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submitted 5 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[-] [email protected] 1 points 5 days ago* (last edited 5 days ago)

Maybe i am wording it wrong. I did make the comment half joking but my current understanding of how magnetism really works, which my physics teacher was unable to answer has a chapter on wikipedia called Quantum-mechanical origin of magnetism

I have no degrees in this stuff though, i just think about them recreationally.

The carrier particle thing to describe a fundamental force is new to me, and honestly feels very counterintuitive to how i started to understand things.

[-] [email protected] 6 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

diamagnetism, paramagnetism and ferromagnetism can be fully explained only using quantum theory

The magnetic properties of certain materials (e.g. why an unmagnetized piece of iron sticks to a magnet of either polarization), the way permanent magnets work, is best explained by quantum mechanics.

However, the electromagnetic force itself doesn’t “arise” from quantum mechanics, and you can explain things like electromagnets and a lot of common electric circuits (until you need a transistor) quite well without considering quantum mechanics.

Usually you take the “classical” formula for a force and to inform your quantum mechanical model of particles, and that’s how you can arrive at things like deriving how permanent magnets work with the help of w quantum mechanics.

Generally, a lot of material science and chemistry is inherently quantum mechanical because the way atomic orbitals and molecular bonds work is heavily quantum mechanical.

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

Thanks for a well written reply.

Though i still dont quite get this

the electromagnetic force itself doesn’t “arise” from quantum mechanics, and you can explain things like electromagnets and a lot of common electric circuits (until you need a transistor) quite well without considering quantum mechanics.

You seem to say if we can explain x without y then y cannot be fundamental to x.

But can electromagnetism at all emerge if the quantum mechanics dont exist to emerge things like magnetism and some of the behavior of electrons?

[-] [email protected] 1 points 4 days ago

But can electromagnetism at all emerge if the quantum mechanics dont exist to emerge things like magnetism and some of the behavior of electrons?

Short answer: yes.

Technically the world can’t exist without all of its physics. But that’s kinda backwards from how you study it. Quantum mechanics isn’t “more correct” than classical mechanics, it’s more that it’s “more detailed”.

If you want to model an electromagnet, an electronic circuit, light (in most macroscopic situations), how permanent magnets interact, electrostatic situations like how static electricity makes your hair stand up, lightning, the magnetic fields of celestial bodies like the Earth and Sun (they are big electromagnets), etc. you will use “classical” electromagnetism (meaning Newton’s mechanics, possibly with Einstein’s modifications, and Maxwell’s equations).

If you want to model material science situations, like determining what material to make a diode or transistor out of, or if a given material can become a permanent magnet, you will likely need quantum mechanics to help model the interactions of electrons on the atomic scale. The section on Wikipedia you were looking at is about this kind of material science. You do this by combining the same “classical electromagnetic” equations with Schrödinger’s equations for quantum mechanics.

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this post was submitted on 04 Jul 2025
688 points (96.5% liked)

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