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A basic understanding of the physics of electricity will give you helpful insight into countless things in your everyday life; you likely don't notice this beca
by Crito 13y ago
A basic understanding of the physics of electricity will give you helpful insight into countless things in your everyday life; you likely don't notice this because you take such a basic understanding for granted. For example, understanding resistance current and voltage will allow you to reason about the efficiency of different sort of light bulbs (the package will give you the numbers and tell you it is good, but consumers are rightfully wary of what packaging tells them), understand how electrical heaters work, reason about their monthly power bill, etc. Knowledge of how electricity works, particularly home wiring, can save lives. Hell, just understanding what a circuit breaker is for and how to use it has the potential to save lives (and you would not believe the number of shoddy low gauge extension cables I have confiscated from my grandmother...) Even figuring out how to jump a car battery becomes much easier if you understand what you are attempting to do.
Meanwhile, since you and I can both code, we naturally inflate the importance of it. If we could not code, we would still get along in life just as well as the majority of the population (which by most reasonable accounts, is "just fine"). Basic computer literacy is much different from the ability to code, and this is only becoming more true year after year.
- jameshart 13y agoDon't know anything about the contemporary curriculum in US high schools, but my secondary education in physics included the basics of AC, DC, semiconducters and fundamental digital electronics, sufficient to help me fault-find a busted LED in a string of christmas lights this past weekend. If schools aren't teaching circuits, V=IR and P=IV, I agree they should. But I'm pretty sure in many cases they are, so you're arguing with a straw man.