By the end of this unit, a successful student will be able to:
1) (1-1, 1-3, notes) Describe common elements of scientific methods
2) (1-1, 1-3, notes) Explain what is meant by “scientific theory”
3) (1-1, 1-3, notes) Identify whether a described item is or is not scientific and why or why not.
4) (1-1, notes) Describe how science is self-correcting.
5) (1-2, notes) Define physics and identify its major branches
6) (1-4, notes) Differentiate between accuracy and precision and relate them to forms of error and how they are expressed
7) (1-4, notes) Take measurements to the proper degree of precision
8) (1-4, notes) Identify the significant figures in calculations
9) (1-4, notes) Perform calculations using the proper number of significant figures
10) (1-5) Define measurement and describe the utility of standard and SI units
11) (1-5) Identify the SI base (fundamental) units
12) (1-5) Identify what each common metric prefix represents
13) (1-6) Use scientific notation and significant figures in problem solving
14) (1-7) Solve problems to low precision using order of magnitude estimation
15) (notes) Interpret trends in and compose line graphs
16) (notes) Use elementary trigonometry to relate angles and lengths of right triangles for problem solving.
17) (lab) Conduct an experiment applying the above techniques.
All assignments are due on the date listed. That is not the date they are assigned.
Due date Day Assignment
? Day 1 Read: Ch 1
Do: p. 16: Questions: 1- 10 (Problem Set 1 (PS1)) (Goals: 1 – 14)
? Day 2 Do Problems: 3c, 3d, 8, 9, 12a, 12b, 10, 11 19 (PS2) (Goals: 8 – 13)
? Day 4 Do Problems 33, 42, 46, and graphing handout questions (PS3) (Goals: 8 – 15)
? Day 6 Do: Handout: Trigonometry problems : handout 40, 41, 43, 46 (PS4) (Goals: 8 – 14, 16)
? Day 8 Write: Lab report – Gravity Drop (Goals 17)
? Day 9 Test Chapter 1
Links - Physics Preliminaries
Missed a class? Forgot what we did last week? Follow the link to Physics Unit 1 Daily Plans
- Chapter 1 - The Nature of Science from Physics Principles and Problems by Zitzewitz.
- Chapter 2-A Mathematical Toolkit from Zitzewitz.
- Our physics text by Giancoli covers similar material in Chapter 1 - Introduction
- A popular text that uses a little bit of calculus is Haliday, Resnick and Walker which has its first chapter on Chapter 1 - Measurement
- Scientific Methods
- While often described as "The" scientific method, there is no single recipe for doing good science. There are, however a number of common elements in most versions of the scientific method. The following pages describe them.
- Wikipedia's entry on the Scientific Method describes the method in detail as well as its historical development.
- Jose Wudka's The Scientific Method comes from a collection of physics notes. It describes the method in a general form and contrasts it with non & pseudo-scientific methods.
- Bill Latura maintains a similar page taken from Usenet's sci.skeptic FAQ on the Scientific Method.
- J. Stein Carter describes The Scientific Method from a biological standpoint including javascript exercises to help check your understanding.
- Frank Wolfs provides an Introduction to the Scientific Method including an explanation of when the scientific method is not applicable.
- Dr. Terry Halwes explores The Myth of the Magical Scientific Method calling attention to the multiplicity of methods through which good science is accomplished.
- Physicist Richard Feynman addresses the questionWhat is Science? It's from a speech from 1966 and does include a couple of gender stereotypes in recounting an incident from the 1940's.
- Richard Feynman's Lecture Series on The Character of Physical Law gives great insight on how physicists look at the world. The first two lectures: "The Law of Gravitation - an Example of a Physical Law" and "The Relation of Mathematics to Physics" both present ways in which the scientific method plays out in physics.
- Scientific Notation and Basic Trigonometry
- Bruce Bryson has adapted the rather famous film/book The Powers of Ten by Philip and Phyllis Morrison and the office of Charles & Ray Eames. It teaches about scientific notation and length scales in the univese from tiny quarks to the most distant quasars by zooming in and out from a patch of skin on the hand of a sleeping man in a park.
- Right Triangle Trigonometry In this video I present an overview of elementary trigonometric functions as they relate to lengths of the sides of right triangles and the internal angles of those triangles. Sine, cosine, and tangent functions are defined as are their inverse functions.
- International System of Units from NIST describes the SI system, the most widely recognized metric system of units. It includes a history of the system metric prefixes, and unit conversions.
- Frank Tapson's A Dictionary of Measures, Units and Conversions includes tables explaining the same for the SI system as well as for the UK Imperial system and the American systems of measurements with further explanations of units by catagory on separate pages.
- After the mks or SI metric system, the cgs or Gaussian system is the most commonly used metric system - mainly for electricity and magnetism. Eric Weisstein's page compares cgs to SI.
- Measurement, Error, Accuracy and Precision
- Bellevue Community College's physics department has this Introduction to Measurement and Sig Figs including uncertainty, accuracy and precision.
- Offline
- For more on the nature of science and physics you may be interested in: The Demon-Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark, by Carl Sagan and The Character of Physical Law, by Richard Feynman