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Greatest book on physics ever! Shortest review ever!
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Feynman lectures on physics
This book of more than fifty chapters was first published more than fifty years ago. There is a fair amount of math as it quickly covers the core topics found in an undergraduate physics or electrical engineering curriculum. With the exception of some of the thermodynamics sections which were new to me, I found the material to be a good refresher course for those engineers or physicists who remember a good deal of the math and have a fondness for equations.
Here are some notes. Asterisked sections are not found in the book but my from my own understanding.
There are four fundamental forces in Physics
1. Nuclear force -- strength =1, mesons to baryons
2. Electromagnetic force -- strength = 10E-2, between nuclei and electrons, related to chemical bond strengths
3. Weak decay -- strength = 10E-5, beta decay, involve quarks and long decay times
4. Gravity -- strength = 10E-40, universal but extremely weak at the atomic level.
*Now there is evidence to about 4 9s of confidence that there is a very weak fifth force involving muons that is stronger than gravity and weaker than beta decay. This was found in LHC tests in 2021 using high energy collisions where fewer muons than electrons resulted from the collisions. It is was expected that the number of muons created would match the number of electrons. This finding is exciting (although not statistically at the level of five 9s required for adoption to a law) because it is intuited by many particle physicists that there are other forces beyond the standard model needed to adequately explain dark matter and other discrepancies such as an accelerating expansion of the universe. Muons have mass about 200x greater than electrons and decay rather slowly on the millisecond level.
Electric field forces fall off as the third power which helps to explain why they have small effect on large distances. And combined with the fact that it is unlikely that all of the electrons and protons would be lined up in opposition over greater distances makes gravity not electromagnetic force the dominant at great distances
Enzymes are a type of protein. They are big and somewhat complex. GTP and GDP are two very important enzymes because GTP can turn into GDP with water and a few other enzymes which fires muscle contractions. Not terribly relevant to physics but the section was interesting nonetheless.
Half lives and decay. The half life of a proton is more than the age of the universe. The half life of a U238 atom is more than the age of the earth. There are also strange subatomic particles where the decay rate is 10E-24 seconds.
Carbon 14 dating works up to about 100,000 years. To measure old rocks we use uranium and lead isotopes is a similar manner that go back billions of years. The age of the earth and the age of many meteorites found on earth are the same age which indicates that the earth was formed by meteorites.
*The Milky Way Galaxy is about 52,000 light years wide. The galaxy GN-z11 seems to be the farthest detectable galaxy from us, at 13.4 billion light-years.
The radius of a nucleus vs the universe is about 42 orders of magnitude.
Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle
delta_x*delta_p >= h/(4*pi)
As an object approaches absolute zero it does not mean the subatomic particles cease to have momentum
The random walk principle as applied to uncertainty of heads vs trails surrounding .5 probability is +/- 1/(2*sqrt(N)). So if N tosses is 9 then uncertainty is .16. If N=100 then uncertainty is .05 and if N = 1,000,000 then .0005.
Gravitational force
F=Gmm'/(r^2)
Keplers law states each planet moves in an elliptical path around the sun and that the square of their orbital periods are proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis.
With the principle of relativity
m=Mo/sqrt(1 - v^2/c^2)
The Lorentz transformations for time dilation is similar.
T = To/(sqrt(1-v^2/c^2))
Bremsstrahlung helps describe radiation derived from from electrons.
Doppler effect also applies to electromagnetic waves and explains the red shifting of distant stars and galaxies which are moving away from us. The effects are relativistic.
The latter 1/3 of the book covers more miscellaneous topics such as radiation, gases, kinetic theory, thermodynamics. Much of these sections involve a fair amount of calculus and statistical theory.
4 stars. A dated but quite famous book in academia with heavy emphasis on formulae.
This book of more than fifty chapters was first published more than fifty years ago. There is a fair amount of math as it quickly covers the core topics found in an undergraduate physics or electrical engineering curriculum. With the exception of some of the thermodynamics sections which were new to me, I found the material to be a good refresher course for those engineers or physicists who remember a good deal of the math and have a fondness for equations.
Here are some notes. Asterisked sections are not found in the book but my from my own understanding.
There are four fundamental forces in Physics
1. Nuclear force -- strength =1, mesons to baryons
2. Electromagnetic force -- strength = 10E-2, between nuclei and electrons, related to chemical bond strengths
3. Weak decay -- strength = 10E-5, beta decay, involve quarks and long decay times
4. Gravity -- strength = 10E-40, universal but extremely weak at the atomic level.
*Now there is evidence to about 4 9s of confidence that there is a very weak fifth force involving muons that is stronger than gravity and weaker than beta decay. This was found in LHC tests in 2021 using high energy collisions where fewer muons than electrons resulted from the collisions. It is was expected that the number of muons created would match the number of electrons. This finding is exciting (although not statistically at the level of five 9s required for adoption to a law) because it is intuited by many particle physicists that there are other forces beyond the standard model needed to adequately explain dark matter and other discrepancies such as an accelerating expansion of the universe. Muons have mass about 200x greater than electrons and decay rather slowly on the millisecond level.
Electric field forces fall off as the third power which helps to explain why they have small effect on large distances. And combined with the fact that it is unlikely that all of the electrons and protons would be lined up in opposition over greater distances makes gravity not electromagnetic force the dominant at great distances
Enzymes are a type of protein. They are big and somewhat complex. GTP and GDP are two very important enzymes because GTP can turn into GDP with water and a few other enzymes which fires muscle contractions. Not terribly relevant to physics but the section was interesting nonetheless.
Half lives and decay. The half life of a proton is more than the age of the universe. The half life of a U238 atom is more than the age of the earth. There are also strange subatomic particles where the decay rate is 10E-24 seconds.
Carbon 14 dating works up to about 100,000 years. To measure old rocks we use uranium and lead isotopes is a similar manner that go back billions of years. The age of the earth and the age of many meteorites found on earth are the same age which indicates that the earth was formed by meteorites.
*The Milky Way Galaxy is about 52,000 light years wide. The galaxy GN-z11 seems to be the farthest detectable galaxy from us, at 13.4 billion light-years.
The radius of a nucleus vs the universe is about 42 orders of magnitude.
Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle
delta_x*delta_p >= h/(4*pi)
As an object approaches absolute zero it does not mean the subatomic particles cease to have momentum
The random walk principle as applied to uncertainty of heads vs trails surrounding .5 probability is +/- 1/(2*sqrt(N)). So if N tosses is 9 then uncertainty is .16. If N=100 then uncertainty is .05 and if N = 1,000,000 then .0005.
Gravitational force
F=Gmm'/(r^2)
Keplers law states each planet moves in an elliptical path around the sun and that the square of their orbital periods are proportional to the cube of the semi-major axis.
With the principle of relativity
m=Mo/sqrt(1 - v^2/c^2)
The Lorentz transformations for time dilation is similar.
T = To/(sqrt(1-v^2/c^2))
Bremsstrahlung helps describe radiation derived from from electrons.
Doppler effect also applies to electromagnetic waves and explains the red shifting of distant stars and galaxies which are moving away from us. The effects are relativistic.
The latter 1/3 of the book covers more miscellaneous topics such as radiation, gases, kinetic theory, thermodynamics. Much of these sections involve a fair amount of calculus and statistical theory.
4 stars. A dated but quite famous book in academia with heavy emphasis on formulae.
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