Ph 311/312
Supporting
web pages
Training quizzes, hand on simulations,
companion site of the Thorton Rex book: http://www.brookscole.com/cgi-wadsworth/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M20b&discipline_number=13&product_isbn_issn=0534417817
http://wps.aw.com/aw_harris_mp_2/
Pretty good and
comprehensive overview classical physics in preparation of modern physics
http://enjoy.phy.ntnu.edu.tw/data/458/www/simulations/simsb6fb.html?sim=SternGerlach_Experiment
http://www.cengage.com/cgi-wadsworth/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M20b&flag=student&product_isbn_issn=9780534493394&disciplinenumber=13
http://physics.prenhall.com/taylor
http://www.falstad.com/mathphysics.html
http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/hframe.html
http://www.cosmolearning.com/courses/quantum-physics/
higher level Quantum Mechanics
http://www.openculture.com/2012/08/the_character_of_physical_law_richard_feynmans_legendary_lecture_series_at_cornell_1964.html
a lecture series with videos by Nobel Laureate Richard P. Feynman on the
character of physical laws, also http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdZMXWmlp9g,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xdZMXWmlp9g,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJfjRoxCbk,
double slit experiment, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tu57B1v0SzI
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kekayfI8Ii8
advice for students
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=endscreen&NR=1&v=Nv1_YB1IedE
Brian Green, Fabric of the cosmos
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sfeoE1arF0I
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PRBnGRk-VN8
nano-tech future
http://physics.info/#modern
a new free physics hyper textbook resource for the very basics, but it won’t
replace a dedicated modern physics textbook
http://www.cosmolearning.com/topics/general-physics/
https://www.coursera.org/course/eqp
an online course from the University
of Maryland “graduate/advanced undergraduate level introduction
to quantum mechanics”
and somewhat related: https://www.coursera.org/course/nanotech
to watch out https://www.edx.org/
http://www.scribd.com/doc/240219/The-Modern-Revolution-in-Physics
free book,
http://www.scribd.com/doc/118406824/principles-of-modern-physics
properties of the elements, periodic table of the elements
Albert Einstein himself about special and general relativity, an assessment of
the physics of Einstein: http://www.umsl.edu/~chengt/index.html,
pdf of the talk the author gave at Portland State
Modern Physics textbook for evaluation purposes
http://www.scribd.com/doc/23570101/modern-physics
notes on modern physics
novel kind of textbook http://physwiki.ucdavis.edu/Quantum_Mechanics, the
discussion in 1D is useful for our class
First
year college physics and Volume
I of the Feynman lectures
The Nobel Prize in Physics 2012 was
awarded jointly to Serge Haroche and David J. Wineland "for ground-breaking experimental methods that
enable measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems". “kinds of lecture
manuscripts” for modern physics classes, basic: http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2012/popular-physicsprize2012.pdf
download
and advanced: http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/2012/advanced-physicsprize2012_02.pdf
Nobel Prize in
Physics 2013 to François Englert and
Peter Higgs for their theoretical work in 1964, (F. Englert and R. Brout http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v13/i9/p321_1
and P. Higgs http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v13/i16/p508_1);
as observed experimentally on July 4,
2012. (Overview by the master himself http://proceedings.aip.org/resource/2/apcpcs/300/1/159_1?bypassSSO=1)
Three papers
in support of the understanding of the Quantum
Mysteries: Mermin 1981 (before
experimental verification), Mermin 1985 (after the
first successful verifications of the Bell theorem (violations of the Bell
inequalities) that demonstrate that either locality or reality or both have to
be abandoned if we want to keep counterfactual definitiveness / the way we do
science by induction), and (philosophical viewpoint of Mermin
in 2012, QBism,
concerning “observer created reality”). Explained by Feynman from minute 19 onwards
of this movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=72us6pnbEvE
followed up at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ytGo85BZUww
, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AyejXtZrGb0,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWTbtXgqYMo,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PsQfPDG46cs
and utilized to “visualize”
Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle, leading over to Bohm’s
(great work and) prejudices, Bell’s
theorem, the EPR paradox, what physical measurement really means, …
in part II around minute 6 is
a nice example of an eager student “one
of those guys that knows too much” disturbing the sage (who does not wear
socks) for a moment with extra complications that he plans to introduce only
later on because he want to get his points across in a systematic and highly
pedagogical manner
