Recent content by inthenickoftime

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    Planning my books for my first year in physics

    One last question. Since there are at least two approaches to EM (relativity first like you say or building up from electro and magnetostatics), what am I going to miss by going with relativity first? Surely the "pedagogical" approach has some merits other than not requiring sophisticated math?
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    Planning my books for my first year in physics

    Does it make more sense then to tackle fluid mechanics first? It was within that context that vector calculus was developed. Electrostatics weren't even known at the time and correct me if I'm wrong but knowledge of how fluids behave builds up intuition for electromagnetism as electricity can...
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    Planning my books for my first year in physics

    What's then a good intermediate between Kleppner & Kolenkow, and Schwartz in terms of waves? What are the prerequisites to Schwartz?
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    I Isn't it terrifying that AI can become smarter than any Mathematician?

    For what it’s worth, an AI software found Newton’s laws of motion by brute force. It was fed raw data coming from various physical experiments and used a recipe of simple rules from what I understand. https://www.wired.com/2009/04/Newtonai/
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    B If and only if versus if .... then

    I found a really nice set of lectures by Herb Gross on the subject of calculus, but I'm confused by his usage of if and only if and if ... then in his supplementary notes. It seems to me that he describes identical situations on both pages, but in one case the author uses the wording "if and...
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    B Weird stuff on infinite numerical sequences in a Soviet book

    No restrictions were given. You can check the book online for free, it was rewritten in modern style. Too bad as I was really looking forward to it.
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    B Weird stuff on infinite numerical sequences in a Soviet book

    It still feels weird. On the previous page the author gives his definition of an infinite numerical sequence as a rule assigning every natural number to a definite term in the sequence, but 1 doesn't correspond with anything, at least for the given expression. But I see what you mean
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    B Weird stuff on infinite numerical sequences in a Soviet book

    The book is Calculus: Basic Concepts for High School on the first page you are given the following sequence: 1, -1, 1/3, -1/3, 1/5, -1/5, 1/7, -1/7, ... several pages later the rule is given: in the second rule, for the first term in the sequence, the coefficient of one of the terms is 1/0...
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    Calculus Analysis with or without set-theoretic topology?

    I had to ask because topology and sets are relatively new. If I'm correct, people were doing rigorous mathematics long before these two branches were introduced (I can think of Fourier and Cauchy). The addition of new notions (propositional logic, sets, topology, etc.) to an already complex...
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    Calculus Analysis with or without set-theoretic topology?

    Do you think a first course in analysis should focus entirely on inequalities and leave set-theoretic topology for another occasion? Should this depend on whether or not the student had a first rigorous calculus course first? If I'm not mistaken, Victor Bryant (Yet Another Introduction to...
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    Intro Math Suggestions for an Intro to Proofs Math textbook for Self Study

    I wonder, did mathematicians back in the days (200 years ago) use propositional calculus? It seems like a brute force method. Or were they doing plain and simple direct proofs with no fancy contrapositives and truth tables?
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    Intro Math Suggestions for an Intro to Proofs Math textbook for Self Study

    I don’t think you can self study proving/analysis for the simple fact that there is no way to verify an answer unless someone with good knowledge of proofs checks your work. There are just too many ways to write a proof. That’s why most analysis books come with few or no solutions.
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    Calculus Looking for a book that teaches mathematics within a physics context

    I could not find the second title you mentioned. Not anywhere. Can you post its table of contents? :D
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    Calculus Looking for a book that teaches mathematics within a physics context

    Which one of the 3 books by Marsden and what parts concern high school studies? I had a look at Feynman's lecture notes and to me it seems he does assume previous knowledge from the reader. For example, in volume II he begins with: "Also we will want to use the two following equalities from the...
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    Calculus Looking for a book that teaches mathematics within a physics context

    Exactly. I had a glance at the table of contents and it has less content. What I'm looking for is really a book or resource that teaches multivariable calculus within the context of mechanics/electromagnetism. A sort of marriage so to this speak between physics and math. I liked Morris Kline's...
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