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PREVIOUS YEAR QUESTION& ANSWERS -
PLUS TWO-UNIT 5 -MAGNETISM AND MATTER 

Common Misconceptions

Magnets and Magnetism

1. All metals are attracted to a magnet.

There are only three naturally occurring metals that are magnetic:  iron, cobalt, and nickel

2. All silver colored items are attracted to a magnet.

 The color or amount of shine an object has is in no way related to whether or not it is magnetic. For instance, aluminum foil is shiny and it is NOT magnetic.

3. All magnets are made of iron.

Until 1821, only one kind of magnetism was known, the one produced by iron magnets. Then a Danish scientist, Hans Christian Oersted, while demonstrating to friends the flow of an electric current in a wire, noticed that the current caused a nearby compass needle to move.    In nature, magnetic fields are produced in the rarefied gas of space, in the glowing heat of sunspots and in the molten core of the Earth. Such magnetism is produced by electric currents.

4. Larger magnets are stronger than smaller magnets.

The size of the magnet is not necessarily directly related to the strength of the magnet. Neodynium magnets, made of a combination of neodymium, iron, and boron — Nd₂Fe₁₄B, are much stronger than the same sized iron magnet.

5. The magnetic and geographic poles of the earth are located at the same place.

The Earth's magnetic field can be modeled as a simple  bar magnet, tilted about 11° with respect to the Earth's rotation axis and centered at the Earth's center.

Earth's magnetic field is changing in size and position. The two poles wander  of each other and are not at directly opposite positions on the globe. Currently the magnetic south pole is farther from the geographic south pole than the magnetic north pole is from the geographic north pole. Over geological timescales, the orientation of Earth's magnetic field (and that of other planets) can flip over, so that magnetic north becomes magnetic south and vice versa – an event known as a geomagnetic reversal. The Earth's magnetic field has done this repeatedly throughout history. Although the North Magnetic Pole's motion on any given day is irregular, the average path forms a well-defined oval. The diagram shows the average path on disturbed days.

6. The magnetic pole of the earth in the northern hemisphere is a north pole, and the pole in the southern hemisphere is a south pole.

The North Magnetic Pole attracts the north pole of a bar magnet and so is in a physical sense actually a south magnetic pole. It is the center of the region of the magnetosphere in which the Aurora Borealis can be seen. As of 2005 it was located at approximately 79.74° N 71.78° W, off the northwest coast of Greenland, but it is now drifting away from North America and toward Siberia.