PHYSICS THE BASIC SCIENCE

PHYSICS ONCE KNOWN AS NATURAL PHILOSOPHY. NATURAL PHILOSOPHY IS THE STUDY OF UNANSWERED QUESTIONS. TODAY PHYSICS IS THE MOST BASIC SCIENCE.

THE BACKBONE OF SCIENCE BECAUSE PHYSICS FOCUSES ON THE MOST BASIC OF CONCEPTS IT PROVIDES THE SUPPORT FOR ALL OTHER SCIENCES. WHEN YOU UNDERSTAND PHYSIC, YOU UNDERSTAND THE OTHER SCIENCES BETTER.

MISCONCEPTION 1 “PHYSICS IS THE MOST DIFFICULT OF THE SCIENCES” IT IS NOT MORE DIFFICULT. THE DIFFERENCE IS THAT YOU ARE EXPECTED TO UNDERSTAND WHAT YOU ARE DOING!

AREAS WITHIN PHYSICSTHE MOST BASIC SCIENCE MECHANICS MOTION AND ITS CAUSES FALLING, FRICTION, WEIGHT, SPINNING THERMODYNAMICS HEAT AND TEMPERATURE MELTING, FREEZING, ENGINES, RERIGERATORS VIBRATIONS AND WAVE PHENOMENA TYPES OF REPETIVE MOTIONS SPRING, PENDULUMS,SOUND OPTICS LIGHT MIRRORS, LENSES, COLOR, ASTRONOMY ELECTROMAGNETISM ELECTRICITY, MAGNETISM, AND LIGHT ELECTRICAL CHARGE, CIRCUITS, MAGNETS, ELECTROMAGETS RELATIVITY PARTICLES MOVING AT ANY SPEED COLLISIONS, ACCELERATORS, NUCLEAR ENERGY QUANTUM MECHANICS BEHAVIOR OF SUBMICROSCOPIC PARTICLES THE ATOM AND ITS PARTS

MISCONCEPTION 2 “PHYSICS IS APPLIED MATHEMATICS” WRONG! ALTHOUGH MATHMATICS IS THE LANGUAGE OF PHYSICS IT IS NOT THE ONLY WAY TO STUDY PHYSICS!

MATH MATHEMATICS IS CONSIDERED THE LANGUAGE OF SCIENCE NUMBERS ARE THE SAME IN EVERY LANGUAGE WHY IS THAT KEY?

EQUATIONS PHYSICS EQUATIONS ARE SYSTEMS OF CONNECTIONS, FOLLOWING THE RULES OF LOGIC THEY TELL US WHAT IS CONNECTED TO WHAT AND WHAT WE CAN IGNORE.

STEPS OF THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD PURPOSE-RECOGNIZE THE PROBLEM HYPOTHESIS- TESTABLE STATEMENT PROCEDURE COLLECT DATA- DATA TABLES ANALYZE DATA- CALCULATIONS…SHOW WORK!! CONCLUSION – SUMMARIZE WHAT YOU OBSERVED AND HOW IT DOES/DOES NOT SUPPORT THE HYPOTHESIS. STATE YOUR SOURCES OF ERROR.

SCIENTIFIC METHOD GALILEO AND FRANCES BACON ARE CREDITED AS THE FOUNDERS OF THE SCIENTIFIC METHOD. PHYSICS USES MODELS TO EXPLAIN THE MOST FUNDAMENTAL FEATURES OF VARIOUS PHENOMENA. WWW.SCILINKS.ORG HF2011 PHYSICS USES “SYSTEMS”(A SET OF ITEMS OR INTERACTIONS CONSIDERED A DISTINCT PHYSICAL ENTITY FOR THE PURPOSE OF STUDY.)

WHAT DO MODELS DO? HELP BUILD HYPOTHESES HELP GUIDE EXPERIMENTAL DESIGN GALILEO DEMONSTRATION 10 PENNIES VS 1 PENNY LISTEN CAREFULLY – WHICH HIT FIRST? 10 FILTERS VS 1 FILTER WATCH CAREFULLY – WHICH HIT FIRST?

MEASUREMENTS IN EXPERIMENTS BASIC SI UNITS ARE: METER THE DISTANCE TRAVELED BY LIGHT IN A VACCUM IN 3.3 X 10-9 S LITER EXACTLY EQUAL TO ONE CUBIC DECIMETER AND IS EQUAL TO THE VOLUME OF ONE KILOGRAM OF DISTILLED WATER AT 4°C. GRAM THE MASS OF A SPECIFIC PLATINUM-IRIDUM ALLOY CYLINDER SECOND 9,192,631,700 TIMES THE PERIOD OF A RADIO WAVE EMITTED FROM A CESIUM-133 ATOM.

