Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde Contest
Welcome to the fourth annual "Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" contest. You are each
invited to submit by Safeassign a short (1-3 paragraphs) answer to the
question: which one of the electric flux (field lines) or electric flow
(equipotentials) is more like Dr. Jekyll and which is more like Mr. Hyde?
Why? I will post all of your solutions to the course website on the morning
of Wednesday, 2014-02-19.
Your submissions will be "peer-reviewed" by yourselves, under the criteria of
physical insight, persuasiveness, cleverness, and humour. Each student may
cast one secret vote
by Doodle pool, and the
winner will be announced during class on Friday, 2014-02-21. First-place
prize will be 2% bonus credit in the course, 1.5% for second place, and 1%
honorable mention for all submissions.
2014 Entries:
Entry #1
After considering the dynamic nature of field lines and equipotentials I would
say that field lines are more like Dr. Jekyll in that they do not stay in one
place and even though they may be constrained in some ways they are constantly
spreading into new areas. On the other hand equipotentials are more like
Mr. Hyde in that they are stationary though very powerful. While Mr. Hyde is
not the type to consider his situation and try to change his lot in life,
Dr. Jekyll on the other hand was constantly trying to change is situation with
Hyde. Similarly equipotential lines are stationary and do not change while
actively restraining other forces whereas field lines describe change in a
sense and, instead of restraining forces, can actively push them along.
Entry #2
Flux and flow, yin and yang, good and evil. For eons (or 13.7 billion years,
but who's counting..) past, the epic war waged within the fabric of space-time
as we know it. To utter the words in Matthew, "Enter through the narrow gate.
For wide is the gate and broad is the road that leads to destruction, and many
enter through it. But small is the gate and narrow the road that leads to
life, and only a few find it."
Clearly the flow, or equipotentials of the electric field is the narrow road,
a la Dr. Jekyll. The flow is difficult to find, one needs to first find a
charge, and equipped with a voltmeter, determine where these equipotential
curves lie. No easy task! Not to mention the tight-rope walk across the line
element against the field itself!
The flux, or Mr Hyde, is rampant through a gaussian around a charge. Why, all
you need is a differential area element dotted with the E field to determine
the flux! Clearly, the wide gate is the area differential element, and many
(flux lines) are on the path to destruction entering through it!
The charge contained is proportional to our flux lines. The tendency for
power (or charge) is to become corrupt as it increases. The flux lines are
the window to the dark oligarch soul of the massive charges. Snaking it's
evil grip across the expanse of space. The flow is our mighty stalwart
defender, Jekyllian gradient of justice against these evil Hydian lines
absorbing the full frontal attacks!
Join with me my brothers and sisters! Stand with Dr Jekyll and the flow of
the fields, that will be the road to life.
Entry #3
Story of the Source
According to the Helmholtz theorem, a man can be broken down into two parts,
that which makes him good and that which makes him evil. These decomposed
components represent two distinct parts, a vector potential, flux, and a
scalar potential, flow, but how can we determine which of these is the
representation of a man's evil? In the novella, Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll and
Mr. Hyde, Robert Louis Stevenson tells the tale of a man that wishes to
vanquish evil from himself, however, this plan backfires causing the evil
incarnation, Mr. Hyde, to spring forth. As an analogue to Victorian society,
Dr. Jekyll acts as the respectable veneer to the internal brutal-hearted
Mr. Hyde. In the Christian religion, we can track evil in man to an original
sin, causing the fall from grace.
From this point, we can draw an analogy to electromagnetism from the
properties stated previously. First of all, the idea of original sin can be
drawn to the vector potential, flux. Flux tubes extend from their source and
pierce the surface corrupting what was good, just as evil does. The good,
flow, can do nothing but count its sins as it counts the flux tubes at the end
of sheets, measuring the change in potential. Attempting to vanquish his evil,
Dr. Jekyll brought about a greater evil, pride, the greatest sin. By
attempting this, he projected his evil onto the citizens of London, something
only possible using a vector potential like flux. Furthermore, the attempt to
extinguish flux would be an attempt to destroy part of himself, a form of
suicide, which denies the gift of life, a great evil from a religious
standpoint. Therefore, flux is evil and flow is good, however, we could not
fully define a man without both.
Entry #4
If I had to choose I would make flow Mr. Hyde. Flow is the difference in
potential between two points and to quote the Joker from the Dark Knight,
"Madness, as you know, is a lot like gravity... all it takes is a little
push." After an object is pushed, it may fall and its potential energy will
change. This means that Dr. Jekyll will, after a little push, become Mr. Hyde
and he represents Jekyll's change of potential.
Entry #5
From my extensive knowledge of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde (and I use extensive
here sarcastically because I really learned almost everything I know about
them from Wikipedia) I would say Dr. Jekyll would be more like flow, because
he flows with society. If he is put into a social situation he will act
according to the social norms much like if the closed integral of the flow is
taken (in a conservative field like an E field) the integral is zero meaning
that just going around a loop didn't change anything much like Dr. Jekyll in
the same situation would do the same thing, whereas with Mr. Hyde who knows
what would happen if you put him into the same social situation twice. Also
Mr. Hyde would be more like flux because flux lines come from a source (a
charge), and Mr. Hyde is the source of evilness in Dr. Jekyll and in a sense
Mr. Hyde makes the flux lines. Finally Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are like Flux
and Flow because much like how Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are the different
personalities of the same person, flux and flow are different qualities of a
field.
2012 Winner:
I do not care for the comparison of Flow and Flux to Dr. Jekyll and
Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde are in fact separate states of the same
being; the person is merely the superposition of the two that is "forced" into
one of the two possible states upon observation (or was already in that
particular state just unknown until observation, depending upon whether one
holds a realist or orthodox view of quantum mechanics). By comparison, Flow
and Flux are geospatial properties that are determined by a common entity (the
E-field).
As a thought exercise, I would relate Flow most closely to
Mr. Hyde. Dr. Jekyll feared Mr. Hyde's potential, and as we all know Flux
fears the potential within Flow when Flow is not bound to a closed path. Flux
intends to keep Flow at bay by maintaining a surface with a closed path, and
defining a surface which Flux can dominate while keeping the work from Flow at
zero. However, Dr. Jekyll felt uncomfortable containing the properties of
Mr. Hyde and plotted to occasionally let him out. But the work and potential
from Mr. Hyde when not contained to a closed boundary defined by the good
doctor frightened Dr. Jekyll.
Lastly, as many may not know, Dr. Jekyll was an ancestor to one Dr. Brown, who
harnessed the family's Flux into a capacitor which made time travel
possible. As Griffiths likes to say, QED.
2011 Entries:
Entry #1 1st place
Entry #2 2nd place
Entry #3 Honorable mention
Entry #4 3rd place
2010 Winning response:
From Wikipedia: "This idea represents a concept in Western culture, that of
the inner conflict of humanity's sense of good and evil. In particular the
story has been interpreted as an examination of the duality of human nature
(that good and evil exists in all), and that the failure to accept this
tension (to accept the evil or shadow side) results in the evil being
projected onto others. If someone banishes all evil to the unconscious mind
in an attempt to be wholly and completely good, it can result in the
development of a Mr Hyde-type aspect to that person's character. This failure
to accept the tension of duality is related to Christian theology, where
Satan's fall from Heaven is due to his refusal to accept that he is a created
being (that he has a dual nature) and is not God."
Conclusion: the flux is Satan (evil). Also, evil can be projected, and since
flux is a vector, it can also be projected. :)
Christopher Crawford