I am reading through the Feynman lectures in my spare times (the parts that interest me, anyway). The book and it's explanations are usually high quality, although unfortunately I have come across a very poorly explained part that I cannot understand.
http://www.feynmanlectures.caltech.e...8.html#Ch28-S1
In section 28-2 "Radiation," the book talks about how for an accelerating charge, the field drops off as 1/r instead of 1/r^2. I find the book's explanation confusing though, especially the following sentence (and everything after it):
"Of course, the end of er′ goes on a slight curve, so that its acceleration has two components. One is the transverse piece, because the end of it goes up and down, and the other is a radial piece because it stays on a sphere. It is easy to demonstrate that the latter is much smaller and varies as the inverse square of r when r is very great."
What does he mean by er' curving? I cannot understand this. I also couldn't find anything else online to clarify it. Do you understand what is meant by this?
Thanks
http://www.feynmanlectures.caltech.e...8.html#Ch28-S1
In section 28-2 "Radiation," the book talks about how for an accelerating charge, the field drops off as 1/r instead of 1/r^2. I find the book's explanation confusing though, especially the following sentence (and everything after it):
"Of course, the end of er′ goes on a slight curve, so that its acceleration has two components. One is the transverse piece, because the end of it goes up and down, and the other is a radial piece because it stays on a sphere. It is easy to demonstrate that the latter is much smaller and varies as the inverse square of r when r is very great."
What does he mean by er' curving? I cannot understand this. I also couldn't find anything else online to clarify it. Do you understand what is meant by this?
Thanks