- #36
sophiecentaur
Science Advisor
Gold Member
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If there is an escalator and a slide between the two floors of a building, people can go up the escalator (gaining Gravitational Potential Energy) then walk over to the slide and slide down (losing that PE and eventually losing the KE they gained). There is a continual, non-contradictory, flow of people. No problem, so far?
Now do the same with charges. The battery gives them Electrical Potential Energy and they transfer the energy they gained in the battery as they pass through the resistive load. They are going round in the same direction all the time. Now, OF COURSE, they are going from - up to + inside the battery. But that is because they are being given Potential Energy. Where is there anything paradoxical about that - unless one decides (with no good reason) that 'Charges always go from positive to negative? The Charges are Not Energy. There is nothing in any theory that says that charges 'always' go from positive to negative so there is nothing to disagree with. Theory says that charges acquire potential as they move towards the positive and lose it as they move away.
I can't think of any other ways of saying it. It's so bleedin' obvious that there is no paradox / contradiction / confusion as long as you follow what the theory actually says and not what some primary School teacher told you. That, btw, is a good principle to work by in all of Science.
Now do the same with charges. The battery gives them Electrical Potential Energy and they transfer the energy they gained in the battery as they pass through the resistive load. They are going round in the same direction all the time. Now, OF COURSE, they are going from - up to + inside the battery. But that is because they are being given Potential Energy. Where is there anything paradoxical about that - unless one decides (with no good reason) that 'Charges always go from positive to negative? The Charges are Not Energy. There is nothing in any theory that says that charges 'always' go from positive to negative so there is nothing to disagree with. Theory says that charges acquire potential as they move towards the positive and lose it as they move away.
I can't think of any other ways of saying it. It's so bleedin' obvious that there is no paradox / contradiction / confusion as long as you follow what the theory actually says and not what some primary School teacher told you. That, btw, is a good principle to work by in all of Science.