The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1961-1964) • Hacker News Board

Re: The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1961-1964)

#61

Post by jonjacky » Fri, Mar 25, 2022, 5:29 PM UTC

fsckboy wrote: post #44

Stratoscope wrote: post #27

If you enjoy Feynman's lectures as much as I do (he taught freshman physics when I went to Caltech!) I highly recommend his armchair series, "Fun to Imagine": https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nYg6jzotiAc He's sitting at home in Pasadena, talking about stuff that comes to mind. • Jiggling atoms who like to make friends with each other. • Where do trees come from? (It's not the dirt.) • Why don't your arms sink through…

he makes a solid--but ok, some of you would quibble it--Newtonian physics error in that series. anybody else here have a claim that they can correct Feynman?

There's the time a student was misled by an error in the Feynman Lectures and wrote to him about it. Here's the story and the recent HN thread about it.

https://www.wm.edu/news/stories/2020/feynmans-advice-to-wm-s...

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30417660

Re: The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1961-1964)

#62

Post by jonjacky » Fri, Mar 25, 2022, 5:44 PM UTC

ravel-bar-foo wrote: post #47

pvg wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a classic and highly regarded physics course although these days there are many options to choose from. It's not for median laypeople, though - the original audience was CalTech undergrads so there's a fair bit of mathematical (and, realistically, physics) pre-req.

I read somewhere (probably another HN comment) that most of the undergrads dropped the course, but Feynman didn't know because they were replaced by grad students.

This can't be right. You couldn't drop the course. Two years of physics in the freshman and sophomore years, taught from the Feynman Lectures, was a requirement for all Caltech undergrads, including those in humanities majors like economics, history and even English -- there were a few.

The whole two year physics sequence - the lectures where your entire class attended together, always in the same room, three times a week for two years, the homework sets, the sections, the weekly take-home quizzes - were a shared rite of passage, a central part of the Caltech experience for every student. It was difficult for some of us, but we had to persevere - it wasn't optional. A classmate called it 'intellectual boot camp'.

Re: The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1961-1964)

#63

Post by zanethomas » Fri, Mar 25, 2022, 8:22 PM UTC

zengargoyle wrote: post #49

zanethomas wrote: post #16

Nice! I bought the books decades ago and lost them, decades ago. :\

Same, I had my books from 1986 (when I was 16) bought from Caltech's bookstore while I was there at a summer program (YESS, Young Engineer Summer Scholars) that went on for months where I learned 2-3 semesters worth of undergrad physics/calculus. Such a wonderful summer nerd program for the day and age. Best summer camp ever! So many stories. Lost the books in a move in the late 1990's, still a bit sad about it. One…

Must have been awesome.

My dad was a physicist and we lived next door to a physicist from caltech so ... I met Feynman twice.

Re: The Feynman Lectures on Physics (1961-1964)

#64

Post by ravel-bar-foo » Sun, Mar 27, 2022, 8:17 PM UTC

jonjacky wrote: post #62

ravel-bar-foo wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I read somewhere (probably another HN comment) that most of the undergrads dropped the course, but Feynman didn't know because they were replaced by grad students.

This can't be right. You couldn't drop the course. Two years of physics in the freshman and sophomore years, taught from the Feynman Lectures, was a requirement for all Caltech undergrads, including those in humanities majors like economics, history and even English -- there were a few. The whole two year physics sequence - the lectures where your entire class attended together, always in the same room, three times a…

Oh. I didn't know that. Thanks for clearing that up. The comment I read (or my memory) must have been wrong, then.