What are magnetic field lines made of?

This question is very interesting.

I have never really understood the nature of "fields" in general and its very hard to get a clear answer.

For example, space is a vaccum, right? Yet light travels through space. Light can be seen as a wave. So my question is, "what's waving?" For example, when you toss a pebble into a pond and it makes ripples, these are waves, or vibrations. The water is what is waving. But when a light wave travels through vaccum space, what exactly is waving?

???

Originally posted by butcherguy
I need to ask again.

What is transferred through a magnetic field to cause action at a distance?

Photons have been mentioned, but I don't like that answer, since a photon-opaque barrier can be placed between the objects in the interacting field and the action still takes place...

It's not so much like a light shining on something sort of photon.

It's more an imbalance in the whichness of what that causes virtual photons to sort of pop out of nothingness to get the balance right. They don't stream from the magnet to the steel needle like a flashlight, they sort of emerge around the particles of the needle and the magnet and start shepherding them together or apart. You'd have to put your mirrors down by the nuclei.

It's actually worse than you think - it happens for every electron as well. Each little electron sitting there with what might be a really colossal field, blanketed with little virtual photons that wrap it up totally, except for the little bit that happens to escape, and what leaks out is always exactly the 'charge' of one electron.

I sort of hate virtual photons myself but the math correlates to tons of experimental data, and then there's the really oddball stuff that only makes sense with virtual photons. If you can imagine the sort of thing that only virtual photons can explain AT ALL, you'll get a sort of sense of how creepy and unnatural the thing is. In that case, you've not only got virtual photons, you've got virtual photons going backwards in time, as well as interactions with photons that were never there but potentially could have been there if they had been observed. Ugh. I get headaches thinking about that thing.

Originally posted by Partygirl
This question is very interesting.

I have never really understood the nature of "fields" in general and its very hard to get a clear answer.

For example, space is a vaccum, right? Yet light travels through space. Light can be seen as a wave. So my question is, "what's waving?" For example, when you toss a pebble into a pond and it makes ripples, these are waves, or vibrations. The water is what is waving. But when a light wave travels through vaccum space, what exactly is waving?

???

Electric and magnetic fields that create each other as they propagate, in a sort of leapfrog.

The math makes more sense if you understand it than verbal descriptions. I'm not good at verbalizing that sort of thing either, I have to draw.

ETA: there are a series of "do what?" stages I think everyone goes through as you progress through field theory, to the point that they finally say "my head is full" and stop at their level of incompetence. Field theory in general is usually what you hear eggheads tossing at each other when they're going on about GR and SR. It's like a martial art - there is no place where you say "I know ALL OF IT! Mwa ha ha!" because it just goes on and on.

That might be because we just don't have a clear understanding of the giant overall framework that would give us nice simplifying viewpoints that would tell us "all these things are just variations on a theme, and that theme is...", and there would be the master key to all field theory. That's why you see people like Einstein spend their lives looking for a unified field theory, because if you knew THAT, you could do anything at all that you were clever enough to pry out of the UFT.

Of course, urban scientific legend says that AE and von Neumann DID discover the UFT, and that's the really big cover up, the Grand Unifying Conspiracy Theory. Perhaps. We will never know.

reply to post by Bedlam

virtual photons

I know that you didn't make the name up.

But what I am saying is that I can make up a name for a 'virtual' particle that matches up with the data that we already have from experiments. In other words, I view it as a scientific cop-out.

I would be fine with it if magnetic phenomenon were virtual also.... but everything I see tells me they are real.

A star for your honest answer.

reply to post by Partygirl


Light is an interesting thing in of itself due to the fact that it behaves as both a particle (mass-less photons) and a wave. So while yes, a wave needs a medium with which to propogate, a photon does not.

Space is a near-perfect vacuum, yes, but it is not a complete vacuum. There are plenty of molecules and such floating around out there, but compared to the air at sea-level on the Earth well...it almost might as well be a complete vacuum.

Originally posted by butcherguy
But what I am saying is that I can make up a name for a 'virtual' particle that matches up with the data that we already have from experiments. In other words, I view it as a scientific cop-out.

If you invoked it as an ad hoc solution for just one situation, I'd agree. Unfortunately, it's like making up something, and then discovering you can apply the same made up thing here, and Here, and THERE and before you know it, your made up thing magically fit a ton of seemingly unrelated situations. Eventually, you'd start to believe that maybe you guessed right, even if you didn't want that to be true.

I would be fine with it if magnetic phenomenon were virtual also.... but everything I see tells me they are real.

Centrifugal force looks real too,but it turns out not to be. However, any time field theory crap starts bothering me, I take off my physics hat and put on my engineering hat and all the problems go away. HA

reply to post by Bedlam

If you invoked it as an ad hoc solution for just one situation, I'd agree. Unfortunately, it's like making up something, and then discovering you can apply the same made up thing here, and Here, and THERE and before you know it, your made up thing magically fit a ton of seemingly unrelated situations. Eventually, you'd start to believe that maybe you guessed right, even if you didn't want that to be true.

