Yes, the spin concept has sometimes been explained in terms of classical mechanics(torque-up vs torque-down ala Feynman), but is it not an electromagnetic certitude?
Then it is said it was Dirac with its relativistic QM the one who finally explained it clearly.(as a matter of fact Maxwell equations remain invariant with the Lorentz transformation group)
I have always wondered though if the problem with its explanation had not lied in the difficulty we have to take for granted that duality we find in it, the same reluctancy we have to accept the wave nature of reality?
Normally it is easier and it may seem simpler to explain things starting with the part, i.e., with the simple as was recommended by Descartes.
By the same token when we came across with a certitude as that one of the Stern-Gerlach experiment, where we find ourselves with two different kinds of facts:
-on the one hand with the fact that the orbital angular momentum is right when calculated in a classical way, and
- on the other hand, it is not right for the angular intrinsic momentum, as its observed value is doubled: the electron does not behave as a classical particle.
The duality of the spin expressed in that dual and complementary behavior, where we find an up and down directions, as it were, a sinusoidal behavior, or an inherent polarity of the electron, where each one of those polarities seems to contribute to obtain that double result, which would not be the case if we considered at the background sort of charge dipoles, or just an electric charge?
When we have at the background a most appropriate symbolism based on a natural wave function as Euler relation, things of this sort definitively are seen almost in a most natural and intuitive way
Just some thoughts about the wave nature of reality
Regards
EP
NEOclassic said:
The upshot here is that with the purely classical Maxwellian treatment of electrodynamics, individual electrons do move in loops and do radiate but there is absolutely no concern for the intrinsic fact that an electron has dipolar “spin” that generates its own torque and magnetism.
It is notable that the dipolar "spin" of electrons occurs infrequently in Classical Mechanics (in van de Graff generators and capacitors) it is its orientation, whether as torque-up vs torque-down ala Feynman or as magnetic bar-magnet north pole vs South pole that satisfies the Pauli requirement in Quantum Mechanics... Ipse Dixit
Cheers, NEOclassic