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What is the difference between electric, electronic and electrical? The only ones I have come up with are weak connotations...
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Welcome edodell!
electric, electronic and electrical?
For what it's worth ... a layman's impression without looking them up! :
electric ... the force itself
electronic ... having to do with use of electric impulses to carry or convey something (words, a pulse.)
electrical ... the nuts and bolts (hardware) of anything to do with electrics.
Sort of like the difference between sewerage and sewage (the pipes and the gunk.)
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dear edodell: Wow's analysis covered things quite well. To repeat that, expanding a bit: electric covers the whole wide field that began with the recognition of electricity as a form of energy and an important part of physics.
Electronics is a very important subdivision in which low voltages and currents can be used to operate a very wide range of devices both scientific and domestic.
As for electrical, wow's "nuts and bolts" covers it well enough. The generation, distribution, and installations that permit us to use electricity.
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Joined: Mar 2000
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I would add that electronics is based in the controlled conduction of electrons, as in semiconductors or vacuum tubes. This control over the electrons is what makes possible the production of components that can amplify signals or emulate logic operations.
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Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dr. Bill I am with you-- I think of electronics as more likely to be low voltage-- electrical components, like transistors (remember them?) chips (basicly a collection of transistors and switches packed into a small space), and other low voltage electrical components.. (but some electronics can be high voltage-- your computer might work on mostly 5 and 40 volt circuts-- but not your laser printer-- or your monitor-- they pack enough "juice" to do you in!)
Electronic would also include the study of the electricity, Ohms law, conductivity, generation, storage (batteries or capacitors)-- and natural (static or lightnening) and man made electricity. etc..
Electrical can be anything from your basic 5 vt circut to generators-- Kila and mega kila watts-- anything that uses electricity as a power source-- everything from the generation of electricity to the components that use the energy.
electricity is the energy -- the root word coming from the greek for amber-- which can be rubbed with cloth to generate static electricity. So don't put those real amber worry beads into your pocket-- unless you don't mind a shock when you go to reach for them!
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Carpal Tunnel
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old hand
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old hand
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This is an electrifying subject if ever there was one. I think the historical angle of it alone could fill a book. Electric was probably the only one of the three existing before the time of Faraday. Then the need for distinction between static and "flowing" electricity arose, with the increasing use of the latter in electrical appliances. Electricity was supposed to flow only in "conductors" at that time. In "vacuum tubes", lo and behold, electrons traversed emptiness: reason enough to create a new word, together with the attendant profession, electronics.
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