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So you want to learn physics (2021)

susanrigetti.com

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Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#151

Post by movpasd »

amluto wrote: post #65

This has the same omission that my undergrad program had: continuum mechanics. Even just the very basics (pressure, velocity, etc in a moving, non-equilibrium system) and translating between the terminology used by different science and engineering fields (static pressure, total pressure, velocity pressure, stagnation pressure, hydrostatic pressure, dynamic pressure, plain old pressure, head, oh my!) is very useful.…

I think solid state continuum mechanics are also the optimal place to introduce tensors. For some reason, the first tensors many physics students encounter are very abstract. It would be like if the first vectors you encountered were quantum mechanical states. Stress and strain are, in my opinion, the ideal "prototypical rank-2 tensors", and it's useful to spend time really elaborating what that means, the same way we teach students to think of vectors as "things that look like displacement/velocity".

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#152

Post by niemandhier »

amluto wrote: post #65

This has the same omission that my undergrad program had: continuum mechanics. Even just the very basics (pressure, velocity, etc in a moving, non-equilibrium system) and translating between the terminology used by different science and engineering fields (static pressure, total pressure, velocity pressure, stagnation pressure, hydrostatic pressure, dynamic pressure, plain old pressure, head, oh my!) is very useful.…

I noticed that too, and my explanation was that physics education needs to set itself apart from engineering.

Classical ( non relativistic ) field theories by now are undergrad engineering topics, but there are only a few quantum engineers.

Most of the non quantum topics in modern undergrad physics curricula, is needed to make sense of quantum[ thermodynamics, filed theory, optics, something ]

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#153

Post by LYK-love »

the_g0d_f4ther wrote: post #145
LYK-love wrote: post #78

After reading this blog, I'm ashamed. I just graduated from college. In my high school, the education of physics was so boring and tiresome that I even hated it at one point. For this reason, I chose computer science rather than physics as my major in college. Later, I gradually became interested in physics, however, due to the lack of good enough study habits, atmosphere and courage (which is a self-deprecating way…

I feel the same way about pursuing CS instead of Physics. But at some point, a pragmatic solution had to be made. So don’t go hard on yourself for that, you probably would have felt the same way about CS too.

Yeah thanks. The difference of CS and physics, and other natural science, I think, is that it's more about engineering even though it's name is computer "science". However the pupolar deep learning may satisfy the needs of a natural science enthusiast. Since Hinton sayed the way neural network workss resembles the mechanism of human brain[^1]. It's quite exciting.

[^1]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2EDP4v-9TUA&t=2418s

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#154

Post by LYK-love »

titanomachy wrote: post #128
LYK-love wrote: post #78

After reading this blog, I'm ashamed. I just graduated from college. In my high school, the education of physics was so boring and tiresome that I even hated it at one point. For this reason, I chose computer science rather than physics as my major in college. Later, I gradually became interested in physics, however, due to the lack of good enough study habits, atmosphere and courage (which is a self-deprecating way…

Go easy on yourself.

Thanks, this is inspiring.

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#155

Post by dsqrt »

kingkongjaffa wrote: post #13

It’s a decent list but thermodynamics is introduced way too late in the list (after modern and quantum wtf) and fluid dynamics and fluid mechanics including aerodynamics is entirely missing. If you have a physics education (I have an engineering education) can you tell me if you can really get a physics degree without bumping into Bernoulli or Navier-Stokes? At least just to see the lay of the land.

I think this is, at least in part, specific to the US/Western tradition. US physics curriculum is built to get people up to speed with quantum physics ASAP, because this is the core of most physics research in US physics departments. If you look at Landau-Lifshitz's Theoretical Physics curriculum, you will find plenty of classical physics: from fluid dynamics, to elasticity, and plasma physics. For example, Landau-Lifshitz Vol. 6 is an excellent introduction to Navier-Stokes equations and their applications.

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#156

Post by cgio »

I just realised I had seen the first version of this and thought there’s too much and would take a long time. 6 years passed, I guess enough to have read the majority of those but I haven’t. Hope in 6 years I won’t be thinking the same. Started with some Susskind tonight.

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#157

Post by selimthegrim »

sizzzzlerz wrote: post #134
antegamisou wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Halliday & Resnick Fundamentals of Physics is what we used in AP as well as in freshman year at college. Covers most sections one needs to be familiar with to be physics literate (solid/fluid mechanics, waves, thermo, electromagnetism, optics, relativity).

Is that still in print? That was the physics book we used my freshman year, in 1974. It was a great book. I’m still sorry I sold it.

Jearl Walker (of Cleveland State and PBS’s Kinetic Carnival) was added as an author.

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#158

Post by skipkey »

projectileboy wrote: post #52
whartung wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you present the hard problem first, the student may flail around and realize: I need something to help with this! I suffer from this. Sure, I'd like to learn physics, but what I don't want to do is learn all of it. Right now. Because what I'd rather learn is what I need to solve the problem I have. It's a silly problem, it's not real world, but it's my problem that I'd like solved. As I've grabbed my horse and l…

You might dig “The Theoretical Minimum” by Susskind, as well as his follow-on books. And he has associated lectures on YouTube.

I don’t recommend the first book. At least in my edition the typesetting is just odd, which makes it harder to read than it should be. The front matter indicates it was typeset in Mathematica, which probably explains it. The later books in the series don’t suffer from this problem.

The videos that it was essentially transcribed from are great tho.

If it exists, you could probably replace most of the first book with just a really good explanation of the Lagrangian, with lots of examples, I think.

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#159

Post by phalf »

ChuckMcM wrote: post #35
qsort wrote: post #3

A point that's rightfully emphasized by the author: > Solving problems is the only way to understand physics. There's no way around it. This generalizes well to other fields. I don't want to discourage anybody from trying to educate themselves in a difficult field (be it physics or something else), but that's a very common and immediately visible problem with autodidacts. If you haven't worked through enough hard pro…

Totally 100% with this. When younger I thought I could read the material and say "Oh, okay that makes sense I understand this." Only to fail miserably when on a test or somewhere I had to apply what I "knew" and realizing I didn't actually know it. I lean strongly toward autodidacticism and learned that if I could solve problems with the technique then I knew it.

Which exactly describes the problem with today's culture of people watching a 10 minute youtube clip and then thinking they are experts on the subject matter.

Be it microservices, coronavirus or taxation.

Re: So you want to learn physics (2021)

#160

Post by phalf »

javajosh wrote: post #24
qsort wrote: post #3

A point that's rightfully emphasized by the author: > Solving problems is the only way to understand physics. There's no way around it. This generalizes well to other fields. I don't want to discourage anybody from trying to educate themselves in a difficult field (be it physics or something else), but that's a very common and immediately visible problem with autodidacts. If you haven't worked through enough hard pro…

Yes, and I'd take it further. What I'd like to see more of in physics texts is presenting a problem before offering the solution. Too often you get what amounts to a laundry list of techniques and ideas, which are the components to the answers to hard problems, but the student isn't motivated to learn them. If you present the hard problem first, the student may flail around and realize: I need something to help with…

> IMHO, you should only reach for this understanding when you realize you need it

Issue is that often times people don't know that a certain tool exists, so they re-invent a 100x worse version and just hack something.

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