Self-force and inertia. Old light on new ideas
type: Item
instance of: scholarly article
title: Self-force and inertia. Old light on new ideas
zbMATH Open document ID: 1211.81001
DOI: 10.1007/978-3-642-04785-5
author: Stephen N. Lyle
published in: Lecture Notes in Physics
publication date: 2010-01-08T00:00:00Z
review text: The title problem of this book is worked out in great detail. The reader is guided from basic concepts of electrodynamics, relativity and relativistic dynamics to consider simple models of rigid charge distributions and the problem of inertia. It is well known that the energy of the electromagnetic field of a point charge is infinite. For that reason, quantum electrodynamics, as well as other quantum field theoretical descriptions of point particles, require renormalization. This method, although non-esthetic in some sense, works so well that it is accepted as natural without contemplating the reasons the book likes to remind us of. The author goes a further step ahead. Transducing the problem to point masses in general relativity, he works on the idea that the emergence of inertia may be explained in this way. Eventually, the generation of mass spectra in modern elementary particle physics is considered and related to the idea of extended massive particles. After the introduction (chapter 1), the classical electromagnetic field and the motion of charged point particles are considered. Larmor's formula for the radiated power is compared with a formula due to Feynman (chapter 2). Chapter 3 begins with the derivation of the (momentum-derived) electromagnetic mass of the electron whose charge is assumed to be uniformly distributed over a spherical shell of radius \(a\). Section two of this chapter is essential in that fundamental ideas about the emergence of inertia are exhibited. Inertia may result for an elementary particle like the electron from a mechanical rest mass and the electromagnetic mass. For a nucleon it may result from the rest masses, kinetic energies, and binding energies of its elementary constituents whose rest masses may have mechanical and field dynamical origins. The discrepancy between a momentum-derived or an energy-derived rest mass of the electron leads over to the next sections which are devoted to aspects of the the self-force. The chapter co…
reviewed by: K.-E. Hellwig
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 81-01
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 70A05
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 78A35
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 81V22
Mathematics Subject Classification ID: 83C10
zbMATH DE Number: 5654758
zbMATH Keywords: point charges
zbMATH Keywords: point particles
zbMATH Keywords: extended charges
zbMATH Keywords: extended particles
zbMATH Keywords: origin of inertia
zbMATH Keywords: elementary particle physics
MaRDI profile type: Publication
full work available at URL: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-04785-5
OpenAlex ID: W592392140
description: scientific article; zbMATH DE number 5654758