can anybody filll me in on what a typical class would be like and what topics are cover and how the topics are covered ?

[Edited on April 10, 2007 at 4:15 PM. Reason : ;]

4/10/2007 4:13:13 PM

when I took it we spent about 2 weeks on solar system astronomy stuff ( moon, sun, stars, you know
Kepler's laws and so on)

Then we spent like 6 weeks rest on stellar evolution. Explaining the proposed main-sequence, how it works, how we measure the distance to stars using standard candles and so on...

Then I think we spent the rest of the time on galaxies (elliptical, spiral, etc...)

Mathwise it involves some integration and more differentiation, but mostly algebra. In fact the central
idea in the course is probably conservation of energy, that is at the base of many of the arguments I remember, well that's how I worked problems anyways. I don't think it is very plug and chug, it requires some thought.

4/10/2007 7:31:53 PM

Is there a textbook for the class?

4/11/2007 10:53:19 AM

we had one but I'd guess they've got a new one that has the extrasolar planets and other recent advances. A lot has changed since I took it 5 or so years ago.

We used Zelik and Gregory's "Introductory Atronomy and Astrophysics" 4-th ed. ($89.35, ouch.)

4/11/2007 8:07:32 PM

I took it last semester, I assume you will have it with Dr. Double, the class wasn't that bad at all, it was interesting atleast, pretty much went in the same sequence that he did. I remember spending a lot of time on the Sun though, Dr. Double isn't the greatest teacher, he sometimes makes things a lot harder than they need to be. Make sure you take good notes because a lot of the stuff on the tests are from his notes rather than the book. We used the Intro book as well, overall the class isn't that bad, I'm taking the second part of it, Spacetime Physics right now.

4/11/2007 11:42:36 PM

which book are you using for spacetime physics? I loved that course, spacetime diagrams are a lot of fun. I think it would be better if they used more linear algebra though,

4/12/2007 7:25:45 PM

We're using Special Relativity by French and Spacetime Physics by Taylor and Wheeler

4/12/2007 10:47:16 PM

We used Wolfgang Rindler's book. Recently I noticed this older book by Robert Resnick, "Introduction to Special Relativity". It's the best book I've found as far as details go, it has derivations I've not seen elsewhere. I think it used to be the standard a few decades ago. In particular it does a great job explaining why you need special relativity to make Maxwell's equations and Newton's equations sensible together. Did you guys talk much about electromagnetism as a motivation for special relativity? We didn't in my course, and I think that's a shame.

4/14/2007 5:25:55 PM

No, he mentioned it very briefly but said that would be discussed in higher level EM physics classes.

4/15/2007 12:42:55 AM