Stupid question of the day....

AllTel - Jim Hubbard · 2005-07-30T03:15:20+00:00

I am curious about what would happen to an electrical current in 2 situations.....Assume that you have 2 wires that, when joined, complete a closed electrical DC circuit with electrons flowing thusly.....------------ ============eeeeeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeeeeee------------ ============If you flattened out the end of each wire where they connect , would the resulting electron paths be more like figure A or Figure B?Figure A --- === --- === --- ===--- ===eeeeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeeeeeee--- === --- === --- === --- ===Figure B --- e e === --- eee eeeeee === --- eeeee eeeeeeeeee ===--- eeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeee ===eeeeeeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee--- eeeeeee eeeeeeeeeeeee === --- eeeee eeeeeeeee === --- eee eeeee === --- e e ===(Please note that the vast # of "e"lectrons shown in Figure B is simply to show the path's of electrons. )The second portion of my question is....If the flattened portions were increases in mass (if each wire were connected to a metal cube and the cubes were brought together to complete the circuit) how would it effect electron flow where the cubes touch?Thanks for your help.

ehsjr 21 years ago

I thought the idea was that you can know where the electron is or what direction it is travelling, but never both at the same time. So (theoretically) you could know exactly where it is located, which would lead to it popping in and out of the space under examination, since the "exactness" restricts the space to ever smaller observational limits.

It makes it hard as hell to paint the damn things. :-)

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TokaMundo 21 years ago

On 20 Aug 2005 06:28:39 -0700, "redbelly" Gave us:

The guy is a freakin' loon.

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Jasen Betts 21 years ago

Which would prove what exactly? I could do the same with a piece of string strung out over the quarter mile, and that doesn't mean I can pull on the string to move it at a rate faster than you can drive.

just because the signal reaches the end of the wire doesn't mean it's the exact same electrons coming out one end that went in at the other a fraction of a second earlier, because it isn't.

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redbelly 21 years ago

Well, yes, that's a somewhat better description of the uncertainty principle. But it really is talking about a particle's position and momentum. The direction of travel is included in that.

Still, electrons do not pop out of existance, as one might believe after reading the wikipedia description. The space the electron might be located in (after having been located precisely at some earlier time) is not infinite in size, since the electron can not travel faster than the speed of light. Choose a large enough volume of space, and you can be certain the electron is still located somewhere within it.

Mark

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