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The Feynman Lectures on Physics (2013)
- hackuser 10y agoDoes anyone know how this publication relates to Six Easy Pieces? Same thing now free? Different lectures? Same lectures but one is abridged? http://www.basicbooks.com/full-details?isbn=9780465025275 http://www.basicbooks.com/full-details?isbn=9780465025275
- apetresc 10y agoBased on the description of "Six Easy Pieces", it appears to be a book targeted specifically at a lay audience, to popularize physics. The Feynman Lectures on Physics are basically a collection of lecture notes for a series of courses he taught at CalTech to physics majors, a decidedly not-lay audience.
- CalChris 10y agoSix Easy Pieces corresponds to these chapters in The Feynman Lectures on Physics: Chapter 1, Atoms in Motion Chapter 2, Basic Physics Chapter 3, Relation of Physics to Other Sciences Chapter 4, Conservation of Energy Chapter 7, Theory of Gravitation Chapter 37, Quantum Behavior The editing differences are probably slight. Six Easy Pieces first came out in 1994 and the question would be whether a particular edition contains the 2006 definitive edition corrections.
- sparky_z 10y agoI believe it's just 6 of the lectures, selected for their accessibility to a general audience (i.e., lack of mathyness).
- cbHXBY1D 10y agoIs this a good introduction to physics for a layman who is comfortable with linear algebra and calculus?
- archgoon 10y agoI'm not sure how many 'layman' are comfortable with Linear Algebra and Calculus ;). Give it a shot; there's a fair number of non-mathy digressions that are worth reading, and you sound like you have the background to handle the mathier parts.
- cbHXBY1D 10y agoWell, I mean 'layman' as one of the most common demographics on HN: someone who has a degree in CS and maths but is now a full time developer.
- popobobo 10y agoNo, definitely not. Try to find some book in the topic that you are interested in. If it is electromagnetism, go for the black book with four equations printed. If it is quantum mechanics, I like the Sakurai book.
- Zanta 10y agoParts are and parts definitely aren't. I have a four year physics degree and found the treatment of certain sections very challenging. I would not recommend it as an introductory text
- popobobo 10y agoI was a physics major. These 3 volumes used to be so dry that I can't even turn a page. But those are real good memory considering I am now just a web developer digging code just for the money. Hey, at least I can show off to my former classmates on how much I am making. Don't you pity me.
- anton_tarasenko 10y agoThis series has a fourth book: Feynman's tips on physics: a problem-solving supplement to the Feynman lectures on physics A great book on general problem solving in science and engineering. Something you won't find in standard textbooks. Available online: https://bayanbox.ir/view/6682075492227836301/Feynman-Tips-on-Physics.pdf https://bayanbox.ir/view/6682075492227836301/Feynman-Tips-on...
- AnimalMuppet 10y agoFor those who don't read Farsi (I think it's Farsi, anyway), that link is somewhat less than useful...
- justinhj 10y agoIf you click the buttons at the top they take you through to english pdfs
- forbidden404 10y agoYou just have to press the blue icon if you want to read online (through .pdf nonetheless) or the orange one to download it. I don't read Farsi, but if you hover over those icons, you can see the link and the pdf is in English.
- packetslave 10y agowhy are you posting pirated copies of copyrighted material to HN?
- justinpombrio 10y agoSo that people can read it, I would assume.
- packetslave 10y agothat's... not how copyright works
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- rajeshp1986 10y agoI wish I knew about the Feynman lectures during my undergrad :(
- madengr 10y agoFunny to see the guy in the top photo in the process of lighting a smoke. Ah, the good old days. Anyway, great series. I happened upon the 50th anniversary hardbound edition in a Los Alamos museum bookstore.
- hermitdev 10y agoMicrosoft Research made a number of Feynman lectures available in 2009 with their Project Tuva [1]. Originally it required Silverlight, but the Silverlight app has been decommissioned. The videos are now directly available online. For those interested in Feynman, the man, I highly recommend "Surely you must be joking, Mr. Feynman.". It's a mostly fun, sometimes sad, look at his life. [1] https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/tuva-richard-feynman/ https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/tuva-richar...
- stOneskull 10y agoThank you. I had tried to find this before and it was like Microsoft were making it for Windows users only.
- richard___ 10y agoBill Gates supposedly put all the free video lectures online. I see a comment there that links to 7 of them but I wonder where the rest are.
- evanb 10y agoThere are no videos of the lectures of the material the book is based on. The videos Gates put up are the Messenger Lectures that Feynman gave at Cornell.
- al2o3cr 10y agoMy favorite part of those books is Book II, Chapter 19 on "The Principle of Least Action" - a great explanation of the core of what he would win his Nobel prize for two years later. The sizable section that analyzes ways to try "beat" the two-slit electron experiment is also amazing.
- HaveCourage 10y agoIf only the greatest of us didn't rot away and die. I think Feynman would be great to still have around.
- LordDragonfang 10y agoI notice that the way these volumes are split up is the same as both the way US AP classes and most colleges I've seen split up physics classes. Is it safe to assume that it has become the canonical order to teach the subject because of these lectures?
- rerx 10y agoNo, that was the canonical order of lectures long before Feynman started teaching. Actually, I think Feynman's influence on introductory physics teaching is much smaller than it is often stated. More "standard" courses that put a higher emphasis on how to actually carry out computations are more successful first physics courses. Feynman's lecture notes are an illuminating read to gain a broader perspective when one has already learnt how to "do" physics. IIRC in the preface Feynman himself actually expresses his disappointment with how well his students actually managed to learn from his teaching. Feynman as a researcher was a master at presenting his (innovative and important) results in insightful ways, such that they appear almost obviously plausible from these alternative angles. But he did that after powering through insanely hard, long calculations to really obtain these results. Those are the most important part of the work.
- facepalm 10y agoI'm a huge fan of Feynman, but the lectures gave me the impression they are not the ultimate learning resource for physics. Any other books on physics that people would recommend?
- atpgamma2 10y agoHere is a path for learning physics, https://www.susanjfowler.com/blog/2016/8/13/so-you-want-to-learn-physics https://www.susanjfowler.com/blog/2016/8/13/so-you-want-to-l... for those interested, and here is relevant HN discussion https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12691963 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12691963
- Chris2048 10y agoAre these good for getting an intuition for the underlying math, without particularly caring about physics? I don't care so much about particle interactions, but if I can get a better intuition for thinking about common mathematics, that would be more useful to me.