Cecil Moore wrote:
We already know that, Ian. Please drag out your dusty math book
and try to understand the difference between the standing wave
current function, func(kx)*func(wt), and the traveling wave
current function, func(kx +/- wt). They are obviously different.
Calling the standing wave current a "current" is something of
a misnomer since it doesn't exhibit the characteristics of a
normal current at all. What are the implications of a "fixed
phase" for a current, i.e. its phasor doesn't rotate?

This can be improved.

Current is charge movement. DC, traveling waves and standing waves
all are *exactly* charge moving past a given point, and nothing more.

A phasor is not a real thing, but a mathematical abstraction that
relates how the sinusoidal change in current magnitude and direction
relate to a reference periodic cycle in time. Since, in both standing
waves and traveling waves, current at a point, changes magnitude and
sign in exactly the same way (at a point, they are indistinguishable),
they can both be described with phasor notation.

The difference between a traveling wave and a standing wave is how the
phasor representing the current at one point differs from the phasor
representing the current at a neighboring point.

For traveling waves, the phasor of a neighboring point has the same
amplitude but a different phase shift (passes through zero at a
different time).

For standing waves, the phasor of a neighboring point has the same
phase shift, but a different amplitude, unless the neighboring point
is on the other side of a current node. Then it has the opposite phase.

But at any point along both standing waves and traveling waves, there
certainly is a phasor that represents the current at that point.

You need to get past this misconception that standing waves are not
current and are not describable by phasors. I think your concepts are
correct in lots of ways and recently improving, but this is a
recurring snag that keeps detouring your adversaries into straw men
that you offer them on a platter.