about 9:30 minutes into part IV a theatrical-funny philosophical
statements “with no depth but great profundity” just after minute 21 the sage
apologizing for a mistake he didn’t make (as any good instructor should do from
time to time to make the audience feel good)
it’s all about trying to talk
in common language (that is based on common logic in a classical physics word)
about things that are cannot be described by common language and have a
different kind of logic because they are in the quantum world
Einstein and Eddignton
movie: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BG2sDVjL1wg,
some of the facts are wrong, but the physics is essentially right
Sir Roger Penrose: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3WXTX0IUaOg
Special Relativity: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1TKSfAkWWN0
Minutephysics-Magnetism
on Different Scales: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hFAOXdXZ5TM
BBC program
on the beauty of physical equations http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=erUQhXjY9ic
as explored by an artist
Feynman’s lecture on the
double slit experiment (Part VI of Messenger lecture on character of physical
laws): http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJfjRoxCbk
Character
of physical law, part II of Messenger lecture by R. P. Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJfjRoxCbk
relation of physics and mathematics
Character
of physical law, part III of Messenger lecture by R. P. Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a6n0HSJ5jEE
conservation principles
Character
of physical law, part V of Messenger lecture by R. P. Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aAgcqgDc-YM
distinction past and present
Character
of physical law, part VI of Messenger lecture by R. P. Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hUJfjRoxCbk
probability and uncertainty
Character
of physical law, part VII of Messenger lecture by R. P. Feynman: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MIN_-Flswy0
seeking new laws
More than 20 years later, same lecturer on the nuts and bolts of
doing quantum mechanics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ec03o-7rHLw,
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i4-sz59-Cis,
between minutes 10 and 16, an analogy of what a modern physics course is; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u0LVRgKTPP8
between
minutes 9 and 12 and again between minutes 19 to 23 is “undoing some lumber”
clarifying that there is an abstract model for each physical problem to be
solved with gets the essential physics right (by neglecting some other truths
that are quite irrelevant for the approximate result one would like to get).
For some other problem, there will be some other model, neither of them is
really really
true, and one should not make the mistake to try to picture or draw “a quantum
mechanical thing” and use the common classical physics logic about what it
should be doing; particularly nice 1 hour and 2 minute: “… you have to add the amplitudes first and
then make the square. Why? I don’t know. Nature works that way”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YWIYnLCZWa8
and then
combining special relativity with non-relativistic quantum mechanics to go into
quantum electrodynamics and at about 1 hour 44 makes his usual statement that
one cannot really appreciate the beauty of nature without knowing something
about mathematics of this http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rZvgGekvHes
http://bethe.cornell.edu/ a great site
with three lecture videos by Nobel Laureate Hans Bethe, “Quantum mechanics made
relatively simple” (he does have a German accent, but not as thick as mine)
http://quantizd.blogspot.com/p/so-you-want-to-become-physicist.html
modern physics / quantum physics https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C1yGjB4LBLI
43 minutes
A series of 15 min modern physics movies
by Ed Witten, he summarizes our course in some 10 minutes and then talks about
the outstanding problems of “post-modern physics”, the unification of general
relativity with quantum mechanics (there are a few sections in Italian in these movies,, but you can just
skip them)
I https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fnzLpyDsn3M
II https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NsYRCLYH954
III https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sIT_e62SgdI
IV https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uhNnyii8x_g
V https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-MaT8QKEgjs
semi-original Thornton/Rex slides
chapter
1 here
chapters
2/15 combined old version here
chapter
3 here
chapter
4 here
chapter
5 here
chapter
6 here
chapter
7 here
chapter
8 here
chapter
9 here
chapter
10 here
chapter
11 here
chapter
12 here
chapter
13 here
typically
not taught because of current lack of applications: chapter 14 here, chapter 16 here
older
lecture manuscript/partly included in the power point slides above
for
relativity can be downloaded/printed as *.doc or
*.pdf
for
an alternative approach to relativistic mechanics that does not use the concept
of relativistic mass, about which Einstein said late in his life: not good - no clear definition can be given.
