Life Musings

Years ago, in my grad school days, I got into a vicious debate with some engineers and technicians. They insisted that Ohm's Law is inviolate--one of the immutable laws of the universe.

This displays a problem that is common to many engineers. Engineers are fairly smart, and the best ones are quite brilliant. However, for run-of-the-mill engineers, their grasp of science is often shaky, and their approach to physics is often reduced to mere applied mathematics. As a result, they will often apply equations such as V=IR without properly understanding its origins or limitations.

I've heard people argue that Ohm's Law *MUST* be an immutable law of the universe, on the grounds that R is defined as V/I. This is, of course, nonsense. If this statement were true by mere definition, then it would not qualify as a true scientific law. Heck, I could define some constant G as the ratio between my height (H) and my weight (W). Would that imply that H=GW is some great scientific law? Of course not.