3 ms·

I don't follow. If we're communicating with aliens that we somehow know are made of matter, we tell them that right is the direction a horizontal wire carrying

by raldi 7y ago

I don't follow. If we're communicating with aliens that we somehow know are made of matter, we tell them that right is the direction a horizontal wire carrying positive current away from us gets pushed by a vertical magnetic field.

yorwba 7y ago
That just shifts the problem to specifying the direction of the magnetic field, and you can't use the concept of left vs. right in that definition without creating a circular dependency.
- pbhjpbhj 7y ago
  Vertically up it's just too a higher local gravitational potential, no? Sure, we flip right-left when we look at things upside down, but that's a nuanced usage.
  - yorwba 7y ago
    How do you determine whether your magnetic field is pointing up and not down?
    - goldenkey 7y ago
      Closer and farther can be used to explain up and down.
      - yorwba 7y ago
        How do you use closer and farther to determine whether a magnetic field is pointing up or down? It's not like there are little arrows on magnetic field lines you can just look at.