Stefan:
>>>What does "negative magnetic field" mean here? Is it the south pole
>>>of the magnetic pad turned to you to be meant "negative" or is it the
>>>north pole? Please explain!

Bob:
>>--A compass needle is a magnet balanced so it can freely point at the
>>magnetic north pole of the earth.  The earth's north pole is NEGATIVE,
>>the compass magnet's north pole (really "north-SEEKING pole) is
>>POSITIVE, so whichever end of a magnet a compass needle points to is
>>NEGATIVE.

Lynton:
>excuse me, but if the magnet's north pole ('negative')  is pointing at
>a pole, it means that pointed-to-pole is south and therefor positive.
>For a second, I thought you had invented perpetual motion Bob ;>)

Thank you for your answer, Bob. I got it now.

Lynton, the north-pointing pole of a compass needle is the southpole
of the needle-magnet of course. Therefore if by Bob's definition the
earth's northpole is negative, the compass needle points to all kinds
of negative poles. And since northpoles are negative, southpoles are
positive. That's it. :-)

Bob,
how about distributing large coils under your bed and feeding them
with a strong direct current? That would generate a strong magnetic
field (there are formulas to calculate its strength depending on the
number of windings of the coils and the current going through them).
The technician in me likes to play around with such things, so what
do you think about such an experiment?

By the way...
better to be magnetic positive than HI positive... ;-)

Instinctive magnetic wishes (but not more than 20 Gauss ;-)),

Stefan
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