Still not as fun as spin up/spin down quarks. Are they spinning? Not at all. And Charm quarks. What the hell does that even mean, science nerds? We also have the strange quark… aren’t they all really strange or have you just completely given up?
What if I told you the original selection of terms “positive” and “negative” was arbitrary?
Anyway a positively charged electron exists. It’s called a positron.
explain this one to me?
In Benjamin Franklin’s experiments, he came up with the convention that we use today to define a “positive” charge. As it turns out, electrons, discovered much later, are negatively charged according to the convention. Lots of chemical and physical reactions involve electrons as charge carriers, so lots of physical phenomena have this weird opposite thing going on. E.g. electric current or “conventional current” flows in the opposite direction of electron current. Chemical reactions are also weird. Reduction reactions involve a reduction in electric charge, but gaining an electron. The model works just fine, but it can be tricky and/or annoying at times.
What if we just assume current flows from negative to positive?
No, I think it makes sense.
Living organisms use ions internally (positive charges) because they produce something (like fruits).
Technology uses negative charges because it harvests those fruits, and takes them away (negative).
Negatrons and Positrons would have been so much better names
Relevant XKCD:
Title text: Sure, we could stop dictators and pandemics, but we could also make the signs on every damn diagram make sense.
Well obviously the robots would be good instead of evil that way
Unrelated, but what is the origin of this image? I feel like I’ve seen it often over the years and don’t know where it came from originally.
This is the oldest I could find (from 2013): https://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/john-niven-were-living-high-2319290
It looks like a super genetic stock image, and I always assumed that’s what it is.
What, and live with negativity at the heart of every atom?
Benjamin Franklin’s ultimate prank
this would also be society if counterclockwise and clockwise were swapped. it’s the universal way to talk about 2d rotations but pretty much nothing (except a clock) ends up turning clockwise. it didn’t have to be this way
that’s not arbitrary - the hour hand of a clock mimics the shadow of a sundial.
it makes sense, in the northern hemisphere, where 90% of people live.
so it goes the opposite direction that the earth does, great
Ummm… Have you ever used a screw? Bottle cap? “Right tighty, lefty loosey”? A car wheel when going forward? Literally 99% of things tighten clockwise.
You’re the person people have to say “no, your other left” a lot to, aren’t ya?
Also 99% of things loosen anticlockwise. So why preffer tighten over loosen?
i don’t ever use bottle caps or cars. but in the case of screws (and bottle caps), the choice to make them tighten clockwise and loosen counter clockwise is entirely arbitrary.
my main point is that i think it’s confusing that clockwise is negatively oriented and counterclockwise is positively oriented (in the mathematical sense). and the mathematical definition of orientation is ultimately dependent on trigonometry. and it just feels wrong that clocks are negatively oriented.
You’re the person people have to say “no, your other left” a lot to, aren’t ya?
no.
I’m not sure why you’re saying its clocks that are wrong rather than the other stuff. Currently we have x = r cos(𝜃) and y = r sin(𝜃), and that’s what makes anti-clockwise rotations mathematically natural. But if we instead just used x = r sin(𝜃) and y = r cos(𝜃) then clockwise would be the natural positive rotation. And in that case, the unit circle would start at the top and go around clockwise… like we do for compass bearing (and clocks of course). So perhaps that would be better than changing what clocks do.
Just wanna say, a car tire moves a different direction based on your perspective.
If you’re looking at the driver side of the car, the tires move counterclockwise, whereas if you’re looking at the other side, the tires appear to rotate the other way.
Perspective changes a lot of things, it’s pretty cool.
I thought you messed up the sides but then realised driver side is not the same on every country
You can get a clock that is set up counter clockwise to mess with people
Oilrig
Electrons are considered positive in cars.
I recognise the grandstand from the Marylebone Cricket Club, but they tore down the rest of the stadium. I guess that’s a good thing?
