A Simplification of Maxwell's Equations in Conformity with the Flux-cutting Principle

Abstract

DURING the last thirty years, the question as to whether electromagnetic induction is caused by the change or by the cutting of magnetic flux has been debated at intervals. Faraday's rotating disk experiment and the later experiments of Blondel¹ and of Messrs. Cramp and Norgrove², as well as Prof. H. A. Wilson's experiments with moving dielectrics³, all appear definitely to favour the flux-cutting hypothesis ; and Rowland's experiments with revolving electrostatically charged disks⁴ indicated that a magnetic force is similarly induced by the cutting of an electric field. There seems little doubt that Faraday himself believed that electromagnetic induction was produced by the cutting of his magnetic "lines".