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So, I do not know much about electricty but it has always been interesting to me. (Especially solar cells) but negative is attracted to postive, etc.

So couldn't you theoretically have an "object" in your hand with postive energy and a "object 2" with negative energy like 1+ feet away from you that attact each other so the "object 2" would be pulled closer. (I assume the stronger the differnce in postive/negative energy the stronger the positive attraction)

I also assume I am not the only one who thought of this so is it hard to lose/gain electrons without touching the object? Just was an interesting thought I had. (As said I don't know much about this stuff, I've just learned about how electrons flow and free electrons" so I was curious.

Trevin Corkery
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  • Its the basic Coulomb's law. And remember electrons are not being transferred there is Only attraction and repulsion. – geeky me Jan 11 '16 at 11:26
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    Don't confuse energy with charge, it will make the physicists very unhappy. – Simon B Jan 11 '16 at 12:34
  • you can see this link for demonstrating the electrostatic fields https://phet.colorado.edu/sims/charges-and-fields/charges-and-fields_en.html – Aharon Jan 11 '16 at 11:45
  • Take a look at the Triboelectric Effect and the Triboelectric series; this has to do with how different materials are more or less willing to donate or accept electrons when these materials make contact. The farther apart two materials are on the triboelectric series, the more "static electric" charge gets generated when they make contact. – MarkU Jan 12 '16 at 06:10

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You can have two objects with opposite charge and they will indeed attract each other, or two objects with the same charge which will repel each other. This is known as Coulombs law and the force is inversely proportional to the square of the distance apart.

see the Wikipedia article: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Coulomb%27s_law

It is the reason your hair is attracted to your comb if you comb your hair on a cold dry day, or balloons can be made to stick to your jumper after rubbing them together.

Icy
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Theoretically you can, though the attraction is between charges, energy is released by the bodies moving closer together.

In practice, it is best illustrated when Object 1 is a lightweight insulator, such as a balloon, and Object 2 is a cat.