ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

Scalar electrodynamics

Scalar electrodynamics is like a big playground with two main things that play together: electricity and something called a "scalar field". Electricity is like the energy that powers your toys and makes your hair stand up when you shuffle your feet on a carpet. The scalar field is like a big blanket that covers the whole playground and changes how things move.

Imagine you have two magnets, one positive and one negative, and you want to make them stick together. Normally, they would repel each other and push away. But if you put this big blanket on the playground, the magnets might start to stick together after all, even though they're supposed to repel each other. This is because the blanket changes the rules of how things move around.

Scientists use scalar electrodynamics to study how electricity and this blanket work together in the playground. They want to understand how the blanket affects things like magnets or particles of light, which are called photons.

There are many different ways to study scalar electrodynamics, but they all involve looking at the playground and measuring how things move around. Sometimes scientists use really fancy tools to see what's happening, like a microscope or a telescope. Other times they just use their brains and try to figure things out by thinking about them really hard. But no matter how they study it, scalar electrodynamics is a great way to learn about how the world works.