The lighter creates a diminutive spark that jumps from one wire to another in the front pair. This spark creates electromagnetic waves, with two cables serving as transmission antennas to strengthen the waves. Two rear cables are receiving and producing electricity as in the case of Hertz’s wire. Instead of creating a spark on the receiver, the bulb will turn on on my device. The neon bulb is really nippy because there is high voltage, but low current, and exactly what we need.
Ok, lights! Here’s what it looks like when you shoot this spark.
It may seem minor, but it is not. In fact, you both send AND Receiving electromagnetic waves.
Science, what is it good for?
When Hertz showed his experimental verification of Maxwell’s equations, the scientific community knew that it was nippy and the general public became engaging. Journalists, of course – by the pragmatists know – they planted it, which it can be used for. His answer:
“It doesn’t make sense … It’s just an experiment that proves that Maestro Maxwell was right – we just have these mysterious electromagnetic waves that we don’t see with the naked eye. But they are there.”
Why waste money on experiments, if not useful? Well, the sincere truth is that we are not learning. Human nature makes us explorers. We ask questions and look for answers. This is just one of the things that make us who we are. Sometimes the answers are wrong (it turns out that the sun NO Go through the sky in chariots drawn by white horses), but we are always looking for better ones.
And sometimes learning is accidentally useful. In fact, you are probably now using the results of the Hertz experiment. Not only did he show that Maxwell’s equations were legal, but effectively invented the first radio transmitter. (Radio waves are just a slice of the electromagnetic spectrum.) Then it was used to a wireless telegraph that allowed people to communicate with sea ships using Morse code. Then people came up with how to send music and soaplas and advertising via radio waves, so that we now call it “radio”. There was also this thing called Television, which could give photos of photos in space.
But it doesn’t end! Because the device sends electromagnetic waves that reflect the objects, you can measure how much time it takes to return the signal, which says, how far the radio and lidar are used in self-service cars. And of course, mobile, Wi-Fi and Bluetooth transmission are electromagnetic waves. It is literally everywhere – swimming in the sea of electromagnetic waves.
So if the US spends money on study, will it boost profits and economic growth? Sometimes yes, sometimes not. There are many nippy discoveries without a real application. I mean, look at the gravitational waves detected from the collision of black holes. Will this lead to a up-to-date type of internet or something like that? Probably not. But we are definitely richer that we know it.