The document discusses corrections needed for a physics resource that uses mechanical analogies to explain electrical concepts. Correction #1 notes that a water pump is not analogous to a battery, as a battery stores energy, whereas a water tower is a better analogy as it also stores potential energy. Correction #2 states that equating water pipe resistance to electrical wire resistance is incorrect, as resistance affects flow in opposite ways in each case. Correction #3 argues that using a mechanical analogy ignores time constants that are essential in electric circuits due to inductors. Attempting to reconcile mechanics with electromagnetism in this way leads students down an incorrect path.

1. CORRECTIONS FOR GEORGIA STATE UNIVERSITY HYPERPHYSICS
Re: Newtonian Mechanics vs Electricity & Magnetism Education
CORRECTION #1
PUMP vs BATTERY vs Water Tower
A mechanical water pump is NOT the same mechanical equivalent of a battery which is an energy storage device. However a water tower IS a correct mechanical interpretation of a battery because they both store potential energy.

2. CORRECTION #2
PIPE RESISTANCE vs WIRE RESISTANCE
Resistance to water current flow in a pipe is not the equivalent of electrical resistance in a wire.
The water - pipe analogy gives students a faulty perception that somehow electrical wire resistance and mechanical pipe resistance are the same and require a “pushing” action in order to generate current flow against the wire’s resistance – which is not true.
This error in perception becomes more obvious and glaring when the battery is replaced with an “equivalent” device such as electric generator.

3. The input energy required to produce an electric current flowrate in the electrical circuit is the exact opposite as the input energy required by the mechanical pump.
In the Newtonian Mechanics view:
 When water pipe resistance increases,
 water current flowrate decreases and
 mechanical input power increases.
BUT
In the Electricity and Magnetism view:
 When electrical wire resistance decreases,
 electric current flowrate increases and
 mechanical input power increases
 because a magnetic field exists around ALL current bearing wires in the electrical circuit.

4. CORRECTION #3
ELECTRIC CIRCUIT TIME CONSTANTS vs NO TIME CONSTANTS
“Time delays violate Newton's Third Law [and the Law of Conservation of Energy] because even an infinitesimal time without the second force violates the idea of force-pairs and hence of Newton's Third Law."
~ Professor Nathaniel Lasry, Physics John Abbot College

5. CONCLUSIONS:
Trying to squeeze the Laws of Electricity and Magnetism into a woefully ill equipped Newtonian Mechanics view is a fool’s errand and cannot be done correctly or honestly. The most obvious shortcomings already presented visually are explained below.
CORRECTION #1 MECHANICAL PUMP vs BATTERY vs WATER TOWER
Equating a mechanical pump to an electric battery is very misleading because a battery is an energy storage device whereas a pump is not. Replacing the pump with an energy storage device such as a water tower that stores energy as potential and requires an energy input in relation to that energy storage just like a battery is more accurate.
CORRECTION #2 PIPE RESISTANCE vs WIRE RESISTANCE
Equating mechanical water pipe resistance to electric wire resistance visually in the same breath is very illogical and ill informed because it implies by association that mechanical pipe resistance and wire resistance share similar characteristics when in fact they are diametrically opposed.
As the pipe resistance increases the pump has to do more work if the flowrate is to be maintained in the mechanical analogy whereas the battery does less work. The battery’s workload is at a maximum when the wire resistance is zero.
CORRECTION #3 ELECTRIC CIRCUIT TIME CONSTANTS vs NO TIME CONSTANTS
The only possible way to reconcile a Newtonian Mechanics 3rd Law with an electrical analogy is to deliberately ignore an inductor’s Time Constant Rise Time.
Lenz’s Law certainly is valid and does apply in some inductor performance but it has never correctly represented Newton’s 3rd Law because Newton’s 3rd requires simultaneous action-reaction and inductors cannot comply with this demand.

6. CORRECTION #4 CURRENT BEARING WIRE MAGNETIC FIELD vs WATER PIPE’S NO MAGNETIC FIELD
Poor old Sir Isaac Newton and Michael Faraday would both be rolling over in their graves if they knew how their mutually exclusive works have been clumsily mashed together by today’s physicists and scientists in a effort to use one great work to explain another great work while ignoring the primary essences of both...
Newton went through all the trouble to give us his 3rd Law and we ignore the critical timing component required to satisfy the law because it’s too inconvenient.
Faraday showed us how the magnetic fields produced around all current bearing wires are really important and we ignore that too.
A mechanical water flow pipe analogy
can never be used to accurately describe
an electrical circuit because a water
pipe does not produce a magnetic field
around it.
Attempting to do so only confuses the
student and leads him or her down an
incorrect path which must be unlearned
when they enter the real world.
Kind regards
Thane
Thane C. Heins President & CEO Potential +/- Difference Inc. R & D "We generate solutions" Email: thaneh@potentialdifference.ca YOUTUBE http://www.youtube.com/user/pdicanada1 Linkedin http://www.linkedin.com/profile/view?id=107557432&trk=tab_pro
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