Analysis of the Abraham-Minkowski Controversy by Means of Two Simple Examples

Using a very simple example, H. M. Lai 1] argued in favor of Abraham's proposal for defining electromagnetic field momentum density. Later, using another simple device, Johnson et al. 2] argued in favor of Minkowski's proposal. This indicates that the Abraham-Minkowski controversy remains open. Both models consider nonmagnetic media ( = 1). In this work we analyze both models pointing out some weak points and extend the analysis to magnetic media ( 1). We show that in this case Minkowski's proposal is better than Abraham's. Our analysis throws some light on this very old controversy.