Why do they call these 'virtual' photons?

They are virtual because there is no solid proof of their existence. They are an invention to fit the gap in the equation.

Centrifugal force looks real too,but it turns out not to be. However, any time field theory crap starts bothering me, I take off my physics hat and put on my engineering hat and all the problems go away. HA

Yes, engineering is real.

What are magnetic field lines made of ?,a very good question! I would opt for them being composed of positrons and neutrons that use wave type transference to transmit themselves,It was more or less upon this hypothesis that Tesla based his universal wireless energy research upon,they are certainly a fascinating phenomena and (IMO) are too well defined to be anything other than an "engineered" power source,lay lines,I would suggest are nothing more than magnetic field lines,their purpose? well I like to think that they were used as a magnetic levitation grid for ancient craft.

Originally posted by butcherguy
They are virtual because there is no solid proof of their existence. They are an invention to fit the gap in the equation.

There's been some elaborate research into whether you can directly observe them - I think the vacuum polarization guys managed it.

Seems like I recall seeing it years ago in physical review.

You'd have a meltdown with the reverse tau virtual photon targeting system. I often felt like throttling the eggheads I had to deal with. The conversations went something like

me: so, how does it know where to aim? There's no moving parts...

eh: It doesn't really aim, the beam emerges at the right place to hit the target

me: sounds like aiming

eh: all the possible beam exits are a superposition of possible eigenstates in a probability sheaf of n eigenvectors taken over the...

me: AAAAAA

eh: well, basically, you know that you have to have a pilot photon to trigger the beam...

me: ok

eh: well, the photons in the pilot don't actually have to reflect from the target to cause targeting of the reflection, if one COULD have hit the target and been observed, you get a superposition of eigen..

me: AAAAAA. So, I have to have the pilot, and it has to sort of be in the right place at the right time, but I don't have to see it, and it doesn't have to hit the target?

eh: right, just has to have been able to

me: why have it then? Just imagine it was there?

eh: it's all quantum

me: so how does the thing always hit even if there's enough separation that you've got laser time-of-flight delay?

eh: that's worse

me: try me

eh: not only do you get pilot photons that don't have to hit, and that you don't have to observe, just that they MIGHT have been observed, now you have to add in the virtual photons that could have done the same thing. Only...the virtual photons are travelling backwards in time, and when they arrive at [apparatus] they reverse tau again and instantiate...or at least they have the potential to instantiate, even if they don't really, it's the same thing as the pilot photon. And since it's propagating backwards in time, you set up a negative feedback loop around the target and [apparatus] such that the sheaf of probabilities are reduced to the one correct firing solution. Nothing aims - it just happens that no other solution could work, and the system does this by backward propagating virtual photons that collapse the wave function to the right one.

me: I need alcohol. Lots of alcohol.

reply to post by Bedlam
Did that convo really occur?

Seems too hilarious to have actually happened.

Originally posted by butcherguy
reply to post by Bedlam

 

Did that convo really occur?

Seems too hilarious to have actually happened.

It's sort of a combination of a bunch of separate conversations, with all my f bombs edited out.

But when the eggheads start pulling reverse time propagating virtual photons collapsing probability function sets to the one solution that corrects for atmospheric beam distortion, target motion and focus, it's tough to swallow unless you're an egghead. Or would have corrected. Or did correct. Did have corrected? Meh. English doesn't cover it.

You'd think that was as bad as it got, but there's worse variations of that technology. Much, much worse. At least in terms of making any rational sense, but then that's a hallmark of quantum mechanics: if it doesn't make sense, it's probably true.

Magnetic field lines of force is simply the bending of space and not time. The energy does not come from the magnet itself but rather from the quantum level. The atoms in a magnet all line up in the same direction and the spin causes motion within the quantum existence. It's the same as a vacuum cleaner that sucks air in one end and pushes it out the other end. The vacuum cleaner is not the air, but it is the substance that is in motion is the air. So too, the field is not the the magnet but the substance being forced through the magnet. at the quantum level. Think of it as quantum air and the magnet as the quantum vacuum cleaner sucking in the quantum air at one end and out the other. I hope that helps.

reply to post by Dashdragon


I've been playing around with the notion that rather than quantum particles (photons in particular) being simultaneously a waveform and a particle, that they may instead alternate between the two states. This would imply that matter exists in an indeterminate state between being and non-being, and that motion (waveform) is polarized with manifestation (particle).

Which brings us back into brain-hurty math territory. I gotta go ice my head down.

Great thread, excellent contributions all round.

reply to post by JaxCavalera


It also can be caused the the Rotation of the solid iron core inside the magma

Before I start, I want to thank all of you for your really excellent contributions thus far. I was worried I'd wake up this morning and come here to find a completely empty thread and then have to try and find another location where interest in such a curious topic may exist but my hunch on this community being above the average was right XD

P.S. Yes I am after some information relating to what the magnetic field lines are composed of as I also don't believe they are totally virtual being that they are a tangible force. Centrifugal force on the other hand is only a virtual force as it doesn't exist and I don't feel that it really is on the same level as the composition of magnetic field lines being that it's a term used to describe an effect, where as Magnetic Field Lines is a term used to describe physical (in the same sense as light or air are physical).

