6 ms·

Back of the Envelope [Physics] Problems

57 points by lmarinho 14y ago

pm90 14y ago
Ed Purcell is probably one of the least famous but amazing expositor of Physics that I have come across. His book on electricity and magnetism (part of Berkeley Physics Course) is one of the best introductions to the topic (but again not very well known) Edit: Linking to the amazon page of the US edition, which seems to be out of print(http://www.amazon.com/Electricity-Magnetism-Berkeley-Physics-Course/dp/0070049084/ref=pd_sim_b_6 http://www.amazon.com/Electricity-Magnetism-Berkeley-Physics...)
- jamessb 14y ago
  He also gave the classic talk "Life at Low Reynolds Number": http://brodylab.eng.uci.edu/~jpbrody/reynolds/lowpurcell.html http://brodylab.eng.uci.edu/~jpbrody/reynolds/lowpurcell.htm...
  - Drbble 14y ago
    > I got into this through the work of a former colleague of mine at Harvard, Howard Berg. Berg got his Ph.D. with [Nobel Prize winner] Norman Ramsey Norman Ramsey is also the name of a much younger yet contemporaneous Harvard professor of Computer Science (and a very prolific Stackoverflow answerer). (He is now at Tufts) I wonder how his name affected his career. http://www.google.com/search?q=norman+ramsey http://www.google.com/search?q=norman+ramsey
- jonsen 14y ago
  3rd edition in prep: http://www.cambridge.org/no/knowledge/isbn/item6869923/ http://www.cambridge.org/no/knowledge/isbn/item6869923/
  - pm90 14y ago
    This is good to hear, Thank you! Edit: the picture on the cover is that of the electric field of an electron as it approaches the speed of light. This was the only book I know that actually tried to illustrate this..I simply love the beautiful illustrations :)
- Drbble 14y ago
  I used his book in my class.
brg 14y ago
Has anyone attempted to recreate the original Fermi problem? Fermi was in a bunker during the first nuclear test, and approximated the power by measuring the displacement of paper shreds due to the shock wave.
VMG 14y ago
Also this: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/leino/puzzles.html http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/leino/puzzles.... Does anyone know of any good books with these kinds of problems?

57 points by lmarinho 14y ago

pm90 14y ago

Ed Purcell is probably one of the least famous but amazing expositor of Physics that I have come across. His book on electricity and magnetism (part of Berkeley Physics Course) is one of the best introductions to the topic (but again not very well known) Edit: Linking to the amazon page of the US edition, which seems to be out of print(http://www.amazon.com/Electricity-Magnetism-Berkeley-Physics-Course/dp/0070049084/ref=pd_sim_b_6 http://www.amazon.com/Electricity-Magnetism-Berkeley-Physics...)

jamessb 14y ago
He also gave the classic talk "Life at Low Reynolds Number": http://brodylab.eng.uci.edu/~jpbrody/reynolds/lowpurcell.html http://brodylab.eng.uci.edu/~jpbrody/reynolds/lowpurcell.htm...
- Drbble 14y ago
  > I got into this through the work of a former colleague of mine at Harvard, Howard Berg. Berg got his Ph.D. with [Nobel Prize winner] Norman Ramsey Norman Ramsey is also the name of a much younger yet contemporaneous Harvard professor of Computer Science (and a very prolific Stackoverflow answerer). (He is now at Tufts) I wonder how his name affected his career. http://www.google.com/search?q=norman+ramsey http://www.google.com/search?q=norman+ramsey
jonsen 14y ago
3rd edition in prep: http://www.cambridge.org/no/knowledge/isbn/item6869923/ http://www.cambridge.org/no/knowledge/isbn/item6869923/
- pm90 14y ago
  This is good to hear, Thank you! Edit: the picture on the cover is that of the electric field of an electron as it approaches the speed of light. This was the only book I know that actually tried to illustrate this..I simply love the beautiful illustrations :)
Drbble 14y ago
I used his book in my class.

brg 14y ago

Has anyone attempted to recreate the original Fermi problem? Fermi was in a bunker during the first nuclear test, and approximated the power by measuring the displacement of paper shreds due to the shock wave.

VMG 14y ago

Also this: http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/leino/puzzles.html http://research.microsoft.com/en-us/um/people/leino/puzzles.... Does anyone know of any good books with these kinds of problems?