Know what I love most about science? We have been using magnets for years in all kinds of applications, even multi-billion dollar industries like semiconductor and microprocessing, but no one knows what a magnetic field is.
If you ask a physicist (ahem - a different physicist ) you’ll get answers like “a magnetic field is a region in space where a magnetic force can be detected.” I would say that’s a logical fallacy, namely begging the question, except every journalist in modern America has transmorgified the petitio principii fallacy into something meaning ‘demanding that the question be asked.’ But kicking around journalists can be a topic for tomorrow. Or, if you simply must see me kick around journalists, try here and here and here. Go ahead. I’ll wait.
So while we can’t define what a magnetic field is, we can certainly define what it does, namely by the effect it has on its surroundings. Which is good enough because that’s all we have for freak magnets too.
