1. While the posted guide is excellently written, it's not particularly novel. I was taught EM in a very similar fashion. Diagrams similar to those in the guide were drawn on the board by my professors.
2. Jackson is a graduate EM text. It is mathematically difficult, because when you read it, you should have been familiar with EM and all this conceptual underpinning for at least 3-4 years. The goal of Jackson is to solve the equations for scenarios that undergrads would find challenging. What did you study in your undergrad?
'What did you study in your undergrad?' - Computer Science. I study applied math and physics in my spare time - I'm currently teaching myself quantum field theory and other topics. For the most part - they're incomprehensible to an average person which is why I'm so passionate about doing what I'm doing - all of this stuff is extremely simple underneath but we humans find ways to make it complicated. Why not untangle that complexity and simply explain things in a clear and intuitive manner? Also - your comments on your undergraduate ease of grasping Maxwell's equations usually don't apply to everyone. Many professors don't sketch out what they mean and many books don't go through the fundamentals that students need in order to grasp what they mean. This guide is supposed to give someone a good background on 1) what they need to understand in order to grasp the equations and 2) what the equations actually mean in clear human language. Hopefully this helps - I also haven't had a chance to read Jackson but he's been mentioned so many times that right now I'll make a note to actually read the book and see how well he explains the concepts and see if I can maybe find other ways of making things simpler.
I am happy that you are studying math+physics as a hobby. And I will say once again, that you distilled the conceptual parts of EM in the guide very well.
I will also agree with you that many professors don't teach well. I was a physics prof for a few years, and it is difficult to distill stuff well. Not everyone has the skill, passion and the job incentives to do it well. I was lucky enough to be graced with profs who did.
I am glad that you have the passion for this. I will say this though, that once you become a formal teacher (school/university), then it becomes clear to your that your responsibility is not complete until your students have the skills to use the concepts that you are teaching them. Skill here means being able to model actual physical systems and get both the behavior and numbers out. When teaching a course, you have limited contact time with students and students have limited total time to spend on the course. You have to balance teaching conceptual understanding and modelling skills in that time. That balance is extremely difficult to attain, the reasons for which will easily fill a small book.
You can go all in on concepts, and what happens is that within a few months students have completely blanked out on everything, because you need the mathematical framework and have solved difficult problems for things to stick in your brain long term. And conversely teaching only maths is terrible because no one knows and what and why.
Re #2: Jackson was the standard text for undergrads like me doing a Mathematics degree. It was a late second year or early third (final) year text if I recall rightly. This was 1992, so I'm still amazed to read that its still a commonly used text.
Fwiw, other standard texts used in Durham (UK) back then were Spivak on Calculus, Goldstein on mechanics, and for the mathematical physics kids, landau and lifschitz on mechanics and electromagnetism, and (an absolute doorstop) Misner, Wheeler and Thorne on Gravitation (relativity).
> Typically, the undergrad program in electricity and magnetism involves two or perhaps three semesters beyond elementary physics.... As a general rule, a two-semester course in electromagnetic theory is given to beginning graduate students. It is for such a course that my book is designed.
So, your professors did you injustice by using an inappropriate book. Spivak, Goldstein and MWT are undergraduate books and appropriate. Landau and Lifschitz is great and accessible to smart undergraduates, but I don't see why you would use it for mathematical physics. Sure, Landau emphasized methods a lot, but there are better books for it.
MTW ("the telephone book") is definitely not an undergrad textbook (although you might be able to cobble together an undergrad course out of bits and pieces of it). It is very heavy on intuition and visualization, though, which is why I like it (e.g. the "egg carton" visualization of differential forms).
> It supplies two tracks through the subject. The first track ... is suitable for a one-semester course at the junior or senior level or in graduate school.
As you say, it picks out bits and pieces that an undergrad can understand.
As someone studying Physics (Bachelor) in Germany Jackson is what my electrodynamics professor recommended.
My professor greatly shortened the chapter maxwell in matter and opted to give an intro into quantum electrodynamics instead.
At my uni it's a fourth semester course with theoretical mechanics (second semester) and quantum mechanics (third semester) preceeding it.
1. While the posted guide is excellently written, it's not particularly novel. I was taught EM in a very similar fashion. Diagrams similar to those in the guide were drawn on the board by my professors.
2. Jackson is a graduate EM text. It is mathematically difficult, because when you read it, you should have been familiar with EM and all this conceptual underpinning for at least 3-4 years. The goal of Jackson is to solve the equations for scenarios that undergrads would find challenging. What did you study in your undergrad?