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I earned my PhD in physics at Penn and Columbia, helping build a satellite still taking data (XMM-Newton). I love physics. I loved learning physics. Physics is
by spodek 6y ago
I earned my PhD in physics at Penn and Columbia, helping build a satellite still taking data (XMM-Newton). I love physics. I loved learning physics.
Physics is not math. It is an experimental field. Ctrl-f experiment yields no results on that page. Ctrl-f lab shows only results in the comments. I love that that page exists, but it's missing the physical component of physics. Learning only theory may serve many people, but it doesn't serve the field.
Now that I teach project-based learning, albeit in leadership not physics, I see huge gaps in my physics education about experiment, curiosity, doing things with our hands, realizing we can test things ourselves. Most lab classes I took walked us through known results so we could write the data we were supposed to find if we measured wrong -- the opposite of science.
If you want to be a theorist, great, but distancing physics from what anyone can do seems to make it less accessible.
For example, I work on sustainability. People routinely seem shocked that their turning on a light switch or air conditioner necessarily today means somewhere some power plant had to convert that energy from something else, polluting in the process.
- a9h74j 6y ago> experiment, curiosity, doing things with our hands, realizing we can test things ourselves Partially-related, I have heard it claimed that would-be surgeons are showing less dexterity than previous generations, presumably from lack of hands-on hobbies when younger.
- petermcneeley 6y ago"If you want to be a theorist, great, but distancing physics from what anyone can do seems to make it less accessible." Well said. I also dont fully understand this strong desire to push everyone towards the theoretical boundaries of physics. "Physics is not math." I would lean towards agreeing with this statement however its pretty much considered heresy. "Most lab classes I took walked us through known results so we could write the data we were supposed to find if we measured wrong " This is extremely unfortunate. Perhaps it was a time/resource constraint issue. Real labs can be very time intensive but I found them to be very rewarding and motivating.
- BeetleB 6y agoWhile I don't particularly disagree with you, I can assure you that there are plenty of physics PhDs who focus on theoretical physics and know as little about the experimental world as the archetype you are trying to criticize. You definitely can get a PhD in physics and be fairly clueless about the experimental world.
- mindcrime 6y agoPhysics is not math. It is an experimental field. Isn't this kinda what Sabine Hossenfelder has been saying for the past couple of years? But that itself seems to be a reaction to the way so much of physics has become "just math". One can bemoan this state of affairs (and people have, obviously. Hossenfelder, Peter Woit, Lee Smolin, etc.), but it seems like that's kinda where we're at these days... at least for a large portion of the physics community.
- lambdatronics 6y agoThere's plenty of experimental physics, but everyone seems to think physics means theoretical particle physics. It bugs me.