Or you could look at it the other way around. When we first had compasses we had already said north was a certain direction, thus the end of the magnet that pointed north was the north pole of the magnet in the compass. People hence called the part of the earth that we consider the most northerly pa...

Or you could look at it the other way around. When we first had compasses we had already said north was a certain direction, thus the end of the magnet that pointed north was the north pole of the magnet in the compass. People hence called the part of the earth that we consider the most northerly part, or the part that all north poles of magnets pointed to, the north pole. When magnetism was worked out we had the option, do we call the part of the earth that all north poles point to a south magnetic pole, or do we say that the polarity of all magnets should be reversed so that the compasses south pole was pointing north along with every other magnet (this is what you are saying and essentially what Gus is saying), the former was the easier option. You will find that scientifically a north pole will point to the planets geographical north pole which hence must be a southern magnetic pole. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Magnetic_Pole#Polarity
Another way of proving this is to look at how the earth’s magnet field affects a charged practical. When a current is run through a wire they experience a force due to the fact that a moving electric charge passing through a magnetic field will experience a force. When the current is generated a force (albeit a very week one) will be applied to the wire, if you run the current east to west it will experience a force downwards due to the motor effect ( a principal of physics). Using the motor effect there must be a magnetic field generated by the earth such that the magnetic flux lines run form the geographical southern pole to the geographical northern pole, essentially as the magnetic lines in a magnet run from a north pole to a south, hence there is a magnetic north pole in the south and a magnetic south pole in the north. en.wikibooks.org/wiki/GCSE_Science/The_motor_effect

That's what happens when one gets an engineer to explain physics. Then he tried to discuss magnetism using the word "charge", showing a dramatic lack of understanding. Get your bf on the next DrunkTank!

That's what happens when one gets an engineer to explain physics. Then he tried to discuss magnetism using the word "charge", showing a dramatic lack of understanding. Get your bf on the next DrunkTank!