It is better to introduce no other mass concept that the rest mass click here, relativistic momentum is
explained by the concept of relativistic velocity - the so called “One map two clock approach”
lecture
manuscript for chapter 2 (quantum theory of light) can be downloaded I word
format here and here in pdf
lecture
manuscript for Applied Modern Physics can be downloaded as *.doc
or *.pdf
lecture
manuscript for chapters 3 can be downloaded here
lecture
manuscript for chapters 4 can be downloaded here
lecture
manuscript for chapter 5 can be downloaded here
lecture
manuscript for chapter 6 can be downloaded/printed here
lecture
manuscript for chapter 6/tunneling phenomena can be downloaded here
the
manuscript on tunneling/frustrated total internal reflection in electromagnetic
and water waves can be downloaded here
part
1 of lecture manuscript for chapter 7 can be downloaded/printed here
part
2 of lecture manuscript for chapter 7 can be downloaded/printed here
part
3 of lecture manuscript for chapter 7 can be downloaded/printed here
lecture
manuscript for chapter 8/multi electron atoms can be downloaded here
statistical
physics part II can be downloaded/printed here ; applications of statistical
physics to electrical and thermal conductivity can be downloaded/printed here
lecture
manuscript for chapter 9, part I (Beiser) Statistical Mechanics can be
downloaded/printed here
here is the link in *.pdf, on
superconductivity, I do not have it in word as a colleague has given it to me,
the respective section in Beiser is 10.9 and 10.10
Lecture
manuscript for first part of chapter 13 is here
Lecture manuscript second part of chapter 13/14 is here
Lecture manuscript for superconductivity (in Beiser within the chapter on solid state physics) can be downloaded/printed here
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
As
a special treat, you will hear Richard P. Feynman giving a lecture out of the
computer system in class, lecture manuscript for (Feynman) 1st
lecture can be downloaded here in word and here in pdf
lecture
manuscript for (Feynman) 2nd lecture can be downloaded here in word and here in pdf
watch Richard Feynman giving the The Douglas Robb Memorial Lectures at
http://www.vega.org.uk/video/subseries/8 (streaming video for free) have some fun at http://physicsweb.org/article/world/16/9/2
if time permits, we will also explore resources by PBS/NOVA
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/elegant/
For
PH 311, you may like to read the Planck PAPER and answer for yourself
the following questions: Which novel idea(s) did Planck introduce in the
derivation of his black body radiation formula? In which paragraph do(es) it
(they) first show up? What are (is) the equation number(s) relating to this
(these) new idea(s)? Where did he get an estimate of h from?
Also
for PH 312, you may like to read about the important theorem by Bell and his
famous inequalities in two popular science papers by David Mermin (one without much physics, one with a bit more physics) and about the
experimental verification that Einstein, Podolsky and Rosen have probably been
wrong in the Aspect nature paper. We will also cover
this in the last two lectures, but without preparations the very elegant
reasoning by David Mermin may be difficult to comprehend. For the extra credit
answer the following questions.
a
very nice book that builds a bridge between introduction to modern physics and
real quantum mechanics is A. I. M. Rae, Quantum Mechanics, CRC Press, Boca
Raton, Ann Arbor, London, Tokyo, 5th edition, 2007
see
how he starts:
1.
For every dynamical system there exist a wavefunction that is a continuous,
square-integrable, single-valued function of the parameters of the system and
of time, and from which all possible predictions about the physical properties
of the system can be obtained.
2.
Every dynamical variable may be represented by a hermitian operator whose
eigenvalues represent the possible results of carrying out a measurement of the
value of the dynamical variable. Immediately after such a measurement, the
wavefunction of the system is identical to the eigenfunction corresponding to
the eigenvalue obtained as a result of the measurement.
….
Actually
a total of four basic postulates of quantum mechanics (two of them are given
above) are all that is really fundamental, the rest can be derived from these
postulates, it is that cool!
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
free
*.pdf files on: general introduction to quantum mechanics,
one-dimensional Schroedinger equation, three-dimensional Schroedinger equation,
and further details on the book where these
chapters are from (it is European university course stile, not expensive, no
examples within the text, but pretty much to the point, if you like doing
maths, this book very well complements the course and your other textbook)
I
use all of the text books above to prepare my lectures,
probably I use Beiser, Thornton & Rex, Serway et al., Tippler and Llewellyn, Taylor et al., Krane, the
most (possibly in this order). You may work with anyone of these textbooks or
with previous editions of these books, the homework problems will be given on
the webpage and may be from either of these books. So I am not forcing you to
purchase any a textbook, it is up to you, you are responsible adults. If you are really
short of money, I may lend you a few current and older versions of these texts
as long as supplies last. Unfortunately, supplies are depleted a bit since some
students never returned what they had borrowed from me.
further
reading and real fun to read at bedtime and very useful to explain modern
physics to your
grandparents
and kids:
Sheldon
L. Glashow, From Alchemy to Quarks,
Brooks/Cole, 1994, this is the text the Nobel prize winning author uses to
teach physics to non-science majors, so it is essentially non-mathematical, but
concepts are very clearly expressed verbally. My course gained a lot from this book
as Glashow writes: There is but one culture of which science
is an essential part. Membership in the community of educated men and women
demands competence in science and awareness of its history.
