Four equations proved light, electricity and magnetism are the same thing

In 1865, James Clerk Maxwell combined the known laws of electricity and magnetism into a single set of equations and found they predicted self-sustaining waves travelling at the speed of light. He concluded light itself must be an electromagnetic wave, unifying three phenomena studied as separate subjects for centuries and laying the groundwork for radio and radar.

— James Clerk Maxwell, A Dynamical Theory of the Electromagnetic Field — Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society, 1865

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