Comments on: Thing which may interest only me http://blog.archenemy.org/2004/11/22/thing-which-may-interest-only-me/ rum, bloggery & the lash Fri, 05 Dec 2008 11:41:05 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.6.3 By: the ungoverned http://blog.archenemy.org/2004/11/22/thing-which-may-interest-only-me/#comment-75 the ungoverned Mon, 22 Nov 2004 17:28:05 +0000 http://blog.archenemy.org/?p=197#comment-75 I first learned this amazing fact in a nifty book titled "The Science Of Radio" by Paul Nahin. I didn't know that Einstein cited Maxwell as inspiration, however. Another curious fact is that Maxwell apparently had this mental model of the physics behind electromagnetism which was wildly wrong, but it didn't matter because it lead him to the correct mathematics. I might have read that in a collection of Feynman lectures, perhaps it was The Character of Physical Law. Highly recommended. Now, if you find even a semi-accessible explanation of General Relativity which doesn't require mastery of tensors, I'd love to know about it. Someone once recommended "Spacetime Physics" by Wheeler, but this turns out to be almost entirely about SR with a tiny bit of GR explanation towards the end. I first learned this amazing fact in a nifty book titled “The Science Of Radio” by Paul Nahin.
I didn’t know that Einstein cited Maxwell as inspiration, however.

Another curious fact is that Maxwell apparently had this mental model of the physics behind electromagnetism which was wildly wrong, but it didn’t matter because it lead him to the correct mathematics. I might have read that in a collection of Feynman lectures, perhaps it was The Character of Physical Law. Highly recommended.

Now, if you find even a semi-accessible explanation of General Relativity which doesn’t require mastery of tensors, I’d love to know about it.

Someone once recommended “Spacetime Physics” by Wheeler, but this turns out to be almost entirely about SR with a tiny bit of GR explanation towards the end.

]]>