Si uses prefixed for extremes pico f 10-12 deka da 101 nano p 10-9 kilo k 103 micro μ 10-6 mega M 106 milli m 10-3 giga G 109 centi c 10-2 tera T 1012 deci d 10-1 peta P 1015

AGREEMENT DIMENSIONS AND UNITS MUST AGREE YOU MUST ONLY WORK IN ONE DIMENSION YOU CAN ONLY ADD AND SUBTRACT LIKE UNITS. EX: METERS + METERS = METERS METERS + CENTEMETERS ≠ METERS

ACCURACY AND PRECISION HOW CLOSE A MEASURED VALUE IS TO THE TRUE VALUE OF THE QUNATITY MEASURED. PRECISION THE DEGREE OF EXACTNESS WITH WHICH A MEASUREMENT IS MADE AND STATED

SIGNIFICANT FIGURES THOSE DIGITS IN A MESUREMENT THAT ARE KNOWN WITH CERTAINTY PLUS THE FIRST DIGIT THAT IS UNCERTAIN. HELP KEEP TRACK OF IMPRECISION.

SIGNIFICANT FIGURES RULES 1. ZEROS BETWEEN OTHER NONZERO DIGITS ARE SIGNIFICANT. 2. ZEROS IN FRONT OF NONZERO DIGITS ARE NOT SIGNIFICANT. ZEROS THAT ARE AT THE END OF A NUMBER AND ALSO TO THE RIGHT OF THE DECIMAL ARE SIGNIFICANT. ZEROS AT THE END OF A NUMBER BUT TO THE LEFT OF A DECIMAL ARE SIGNIFICANT. IF THERE IS NO DECIMAL, THEY ARE NOT SIGNIFICANT.

RULES FOR CALCULATING WITH SIG. FIGS. ADDITION OR SUBTRACTION THE FINAL ANSWER SHOULD HAVE THE SAME NUMBER OF DIGITS TO THE RIGHT OF THE DICIMAL AS THE MEASUREMENT WITH THE SMALLEST NUMBER OF DIGITS TO THE RIGHT OF THE DECIMAL. 97.3 + 5.85= 103.15 103.2

RULES FOR CALCULATING WITH SIG. FIGS. MULITPLICATION OR DIVISION THE FINAL ANSWER HAS THE SAME NUMBER OF SIGNIFICANT FIGURES AS THE MEASUREMENT HAVING THE SMALLEST NUMBER OF SIGNIFICANT FIGURES. 123 X 5.35= 658.05 658

RULES FOR ROUNDING WHEN TO ROUND UP WHEN TO ROUND DOWN WHENEVER THE DIGIT FOLLOWING THE LAST SIG. FIG IS A 6,7,8 OR 9 EX: 22.49=22.5 IF THE DIGIT FOLLOWING THE LAST SIG. FIG IS A 5 FOLLOWED BY A NONZERO DIGIT. EX: 54.7511=54.8 IF THE LAST SIG. FIG. IS AN ODD NUMBER AND THE NEXT DIGIT IS A 5, WITH NO OTHER NONZERO DIGITS. 54.75=54.8 OR 79.3500=79.4 WHEN TO ROUND DOWN WHENEVER THE DIGIT FOLLOWING THE LAST SIGNIFICANT FIGURE IS A 0,1,2,3,OR 4 EX: 30.24 = 30.2

WARNING CALCULATORS DO NOT PAY ATTENTION TO SIG. FIGS. IN ORDER TO PROVIDE ANSWERS WITH THE CORRECT NUMBER OF SIG FIGS, IT WILL SOMETIMES BE NECESSARY TO ROUND THE RESULTS OF A CALCULATION. USE THE RULES I HAVE GIVEN YOU.

THE LANGUAGE OF PHYSICS INTERPRETING DATA IN TABLES AND GRAPHS, AND RECONGIZING EQUATIONS THE SUMMARIZE DATA WILL BE IMPORTANT TO YOU IN PHYSICS. WWW.SCILINKS.ORG HF2013

EQUATIONS EQUATIONS INDICATE RELATIONSHIPS. DIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL INDIRECTLY PROPORTIONAL Δ DELTA MEANS THE CHANGE IN Σ EPSOLON MEANS THE SUM OF Π PI MEANS PI – 3.14…..

DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS CHANGING FROM ONE DIMENSION TO ANOTHER USING CONVERSION FACTORS. EX: 88 KM/H TO M/S 88.0KM X 1000M X 1H = 24.4 M/S 1 H 1 KM 3600 S

ADVANTAGES OF DIMENSIONAL ANALYSIS GREAT TOOL FOR CHECKING WHETHER THE EQUATION YOU ARE USING GIVES THE KIND OF QUANTITY YOU WANT TO CALCULATE. EXAMPLE: DENSITY = MASS/VOLUME DENSITY IS MEASURED IN G/CM3 OR KG/M3 DENSITY = KG/M3 OR G/CM3

ORDER OF MAGNETUDE WWW.SCILINKS.OR HF2014 AN ESTAMTE OF AN ANSWER TO A PROBLEM BEFORE TRYING TO SOLVE THE PROBLEM EXACTLY. THIS WILL GIVE YOU THE ADVANTAGE OF KNOWING WHETHER ON NOT YOUR CALCULATED ANSWER IS IN THE BALL PARK. EX: 103 km = 10 h 102 km/h