Why I became a Theoretical Physicist 1: The unexpected discovery of James Clerk Maxwell

Why Physics students have T-shirts that say "Let there be Light" was the first time I ever discovered an interesting frontier calculation as an undergraduate physics student.

I liked physics enough that I survived the boredom of calculating the motion of blocks sliding down inclined planes and the other tedious examples one studies in introductory physics classes. I knew there was light at the end of the tunnel and eventually I would be exposed to the mysteries of particle physics, black holes, and beyond.

Even though I romanticized Albert Einstein and the other physics giants, I now remember two moments when I was an undergraduate when the true power of theoretical physics hit home for me, and convinced me that the mathematical description of nature held out immense power to surprise, allowing unexpected predictions that seemed far removed form one’s starting point.

When I posted a short article to Critical Mass explaining the purpose behind my publishing plans for this website, and asking for feedback, many different people asked me if I could include more science tutorials on the site. I had been toying with the idea of recording a few (along the lines of the Five Minute Physics tutorials I recorded at the beginning of the pandemic), and this feedback convinced I would try some to see how things went.

In particular, I thought I would explain, with as little math as possible, what those two revelatory moments were for me as an undergraduate. The first involves a very famous calculation in physics due to James Clerk Maxwell, associated with the discovery of the nature of light. The second is a less well-known result, called the Tennis Racquet Theorem, which still surprises me whenever I think about it.

I have had more experience explaining the former, so I thought I would try that video first. Here it is. I hope you enjoy it, and will look forward to hearing your thoughts before I record the next one. Please don’t tell me to use more sophisticated graphics, because I try and avoid that whenever possible…

The full ad free video tutorial is presented here on Critical Mass for paying subscribers only. I will later be posting a free version on the same youtube channel that the Five Minute Physics videos are on, but that version will have advertising, typical of Youtube videos.