What is Electricity?
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What Is "Electricity"?
©1996 William J. Beaty
Electrical Engineer
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Scroll down: list of definitions<br>Scientific definition of Electricity<br>Famous scientists' quotations<br>Electricity is not Energy<br>What is electricity, REALLY?!<br>All articles here
What is electricity? This question is impossible to answer because the<br>word "Electricity" has several contradictory meanings. These<br>different meanings are incompatible, and the contradictions confuse<br>everyone. If you don't understand electricity, you're not alone. Even<br>teachers, engineers, and scientists have a<br>hard time<br>grasping the concept.
Obviously "electricity" cannot be several different things at the same<br>time. Unfortunately we've defined the word Electricity in a<br>crazy way. Because the word lacks one distinct meaning, we<br>can never pin down the nature of electricity. In the end we're forced to<br>declare that there's no such stuff as "electricity" at all! Here's a<br>quick example to illustrate the problem.
Do generators make electricity? To answer this<br>question, consider the household light bulb. Inside a lamp cord the<br>charges (the electrons) sit in one place and wiggle back and forth.<br>That's AC or alternating current. At the same time, the waves of<br>electromagnetic field move rapidly forward. This wave-energy does not<br>wiggle, instead it races along the wires as it flows from the distant<br>generators and into the light bulb. OK, now ask yourself this: when<br>"electricity" is flowing, is it called an Electric Current? Yes? If so,<br>then "electricity" is simply the charges already inside the wires, where<br>a flow of<br>electricity is a flow of charge. And therefore we must say that<br>the "electricity" sits inside the wires and vibrates back and forth.<br>Generators do not create any, and electricity does not flow forward<br>through the wires.<br>Next, ask<br>yourself if electricity is a form of energy. If it's energy, then<br>electricity is not the movable charges. Instead, electricity is<br>made of invisible electromagnetic fields, and it<br>doesn't wiggle back and forth within the AC cables. Instead it can<br>only exist in the space outside the wires, and not within the metal.<br>Generators do create electricity, and it races along the wires at high<br>speed. Yet please note that Electricity cannot do<br>both, it cannot be both the charges and the fields, the electrons and<br>the energy. So which one is really<br>"the electricity?" Is it the wiggling electrons within the wires? Or is<br>it the high-speed EM field energy? The experts unfortunately cannot agree<br>on a narrow<br>definition. The reference books give conflicting answers, so there *is*<br>no answer.
If someone asks whether generators make electricity, it exposes a great flaw<br>in the way we talk about "electricity". If we can repair this flaw,<br>perhaps our explanations will finally make sense.
Below are the five most common meanings of the word Electricity.<br>Which one do you think is right? Think about this carefully, because if<br>one of<br>these meanings is correct, all the others must be wrong! After all, no<br>"science term" must ever possess several conflicting definitions.<br>Unfortunately our dictionaries and encyclopedias contain all of these<br>contradictions. (Click the links to find out more about each.)
The word "Electricity:" common definitions
1. The scientist's<br>definition: "Electricity" means only one<br>thing:<br>quantities of electricity are measured in Coulombs, so<br>"electricity" is the electrons and protons themselves; it is the<br>electric<br>charge inside metals. All wires contain electricity all the<br>time, that's why they're conductors.<br>Examples: CURRENT OF ELECTRICITY. QUANTITY OF ELECTRICITY. COULOMBS<br>OF ELECTRICITY.
2. The everyday definition: "Electricity" means only one thing: the<br>electromagnetic field energy<br>sent out by batteries and generators.
Examples: PRICE OF ELECTRICITY. KILOWATT-HOURS OF ELECTRICITY.
3. The grade-school definition: "Electricity" means only one thing: it<br>refers to the flow of<br>electrons, the flowing motion of electric charge. When they stop<br>flowing, the electricity disappears.<br>Examples: "CURRENT" ELECTRICITY. AMPERES OF ELECTRICITY.
4. "Electricity" means only one thing: it refers to the<br>amount of imbalance<br>between quantities of electrons and protons.
Example: "STATIC" ELECTRICITY. DISCHARGE OF ELECTRICITY.
5. "Electricity" is nothing other than the classes of phenomena<br>involving electric charges.
Examples: BIOELECTRICITY, PIEZOELECTRICITY, TRIBOELECTRICITY,<br>THERMOELECTRICITY, ATMOSPHERIC ELECTRICITY ...ETC.
6. Other<br>less common definitions:
"Electricity" refers to the<br>flowing motion of electrical energy (electric power, Watts of electricity)<br>"Electricity" really means the<br>electric potential or e-field (Volts of electricity)<br>"Electricity" only means the<br>glowing nitrogen/oxygen plasma (sparks of electricity)<br>"Electricity" is nothing but a<br>field of science (Basic Electricity, Advanced Electricity)
ELECTRICITY, n.
The power that causes all...