In 1908 Walter Ritz identified seven areas of difficulty with regard to the Maxwell-
Lorentz electromagnetic field equations, which are based on the concept of a solid deformable ether. (1) Electric and magnetic forces really express relations about space and time and should be replaced with non-instantaneous elementary actions (his emission theory). (2) Advanced potentials don't exist (and their erroneous use led to the Rayleigh-Jeans ultraviolet catastrophe). (3) Localization of energy in the ether is vague. (4) It is impossible to reduce gravity to the same notions. (5) The unacceptable inequality of action and reaction is brought about by the concept of absolute motion with respect to the ether. (6) Apparent relativistic mass increase is amenable to a different interpretation. (7) The use of absolute coordinates, independent of all motions of matter, requires throwing away the time honored use of Galilean relativity and our notions of rigid ponderable bodies.

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Historians of science generally recognize three early contenders in the quest for a relativity theory consistent with the null result of the Michelson-Morley experiment. These were H.A. Lorentz, Henri Poincaré, and Albert Einstein. We might call these the three musketeers of relativity.

It is not so well known but there was a relativity D'Artagnan as well. He was Swiss physicist Walter Ritz. But Ritz died in battle and it seems as though the Cardinal placed his ideas under the ban. They do, however, surface from time to time.

This presentation, which is done in the spirit of "lifting the ban," combines selected comments about Ritz's work by William Hovgaard, of M.I.T., in 1932 and by Myron Evans, of Wales, in 1997 [Professor Evans is the Director of the Alpha Foundation Institute for Advanced Study (AIAS).] I'll inject a few remarks to enlarge on certain topics.

The Evans material is from his running commentary of a 1980 translation of Ritz's 1908 critique on Maxwell-Lorentz. The quotes from his commentary are used with his kind permission. Evans, who is pro-Einstein on relativity, generated his commentary from front-to-back, one section at a time. He found a surprise when he got to Ritz's relativistic considerations on mass, length, and time. (A copy of the Ritz translation is on this web site.)

Selected Hovgaard Comments on Ritz

Lorentz, the first of our relativity musketeers, stressed the fact that his system of partial differential equations, was tied to the concept of a solid ether electromagnetic field. (L2)

[Hovgaard] Lorentz regarded the ether as immobile... The earth was conceived as moving through the ether without disturbing it and it followed that there must be an "ether drift," which it should be possible to detect. But this proved impossible. ...It was felt necessary to resort to new hypotheses. [Enter musketeers number two and number three.]

Poincaré proposed to use Galilean relativity to resolve the problem. (The speed of light c is relative to the source.) The sources and detectors were moving at the same velocity, hence no speed of light variations were detected.

[Hovgaard] Einstein ... interpreted the Michelson-Morely experiments as showing simply that the velocity of light was the same for an observer in motion as for one at rest.(This is Einstein's second postulate of special relativity.)

In 1921 Einstein asserted, "The space-time theory and the kinematics of the special theory of relativity were modelled on the Maxwell-Lorentz theory of the electromagnetic field. (E1)

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In his detailed 1908 critique of Maxwell-Lorentz theory, Ritz concluded that:

"The [Maxwell-Lorentz] partial differential equations and the notion of ether are essentially inappropriate to express the comprehensive laws for the propagation of electrodynamic actions."(172)

If Ritz's conclusion comes to be validated, then we are justified in looking for those other creeks in which to paddle.

...

[Hovgaard] In 1908 [Ritz] published his first and most comprehensive memoir on electrodynamics ... in which he subjected Maxwell's theory, as modified by Lorentz, to a critical analysis and outlined a new theory of electrodynamics. This memoir was followed by several papers on the same and allied subjects such as the theory of the ether and of gravitation. (H218)

[Ritz] Experiment has shown that [electrodynamic] actions are not instantaneous; also it hasn't revealed any trace of a medium which could exist in materially empty space. I therefore felt I could restrict myself to give to the law of propagation of these actions, a very simple kinematic interpretation, borrowed from the [Newtonian] emanative theory of light and satisfying the principle of relativity of motion. [This is the same relativity principle as proposed by Poincaré.]

[Ritz] Fictitious particles are constantly emitted in all directions by electric charges. They keep on moving indefinitely in straight lines with constant speed, even through material bodies. The action undergone by a charge depends uniquely on the disposition, velocity, etc. of these particles in its immediate surroundings.(150)

Ritz claimed that his mathematical model was exactly equivalent to Lorentz's version of Maxwell. (He didn't get into the nuts and bolts of how the actions were generated.) If he got the job done though, if his model really is equivalent to Maxwell- Lorentz, then problems with his model are also problems with Maxwell-Lorentz. ...

[Hovgaard] Ritz proposed ...complete abandonment of the ether. Lorentz and FitzGerald advanced the so-called "contraction hypothesis." according to which all bodies should contract when they move through the ether..... Lorentz accepted Einstein's theory, [the second postulate]and attempted at the same time to uphold the theory of the ether, but this led to highly artificial and complicated conceptions both in electrodynamics and optics. (H1-219,220)

In keeping with Maxwell-Lorentz principles Ritz observed strict adherence to the superposition theorem in his (1908) reasonings. (The superposition theorem says that charged material particles, protons, electrons, etc., don't get in the way of one another or cause reactive effects on the source field . Supposedly there is no decrease in a charge's ability to affect distant charges as a result of its actions imparted to intervening charges ). Ritz claimed the superposition viewpoint was not in accordance with experimental evidence, and because of this, his temporary version of Lorentz's views would be flawed with regard to the speed of light in dispersive media.

[Evans] Ritz set out to make incisive and helpful criticisms of the state of electrodynamics, advocating the use of elementary actions rather than fields. He traces difficulties, which he ascribes to a common origin, the concept of ether, and uses the theory in the form given by Lorentz. This is the same in most if not all textbooks now as in 1908. So the difficulties perceived then are there now.

[Evans] On page 146 {Ritz} notes that electric and magnetic fields can be eliminated entirely from the Maxwell-Lorentz theory and represent only relations of space and time, ... He advocates a return to elementary actions with the sole difference that they are not instantaneous (i.e. retarded potentials). He notes on p. 147 that the [electromagnetic] field theory [characterized by continuum partial differential equations] admits an infinite number of solutions, only some of which are physical. The retarded potential formalism eliminates unphysical solutions and introduces irreversibility in time, while the field equations allow reversibility.

[Evans] The Maxwell Lorentz [field] theory (when integrated using retarded Newtonian potentials) is delayed action at a distance. The only difference from the older Clausius and Weber theories is that action in these theories is instantaneous.. (157)