Inside Perspectives on Classical Electromagnetism

Abstract

The concept "Classical Electromagnetism" in the title of the paper here refers to a theory built on three foundations: relativity principles, the original Maxwell's equations, and the mathematics of exterior calculus. In this theory of electromagnetism the general laws are expressed as geometric (coordinate-free) relations between quantities on a four-dimensional spacetime manifold. Based on these laws, and exterior calculus on metric spaces, we derive fields and relations that describe electromagnetism from the inside perspective of Lorentz observers, inside the Minkowski spacetime (the ordinary flat spacetime). It is shown how fields and relations defined on the spacetime are sliced into three-dimensional fields and relations on time slices, and that Lorentz observers perceive these as time-dependent fields and relations on a single three-dimensional Euclidean space. In exterior calculus (on metric spaces) each field is associated to four field variants from which one can choose how a field is to appear. Using this feature, we derive alternative equation systems describing electromagnetism from the inside perspective. In one system, A, all field quantities are form fields. In another system, C, the fields are represented as vector and scalar fields. But in contrast to the traditional Maxwell's equations with div and curl operators, there is here no need for pseudo-vectors and pseudo-scalars. Some theorems of a pseudo-free vector analysis, adapted to the C-system, are derived. The paper concludes with a section where we analyse properties of the electromagnetic field and its laws with respect to mirror transformations.