Two
very good popular science books that include discussions of EPR, inequalities
by Bell, and the experimental verification that Copenhagen interpretation
quantum mechanics is fine,
L.
M. Lederman, C. T. Hill, Quantum Physics for Poets, Prometheus, 2011, note that L. M. Lederman possesses a Nobel Prize in
physics
B.
Rosenblum, F. Kuttner, Quantum Enigma, Physics Encounters Consciousness, Oxford
University Press, 2006
Also
useful:
Physics
for Scientists and Engineers with Modern Physics, Serway/Jewett, 6th
edition, Volume 5, ISBN 0-534-40854-0 (there is now a 7th edition.)
paperback (it
is volume 5 of the 5 volume set which has a different ISBN, covering only
chapters 39-46, so don not purchase the whole set if you already possess a good
undergraduate text on classical physics, Thomson Brooks/Cole (everything is a
bit simpler, just enough material for a one quarter course, if I were to teach Ph 313 Ideas in Modern Physics, that
will probably be the text I am going to use, I served as a chapter reviewer for
this text)
S.
M. Blinder, Introduction to Quantum mechanics in Chemistry, Materials Science,
and Biology, Elsevier 2004, only about $40 but
pretty good if you are aiming for a career in these professions, not so much
use for a prospective physicist
Wolfgang
Rindler, Relativity, Special, General and Cosmological, 2nd edition,
Oxford University Press, 2006
Physics
for Poets, 5th edition, McGraw
Hill, 2003, by Robert H. March
A
free book chapter from a first year introductory modern physics text
In
Search of Schroedinger’s Cat, Quantum Physics and Reality, John Gribbin, paperback, parallel worlds and all the
rest of that, pretty nice if you don not like the COPENHAGEN interpretation of
quantum mechanics for aesthetical or philosophical reasons
and
Physics and Philosophy, the revolution in modern science by W. Heisenberg, Harper
Torchbooks, 1962, a bit heavier although without any mathematics as he gets
very philosophical
go
also to http://www.whfreeman.com/modphysics/INDEX.HTM#top
for
lots of interesting modern physics stuff by Tippler and Llewellyn, to be
downloaded as *.pdf
a
free pdf with some simplified modern
physics
a
free introductory pdf chapter (some 70
pages with illustrations) on the relationship between classical physics and
modern physics
a
free higher level mp4 file that
explains the double slit experiment mathematically over entanglement in Hilbert
Space
an
interesting paper, partly philosophical/partly quantum physically, from a
former Visiting Professor at Portland State and author of widely read books on
advanced quantum mechanics: A new interpretation on Quantum Mechanics.
I am in no position to judge if all the claims in this paper are correct, but
have a go yourself, your opinion is as valuable as mine.
Heisenberg
himself orally about the uncertainty principle: http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/uncertain.au,
http://www.aip.org/history/heisenberg/voice1.htm,
Some
students - frequently those with strong religious beliefs - do not like the
probabilistic interpretation of quantum mechanics according to the so called
Copenhagen School (Bohr, Born, Heisenberg). Well, there might be an alternative
in the form of a nonlocal hidden variables theory by David Bohm and here is a link to an article published
in Scientific America that may serve as a starting point for exploring that
theory. Sure this article is a bit polemic as its author wants to promote his book,
but it concedes that all predictions of standard quantum mechanics are borne
out in experiments. Interestingly, Bohm’s version of quantum mechanics makes
exactly the same predictions as standard Copenhagen quantum mechanics and can,
thus, also claim to be in agreement with all of the experimental evidence! Sure
the consequence of being indistinguishable as far as experiments go is also a loose
end, i.e. some ad hock invented but not really physically observed
quantum potential that represents the influence of the rest of the universe and
about which the physicist is partially ignorant so that he or she can only make
probabilistic prediction on the basis of quantum mechanics.
