Volume 1 of an important foundation work of modern physics. Brings to final form Maxwell's theory of electromagnetism and rigorously derives his general equations of field theory.
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Rated by buyers - Back to the 19th Century
It's reading such a book we can understand how powerfull was the 19th Century scientific thought. Maxwell, was a genius as was Newton and Einstein, his book is didactic and clear. A must have.
Rated by buyers - This book is the fountainhead of physics
I suggest that some reviewers miss the significance of Maxwell's book Electricity and Magnetism.
First, it introduced "Dimensional Analysis" which is the standard against which ALL physics models must be tested.
Equations are maths.
Units are politics.
Dimensional Analysis is physics.
( If a model doesn't fit Maxwell's Dimensions, it is not correct.)
Secondly, Maxwell established the framework for Quantum Mechanics when he showed that statistics, rather than two-body math, is required to model multi-body systems.
Thirdly, Maxwell established the framework for modern atomic theory by postulating dimensionless points, and assembling the
points into atoms, molecules, and larger structures, while leaving room for finer complex assembles of points such as quarks and neutrinos.
Fourthly, Maxwell laid the ground work for the Bose-Einstein and Fermi-Dirac distributions, which are slight modifications of Maxwell's distribution to account for the separation of matter into two classes, bosons and fermions.
Fifthly, Einstein's much touted paper on Brownian movement is a variation of Maxwell's more comprehensive treatment of the
velocity distribution of particles.
Just as most historians parrot Herodotus, most physicists parrot Maxwell, but none come close to the masters.
Maxwell was the fountainhead of modern physics, and this book is his best.
Rated by buyers - Good stuff
There's alot of interesting stuff here. Very informative about history yes, but it is still probably the best text on eletromagnetic theory. There is some advanced math in here. I only read part of it for a research project(its huge). From this(and the equation contained within) came the basis for all of modern physics. Maxwell's equations are inconsistent in some ways with classical mechanics. To compensate, physicists had to create relatvity and quantum mechanics. Maxwell's work was not all new stuff. He took other people's theories and summed them up in his book. He then predicted the existence of EM waves and such .
Rated by buyers - A classic that still is worth reading
Whenever I teach a course which touches on electric or magnetic phenomena I find myself going through this book. It works well with the early chapters of Jackson, in particular, and Smythe. Maxwell knew the subject thoroughly, up to the 1870s (and much of this material has since dropped out of courses and almost out of memory), his thinking was both profound and clear, and he may well be the best writer on physics in the English language. His proofs are economical and elegant. Oh yes - this book is still a good reference for the treatment of spherical harmonics and multipole expansions in Cartesian coordinates.
Rated by buyers - Electricity & Magnetism defined mathematically
The book in my opinion coming from a calculus III student is very rigorous and one needs to have a firm foundation on Mathematics I would say about calc III or better to even try to read this book. So far I have just started but every page is exciting because he goes into a deep explanation of what is happening and going on physically and mathematically. Not to mentioned his work is very organized.
- Back to the 19th Century
- Good stuff