A few theories from replies that spiked a bit more thought were the following :
reply to post by kwakakev


This is an interesting concept, it made me think that perhaps the South end of a magnet is where all the Electrons reside and the North end is where the Protons reside and then you have the field lines being made up of Neutrons that allow the flow of the field to occur? (seems simplistic and no doubt wrong but still it's something that did occur to me as I read this).

I mean in essence, it would more likely be that each pole were either a Proton and the opposite end a Neutron gathering point and the lines the Electrons. The only thing that makes me unsure of this is that if they were electrons, can electrons move other electrons? It seems to me that perhaps instead Neutrons may be able to move electrons due to them facilitating an attraction between the North and South poles of the magnet and thus they would substitute some of the Neutron field lines from connecting to the South end of the magnet (where the Electrons reside).

reply to post by butcherguy


reply to post by Toromos


reply to post by Bedlam


The above replies relate to the field lines as being photons in one way or another.

When my brain wants to work, I get a very vivid image of how this could be but then it ceases to want to comprehend it again and I'm back to being irritated about the description of such a substantial force falling between tangible and non tangible states.

Also, with mention to this a little further, it's an interesting force indeed as it is able to neutralise the effects of gravity.

I too have always been under the impression that a photon were related to light beams and thus you would be able to deflect a magnetic field using some form of mirror. This doesn't seem to be possible which is where I noticed mention that they aren't photons in the sense of light photons but a different form of photon.

Not to complicate this too much further but I did want to bring into this subject the aspect of diamagnetic water and other superconductors. I read an earlier post that mentioned it but it hasn't been mentioned since. Perhaps by looking at the reason for this interaction and what a water molecule consists of, there may be some interesting links here too.

Thanks again for all the posts thus far, looking forward to more of your thoughts

The above replies relate to the field lines as being photons in one way or another.

There are no lines. The so called lines created by iron fillings e.g. are a construct of your brain. They are just iron fillings oriented by the magnetic field.

Even the magnetic field is just a consequence of the finite propagation speed of a changing electric field. But then the whole field idea(maxwell) is just a model. We have no friggin idea what is really going on there and we won't be able to know it. It's like being stuck in a box and trying to describe the things happening outside.

The quantum physicists simply don't care and use what comes handy to get the job done. The field model isn't general enough. Thus they go for photons. For you a photon is a light particle. For them it is something that has energy, momentum, speed and no mass, that's all. For some reason it fits quite well if one goes on to describe a model of the fundamental interactions in the known universe.

reply to post by moebius


When I am referring to the field lines, I'm just using that as a means to describe the particular aspect of a magnet that we are discussing. I know they aren't necessarily a physical thing (in the sense that they can be seen) but that they are physical in the sense that you can see their effects on other things.

Perhaps there is a way to see these things visually, we just aren't aware of the technology required to observe them yet so we have to observe their presence using other things.. Similar to how some particles are too small to see with our current technology but you are able to project a shadow of them onto something at a distance and observe their shadow to observe their presence.

I'd be interested to hear thoughts on the concept I went briefly into in my previous post supposing a magnet to be a similar construction to an Atom. This strikes me as a possible description but again due to my inability to find further data on this on the web sites without the information's reliability being more than a little questionable.

A lot of websites including Wikipedia seem to claim a lot of their theories as fact when it seems that no model as of yet is descriptive enough that we can work with these principles to further develop technology in this area if that makes sense. I'm looking for some theories that may explain this out without falling back on a broad term such as a photon that as you pointed out can easily be shaped to fit almost anything we don't know the actual workings of and don't want to delve further into.

Thanks for the response, looking forward to more great responses to come too

They are made of useful abstractions.

Twenty something years ago when I was studying to be an Electrical Technician I came across a line in a text book it said something along the lines that although magnetism can be observed and used and directed, it still is a mystery .
And that was in a textbook, most of the Universe is still a mystery, even though more and more of it can be observed?

What is magnetism and its so called lines? beats me it can only be measured and observed , but it could be Gods breath....but no one really knows.

Most theories that people paraphrase are just that...theories.

I like my textbook description...it was HONEST.

when i was studying electromagnetics, i found this pretty amazing:
lets say you have positive charged particle(mathematically, u just have particle and vacuum and nothing else around), which is traveling at constant speed; then there is equation of magnetic field it generates. pretty simple.
but, if that particle starts to accelerate and change speed, all of a sudden a lot of things start to happen:
now there is magnetic and electric field which are varying with time and propagating through space (like antenna radiating); and now you have huge equation (like 5time more complex then previous one) which depicts all that.
so i was always wondering, how come there is so much different situation from particle traveling at constant speed and accelerating, on the other side.

p.s. sry for bad grammar