Michael Faraday: Scientist and Nonconformist (1996) | Hacker News Reader

Michael Faraday: Scientist and Nonconformist (1996)

silas.psfc.mit.edu

41 pointso4c10 comments

Faraday was the quintessential "non-formal" Scientist. He was proof that you don't have to always formalize everything mathematically (in a domain) before understanding and contributing to it. While formalization is important it is not the be-all and end-all that it is often made out to be.

Here is a great communication from Faraday to Maxwell on receiving one of Maxwell's paper;

Maxwell sent this paper to Faraday, who replied: "I was at first almost frightened when I saw so much mathematical force made to bear upon the subject, and then wondered to see that the subject stood it so well." [Faraday to Maxwell, March 25, 1857. Campbell, Life, p. 200].

In a later letter, Faraday elaborated:

"I hang on to your words because they are to me weighty.... There is one thing I would be glad to ask you. When a mathematician engaged in investigating physical actions and results has arrived at his conclusions, may they not be expressed in common language as fully, clearly, and definitely as in mathematical formulae? If so, would it not be a great boon to such as I to express them so? translating them out of their hieroglyphics ... I have always found that you could convey to me a perfectly clear idea of your conclusions ... neither above nor below the truth, and so clear in character that I can think and work from them". [Faraday to Maxwell, November 13, 1857. Life, p. 206]

PS: You can read Faraday's (and other 19th century scientists) letters at the Epsilon website - https://epsilon.ac.uk/

Thank you very much for the link.

This letter from Maxwell to Faraday: https://epsilon.ac.uk/view/faraday/letters/Faraday3354 is very surprising to me. Already they are thinking of gravity in field theoretic terms. Just to set context: Riemann's Habilitationsschrift was just 3 years earlier but not to be published till late 1860s.

Faraday actually did some experiments to try and show that Electricity and Gravity were related and in 1851 published On the possible relation of Gravity to Electricity in "Philosophical Transactions" of the Royal Society!

This article gives the details; Michael Faraday, grand unified theorist? (1851) - https://skullsinthestars.com/2009/03/06/michael-faraday-gran...

His ability to conceptualize/intuit and devise theories/experiments-to-test-theories was unparalleled. Maxwell could not have come up with his formal mathematical equations if he did not have Faraday's conceptual work on which to build upon. It goes to show that concepts/intuition must always go ahead of formalization.

"Faraday Life and Letters" is a good read (long out of copyright) and includes a description of his scientific tour of Europe with Sir Humphry Davy during the Napoleonic wars.

Google Books: https://books.googleusercontent.com/books/content?req=AKW5Qa...

Another excellent (paperback) book is `Faraday - The Life' by James Hamilton 465 pages Harper Collins publishers

I do like to see the historic use of non-conformist.

Non-conformists and free thinkers/ non-theists teaming up has produced some great outcomes. Think of the popular non-conformist support for Jefferson & Madison in VA in 1786.

The idea of baptists handing out copies of common sense has always had a certain beauty to it.

I'm a non-Conformist is the historic sense. In the past decades, American Christianity has devolved into a smorgasbord of personality cults and group therapy that effectively suppresses the freedoms that many Christians fought for at the country's founding. Not usually overtly, but the prison is in the mind (or its lack of use).

There are a number of links to the author's related writings: http://silas.psfc.mit.edu/monopolizingknowledge.net/links.ht...

The one on Maxwell is particularly interesting, as his religion lead to strong political positions as he was influenced by a Christian Socialist:

"Maxwell did not adopt Maurice's theological positions as a whole, but he did become convinced of one of Maurice's key tenets, that the dehumanization of the working class in an industrializing society was to be prevented by a cooperative approach in which workers were given greater influence though education. Maurice and his friends set up Working Men's Colleges, and Maxwell, seeing this as a vital Christian service, taught Working Men's classes weekly till at least 1866. "

http://silas.psfc.mit.edu/Maxwell/

The link wasn't working for me; here is the archive.org version:

https://web.archive.org/web/20260314130229/http://silas.psfc...

"Nothing is too wonderful to be true"

-- Michael Faraday (incribed over the entrance to the UCLA physics building)

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