science

Verticity

Verticity is a science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Verticity rather than just read about it. In short: In the history of physics, verticity (Latin: verticitate) is an alleged tendency to move around or toward the North or South Pole, often called Earth's "vertices". In his acclaimed 1600 treatise On the Magnet and Magnetick Bodies, and on That Great Magnet the Earth, William Gilbert distinguished two kinds of verticity.

Key takeaways

Verticity belongs to science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Verticity to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Verticity from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

In the history of physics, verticity (Latin: verticitate) is an alleged tendency to move around or toward the North or South Pole, often called Earth's "vertices". In his acclaimed 1600 treatise On the Magnet and Magnetick Bodies, and on That Great Magnet the Earth, William Gilbert distinguished two kinds of verticity. Surface verticity is the tendency to point north found in ordinary "loadstones" and magnetised iron. This verticity was the weaker expression of a more powerful kind of verticity: the deep verticity in the Earth's core. Gilbert was among the first to believe that the Earth spins. It spins, he says, because of its deep verticity. In his judgement, deep verticity also explained surface verticity: over time, bits and pieces of matter escaped from Earth's core, their verticity having been corrupted and weakened by exposure to the degraded matter of Earth's crust. These bits of matter became the variety of weak magnets found nearer the Earth's surface. Gilbert's theory of magnetism did not persuade Francis Bacon. For him, the Earth did not spin, and it had no deep verticity or magnetism. Its core was cold, passive, and unmoving, as Telesio had said. Bacon explained ordinary magnets in a different way. Their motion was westward motion around Earth's vertices. Such motion could be found everywhere. The Atlantic Ocean rolled westward and ricocheted off the eastern coast of the New World, creating the tides. The planets, stars, sun and moon too migrated westward. The stirrings of magnets could not be blamed on a special force, but only on the impulse of nearly all things to go west.

References William Gilbert, De magnete, London, 1600, pp. 10–11, 12, 173–176. (Cited in Rees 2006, p. liii) William Gilbert, De mundo nostro sublunari philosophia nova, Amsterdam, 1651, pp. 35–36, 46, 107–109. (Cited in Rees 2006, p. liii.) Graham Rees, ed. 2006. The Oxford Francis Bacon, VI: Philosophical Studies c. 1611-c. 1619. Oxford: Clarendon Press. ISBN 0-19-812290-X. Rees, Graham (1979). "Francis Bacon on Verticity and the Bowels of the Earth". Ambix. 26 (3). Informa UK Limited: 202–211. doi:10.1179/amb.1979.26.3.202. ISSN 0002-6980. PMID 28521586.

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Verticity

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Verticity claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Verticity before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Verticity ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Verticity

In research: Verticity appears in science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Verticity in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Verticity is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics Geomagnetism, History of science and technology in England, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Verticity outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Verticity in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Verticity means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Verticity out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Verticity in simple terms?

Why does Verticity matter?

Because it connects several science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Verticity?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Verticity.