Re: Magnetic field collapse



Vince Morgan wrote:
"Benj" <bjacoby@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message

Note
that even the "nothing at all" of a perfect vacuum will break down and
arc if the voltage is high enough.

That's very interesting. I didn't think a DC current could do that. Ion
flow?

Correct. If you have two electrodes in a vacuum, and start raising the
voltage atoms can literally be pulled from the material, ionized and
accelerated across space. These ions smash into the other electrode
liberating lots more atoms which in turn can be ionized and
accelerated across the gap. The whole thing can run away like a chain
reaction until a massive breakdown occurs. It is interesting that one
can actually measure the pre-breakdown currents before an avalanche
effect occurs showing the ions being pulled from the electrodes. High
current vacuum switching devices are built like this with a tiny side
spark as the trigger to inject a few ions to get things going.

Hence, even field theory fails at
some point! And as for "instantaneous", we need to note that all
actions are "retarded" by the speed of light and the distance
traveled. For something to be "instantaneous" requires acceptance of
the long discredited (but lately newly-resurrected) "action at a
distance" theories.

At what rate does a static potential propogate through vacuum?

Both electric and magnetic effect propagate through vacuum at or below
the speed of light. Were it not true then the effect could be used to
transmit information faster than the speed of light. I would note,
however that transluminal transmissions are indeed possible even if
the speed of light for fields is an absolute maximum.

The theories would go like this.

1. one assumes a reality with a number of dimensions higher than 3. If
your transmission takes a "shortcut" through a higher dimension the
path there could be shorter than through your 3D space. Such an effect
would APPEAR to produce transluminal transfers in your space even
though the speed of light might still be c in those higher
dimensions.

2. The other transluminal signaling theory would be to use a particle
beam where the particles are traveling faster than light. As you know
relativity assumes that particles cannot be accelerated faster than
light. The mass apparently acts as if it increases at high speeds
limiting the acceleration. However, if one ponders this
philosophically, one could surmise that if whatever it is that is
producing the acceleration (fields, whatever) are themselves limited
to the speed of light, then clearly as a particle approaches that
speed energy no longer can be transferred. Hence it is not the MASS of
the particle that is increasing in F = ma but rather a force transfer
coefficient in the equation that is tending to zero. Hence it is F
tending toward zero! Transluminal communications then simply require
some mechanism to accelerate particles faster than c. I'm guessing
that some galactic phenomena might produce such acceleration.




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