Some consistency problems existing in continuum field theories are briefly reviewed. Three arts of consistency problems are clarified based on the renewed basic laws for polar continua. The first art discusses the consistency problems between the basic laws for polar continua. The second art discusses the consistency problems between the basic laws for polar continua and for other nonpolar continua. The third art discusses the consistency problems between the basic laws for micropolar continuum theories and the dynamical equations for rigid body. The results presented here can help us to get a deeper understanding the structure of the basic laws for various continuum theories and the interrelations between them. In the meantime, these results obtained show clearly that the consistency problems could not be solved in the framework of traditional basic laws for continuum field theories.
Through a comparison between the expressions of master balance laws and the conservation laws derived by Noether＇s theorem, a unified master balance law and six physically possible balance equations for micropolar continuum mechanics are naturally deduced. Among them, by extending the well-known conventional concept of energymomentum tensor, the rather general conservation laws and balance equations named after energy-momentum, energy-angular momentum and energy-energy are obtained. It is clear that the forms of the physical field quantities in the master balance law for the last three cases could not be assumed directly by perceiving through the intuition. Finally, some existing results are reduced immediately as special cases.
