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Physics 10 Lecture 01 Initial Remarks On Science and Physics PDF

The document provides an overview of an introductory physics lecture that uses an analogy of intelligent beings from the planet Twilo visiting Earth to illustrate key concepts in physics. The Twiloans cannot see objects with sharp black and white contrasts. When shown a soccer game, all they see is people running and falling with no understanding of the ball or objective. This leads them to postulate an invisible ball to make sense of what they are seeing and discovering the essence of the game, similar to how Neptune was discovered. The document then discusses diagnostic features of science like repeatability, economy, mensuration, heuristics, and consilience. It also covers characterizing physics through its goals, strategies, tools, subfields, and

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114 views36 pages

Physics 10 Lecture 01 Initial Remarks On Science and Physics PDF

The document provides an overview of an introductory physics lecture that uses an analogy of intelligent beings from the planet Twilo visiting Earth to illustrate key concepts in physics. The Twiloans cannot see objects with sharp black and white contrasts. When shown a soccer game, all they see is people running and falling with no understanding of the ball or objective. This leads them to postulate an invisible ball to make sense of what they are seeing and discovering the essence of the game, similar to how Neptune was discovered. The document then discusses diagnostic features of science like repeatability, economy, mensuration, heuristics, and consilience. It also covers characterizing physics through its goals, strategies, tools, subfields, and

Uploaded by

AcademicBM
Copyright
© © All Rights Reserved
We take content rights seriously. If you suspect this is your content, claim it here.
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Lecture 01:

Initial Remarks on Science


and Physics
Visitors From Twilo
• Taken from Leon Lederman’s
“The God Particle”
• Imagine an intelligent race of
beings from the planet Twilo.
• They look more or less like us,
they talk like us, they do
everything like humans - except
for one thing…
Visitors From Twilo
• …they can’t see objects with a sharp
juxtaposition of black and white
Visitors From Twilo
• A contingent from Twilo comes to Earth on a
goodwill mission
• We take them to see one of the most popular
cultural events on the planet:
www.ballooninaboxusa.com/
sports.htm,http://athletics.vassar.edu/soccer/w-
pics/soccer.jpgwww.news.harvard.edu/gazette/ 2002/09.26/08-
soccer.htmlhttp://www.tamucc.edu/images/soccer.jpg
What Earthlings See
• Play Video
What Twiloans See
• Play Video
Visitors From Twilo
• As far as the Twiloans are concerned, a bunch of
short-pantsed people are running up and down
the field kicking their legs pointlessly in the air,
banging into each other, and falling down
• At times an official blows a whistle, a player runs
to the sideline, stands there, and extends both his
arms over his head while the other players watch
him
• Once in a great while the goalie inexplicably falls
to the ground, a great cheer goes up, and one
point is awarded to the opposite
Twiloans Try to Make Sense of Soccer
• Some use classification techniques
– Clothing → Two Teams
– Player movements → “geographical territories”
– Different players display different motions
– Named various positions
– Charts, tables, etc → great discovery: Symmetry
– More work → tables, scores, complicated rules
• Missing: What is the essence of the game???
Twiloans Try to Make Sense of Soccer
• Young Pipsqueak Twiloan: “Let's postulate the
existence of an invisible ball.”
• Elders: Say what?
• How did the pipsqueak come up with the idea?
Twiloans Try to Make Sense of Soccer

• Planet Neptune was discovered this way


Discovery of Neptune
Only five planets are visible in the night sky without
using a telescope. These are Mercury, Venus, Mars,
Jupiter and Saturn.

We know that they are planets because their


movements are apparent with respect to the
background stars.
Discovery of Neptune
In 1781, William Herschel discovered the planet Uranus
using his telescope
(the most powerful telescope back then).
The problem with
Uranus is that its
orbital speed does
not match with the
calculations done
using Newton’s
theory of gravity.

Newton’s theory of gravity predicted so much that it is


almost impossible for it to be wrong.
Discovery of Neptune
Urbain Jean-Joseph Le Verrier and
John Couch Adams postulated the
existence of another planet to
make sense of Uranus orbit and
Newton’s theory of gravity.

E1 Suppose Uranus is moving


relatively faster at point P 𝑨
compared to the result of
calculation. What is the most
likely position of another planet? 𝑩 𝑷
Explain your answer.

𝑪
Discovery of Neptune
Urbain Jean-Joseph Le Verrier told astronomer Johann
Gottfried Galle where and when to point his telescope.

In September 24, 1846 (within 1 degree of accuracy) the


new planet was found and that is the planet Neptune.
Diagnostic Features of
Science
“Science is the organized, systematic enterprise that
gathers knowledge about the world and condenses
the knowledge into testable laws and principles”.

