat according to the above definition, magnetic field in empty space is a mass.

If a new view of magnetic field has to be developed, why shouldn’t one consider the field as modifying the space it occupies

Terminology is important. If there is a Field around a magnet, it is not static, but a flow of mass. Anyone going to address this point?

[justcurious]

@sparky...

So if a magnetic "field" has mas or whatever (ie there is an Aether), then what about the gravity field?
Does the gravity field contain something even if the space is empty?
If a "field" necessarily contains something, then why limit to magnetic and/or electric fields?

[Sparky]

@sparky...

So if a magnetic "field" has mas or whatever (ie there is an Aether), then what about the gravity field?
Does the gravity field contain something even if the space is empty?
If a "field" necessarily contains something, then why limit to magnetic and/or electric fields?

Michael Faraday (1791-1867)
"I cannot conceive curved lines of force without the conditions of a physical existence in that intermediate space."

I am exploring the different configurations of aether, and the possibilities that there is more than one aether. Now I am focusing on a solid matrix which is able to transmit force at a distance almost instantly. Also, this aether is electrically transparent,which allows for charge field to pass unrestricted through it.



Here is someone with ability to theorize and model...
http://youtu.be/9sUe6SL22NA
http://youtu.be/FTBISCAjh60

I am way over my pay grade with this

[Sparky]

Bibhas De is examining the idea that magnetic field is a mass and not that magnetic field has a mass

How would one substance , that is mass, not have mass?

magnetic field. This region of influence extends out to infinite distances in all directions.

This does not seem correct. What maths were used to determine this?

Mass and energy are two distinct entities of physics: an EM wave traveling in space is pure EM energy and has no mass.

A wave is transmitting it's energy via the medium upon which it rides.
The medium, aether, has mass, and it returns the energy to the EM wave when the wave contacts matter. Effectively the EM wave borrowed the aether mass to transport it's energy.

a static magnetic field in empty space has no co-located energy.

There is no "static field". The field is a mass of moving aether, a local disruption of the aether matrix. Any intrusion into that disruption of aether by a conductor will exhibit electrical phenomenon, as demonstrated by experiment.[/quote]

What thinketh thee?