So
in effect that version of quantum mechanics proofs nothing beyond the point
that one actually does not need to stick to the Copenhagen Interpretation
(while using the mathematics of Hilbert Space) in order to make progress in
quantum mechanics. In fact the mathematics are completely independent of any
interpretation.
As
already mentioned the theory by David Bohm is a hidden variable theory, but is
very special in the respect that it is non local. His new idea of the quantum
potential makes in some sense up for the difference between quantum mechanics
and classical mechanics. This concept has, however, been criticized as being
closer to Aristotle than to Newton. The
experimental tests of Bell’s inequality by Aspect, Grangier, and Roger show
convincingly that standard quantum mechanics is complete (besides being
correct) and that local hidden variable theories give false predictions.
According
to current wisdom, this experimental fact means one of the following, (i) there
is no local physical reality to the properties of quantum mechanical entities
before they are observed, everything is at least in principle somehow
connected, and (ii) there is no counterfactual definiteness (loosely speaking
is does not make sense to speak with meaning of the results of measurements
that have not been performed).
The
second condition kind of invalidates all theories that are based on local
physical reality, e.g. the general theory of relativity by Albert Einstein, as
points in space-time are then no longer separable. From the first condition,
one can conclude that since the properties are not real before they are
measured and the object being kind of the sum of its property, the object may
not be real either. The question arises then how can large objects (which are
ensembles of small objects) be real.
The
Copenhagen interpretation does not contain counterfactual definiteness, so that
is probably easiest to give up. Non-local reality might be quite acceptable as
well.
A
way out could be to follow Stephen Hawking: I do not demand that a theory
corresponds to reality because I don’t know what it is. Reality is not a quality
you can test with litmus paper. All I’m concerned with is that the theory
should predict the results of measurements. Quantum theory does this very
successfully and when I hear of Schroedinger’s cat, I reach
for my gun. A position such at this is known as philosophical
positivism. There is also the Decoherence/Consistent Histories approach,
sometimes called Copenhagen done right
which does not see a problem at all. More recently, the well known physicist
David Mermin commented on QBism, Replace “knowledge” with “belief.”
Whose belief? The belief of the agent who makes the state assignment, informed
by her past experience. Belief about what? About the content of her subsequent
experience. This sure is not religious beliefs, it’s just a Bayesian
approach to something “nobody quite
understands”.
David
Mermin again: It is because nothing required us to apprehend atomic structure during
our evolutionary development that we are incapable of understanding what it is
that quantum mechanics describes. Quantum mechanics is weird to us because we
can make inferences about the atomic world only indirectly through the
correlations we can arrange for it (called measurements) which those parts of
the world (called classical) that evolution has outfitted us directly to
apprehend.
Richard
P. Feynman in chapter 1 of QED, the strange theory of light and matter gives
good advice for the novice student of modern physics
I
would like to talk a little bit about understanding. When we have a lecture,
there are many reasons why you might not understand the speaker. One is, his
language is bad, he doesn’t say what he means to say, or he says it upside
down, and it’s hard to understand. That’s a rather trivial matter, and I will
try my best to avoid too much of my New York accent.
Another
possibility, especially if the lecturer is a physicist, is that he uses
ordinary words in a funny way. Physicist often use ordinary words as work or action or energy or even,
as you shall see, light for some
technical purpose. Thus, when I talk about work
in physics, I do not mean the same thing as when I talk about work on the street. During this lecture
I might use one of those words without noticing that it is being used in this
unusual way. I will try my best to catch myself, that’s my job, but it is an
error that is easy to make.
The
next reason that you might think you do not understand what I am telling you
is, while I am describing to you how Nature works, you will not understand why Nature works that
way. But you see, nobody understands
that. I can not explain why Nature behaves in this peculiar way.
Finally,
there is this possibility: after I tell you something, you just can not believe
it. You can not accept it. You do not like it. A little screen comes down and
you do not listen anymore, I am going to describe to you how Nature is, and if
you do not like it, that is going to get in the way of your understanding it.
It is a problem that physicists have learned to deal with: They have learned to
realize that whether they like a theory
of they do not like a theory is not
the essential question. Rather, it is whether or not the theory gives
predictions that agree with experiment. It is not a question of whether a
theory is philosophical delightful, or easy to understand, or perfectly
reasonable form the point of view of common sense. The theory of quantum
electrodynamics describes nature as absurd form the point of view of common
sense. And it agrees fully with experiment.
Some BS from a senior editor of the
American Spectator:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bgms0J5m-Vc