What distinguishes Science from other ways of


knowing?
We use the Five Diagnostic Features of Science:
1. Repeatability
2. Economy
3. Mensuration
4. Heuristics
5. Consilience
Repeatability
• The same phenomenon is sought again and again,
preferably by independent investigation, and the
interpretation given to it is confirmed or discarded
by means of novel analysis and experimentation.
Repeatability
Economy
• Scientists attempt to abstract
the information into the
form that is both simplest
and most pleasing - the
combination called elegance -
while yielding the largest
amount of information with
the least amount of effort
• Occam’s Razor: The simplest
explanation is usually the
best.
Mensuration
• If something can be properly measured using
universally accepted scales, generalizations about
it are rendered unambiguous
• Consider process of observation with human
senses, it really creates a mental model of the real
world, as macroscopic approximation to the
microscopically comprised real world. Therefore
absolute reliance on perceived fact are subject to
error induced by crudeness of model
Parallel or Not?
Spinning or Not?
Heuristics
The best science stimulates further discovery, often in
unpredictable new directions, and the new knowledge provides an
additional test of the original principles that led to the discovery.

The principles of
Quantum Mechanics
is used to design
better algorithms.

Quantum Mechanics is
formulated to explain
atomic spectra.

http://www.assignmentpoint.com/science/physics/introduction-of-hydrogen-spectrum.html
https://www.media.mit.edu/quanta/qasm2circ/
https://www.overclockers.ua/news/hardware/2015-12-10/117134/
Consilience
The explanations of physical phenomena most likely
to survive are those that can be connected and
proved consistent with one another.

Gravitational wave signature


of two merging black holes.

Gravitational wave signature


of two neutron stars.
https://www.ligo.org/science/Publication-GW150914/
https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/page/press-release-gw170817
https://www.ligo.caltech.edu/system/avm_image_sqls/binaries/92/original/SkyMap__CREDIT__LIGO_Virgo_NAS
A_Leo_Singer__Axel_Mellinger.jpg?1508029988
Skill Sets: Perspective/Open-mindedness
• Science is thinking beyond, out of, and of the
“box”
• E5. Draw five (5) LINES to connect all nine dots
WITHOUT LIFTING YOUR PEN.
• E6. This time, use only four (4) LINES!
Skill Sets: Perspective/Open-mindedness
• Example: Heliocentrism VS Geocentrism
Skill Sets: Sense Making
• Science is not just accumulating facts but
putting them together in a coherent way
• Example: existence of atoms
Skill Sets: Sense Making
Skill Sets: Sense Making
Skill Sets: Sense Making
Skill Sets: Ability to Falsify
• Karl Popper: “It is easy to obtain confirmations,
or verifications, for nearly every theory — if we
look for confirmations.
• “Every genuine test of a theory is an attempt to
falsify it, or to refute it. Testability is
falsifiability...”
Physics
• From the Greek word “phusis” (sometimes
“physis”) which means nature
• Physics is difficult to define since the subject
has been evolving
• Instead of trying to define physics, we attempt
to characterize it instead
Characterizing Physics
1) Goals?
2) Strategy?
3) Tools ?
4) Subfields?
5) Frontiers?
6) Incompletely understood phenomena?
• Etc.
Characterizing Physics
• Goals
– To understand nature, that is, rationalize, explain
and predict physical phenomena
• Strategy
– Use of abstraction or unifying concepts (e.g.
energy, entropy, charge, force, etc.)
• Tools
– Mathematical models, experiments, computational
work
Characterizing Physics
• Subfields
– Up to the 19th Century: Astronomy, Mechanics,
Acoustics, Fluid Mechanics, Electromagnetism,
Optics, Thermodynamics, Statistical Physics
– Modern Physics: Relativity, Cosmology, Astrophysics,
Quantum Mechanics, High Energy Physics,
Condensed Matter Physics, Chaos, Nonlinear
Dynamics, Complex Systems, Biological Physics, Earth
Systems Physics
• Physics is about Frontiers!
– Dark Matter, M-Theory, Quantum Computing, etc.
7 Important Ideas In Physics
1. The Earth is not the center of the universe
(Copernican Astronomy)
2. The universe is a mechanism run by rules
(Newtonian mechanics and causality)
3. Energy is what makes it go
(the concept of energy)
4. Entropy tells it where to go
(entropy and probability)
5. The facts are relative but the law is absolute
(relativity)
6. You can’t predict or know everything (quantum theory
and the end of causality)
7. Fundamentally, things never change
(conservation principles and symmetry)

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