since electrons are so much smaller than protons, why are the magnitudes of their charges the same?

Question

since electrons are so much smaller than protons, why are the magnitudes of their charges the same?

Answer 1

It isn't a proton that is positive, it's the positron inside the proton that gives it a +1 charge. A positron is the polar opposite to an electron, same size only positive. A neutron is neutral because it has the same amount of positrons as electrons within it.

Answer 2

This is wonderful puzzle that no one has any answer for as far as I know.

It even gets stranger when you consider the quarks that make up the proton. Why should they have charges that are multiples of e/3? If an electron is so fundamental why does it have a charge three times that of what now seems to be the smallest charge?

Answer 3

A property of an electron is that it has charge. The charge does not depend on its mass. It is one of those fundamental things in the unvierse. You must treat the two as seperate things example...a proton has mass...and it has charge ( Notice two different things that have nothing in common). The idea of charge is just the name some one gave it to label that phenomenon. There are many other properties of particles...such as its color, and its flavor (These words sound weird but there are other affects of nature that just had to be labled. The only one they teach you in basic physics course is the charge becasue it is the easisest to comprehend)...these words in the world of atomic physics describe a certain property of the particle that cannot be describe by another property. Meaning...you cant add charges to get mass, or you cant add color to get flavors, or you cant add mass to get color.

Your question is similar to me asking you....Since buildings are so much larger than ants why are the color of buildings grey...as you can see..that is a strange question because you know that the color of the building has absolutely nothing to do with its mass.