Week 1

Read: Scaling in Art and Nature (ASGv2 Chap. 1) and The Coherence of Substances (ASGv2 Chap. 2).

Key topics: Dimensional analysis, units, scaling, early modern views of the nature of matter...see course materials for this unit.

Week 2

Read: Archimedes' Principle and Falling Bodies (ASGv2 Chap. 3) and Falling Bodies and Pendular Motion (ASGv2 Chap. 4).

Key topics: Archimedes' principle, the effect of buoyancy and drag on bodies falling in fluids, pendular and periodic motion....see course materials for this unit.

Week 3

Read: Pendular motion and harmony (ASGv2 Chap. 5) and The law of the lever (ASGv2 Chap. 6). Chapter 6 is a bit dense. Don't worry if you don't quite follow some of Galileo's geometrical proofs; we'll talk about this in class.

Key topics: sound waves, vibrating strings, frequency and pitch, consonance and dissonance, sympathetic resonance, torque, equilibrium, the law of the lever....see course materials for this unit.

Week 4

Read: Beams, bones and giants (ASGv2 Chap. 7) and Naturally accelerated motion (ASGv2 Chap. 8).

Key topics: strength of materials, beam breaking, uniform acceleration, ...see course materials for this unit.

Week 5

Read: The Mean Speed Theorem (ASGv2 Ch. 9) and Equilibrium, Force and Acceleration (ASGv2 Ch. 10).

Key topics: position, velocity and acceleration, mean speed theorem, early modern views on force and acceleration....see course materials for this unit.

Week 6

Read: From Conic Sections to Projectile Motion (ASGv2 Chap. 11) and The Speed and Force of a Projectile (ASGv2 Chap. 12).

Key topics: two-dimensional kinematics, projectile motion...see course materials for this unit.

Week 7

Read: Reason, Authority and Science (ASGv2 Chap. 13) and Pascal's Principle (ASGv2 Chap. 14).

Key topics: deductive and inductive reasoning, causality, final cause, hydrostatic paradox, pascal's principle, pressure, bernoulli's equaion (PHY 201). ...see course materials for this unit.

Week 8 Spring Break

No classes this week! But you might wish to get ahead on the reading and videos for next week…

Read: Submerged Bodies (ASGv2 Chap. 15); Syringes, Siphons and Suckling Infants (ASGv2 Chap. 16); and Life Under a Sea of Air (ASGv2 Chap. 17)....see course materials for this unit.

Week 9

Read: Now you should definitely read Submerged Bodies (ASGv2 Chap. 15); Syringes, Siphons and Suckling Infants (ASGv2 Chap. 16); and Life Under a Sea of Air (ASGv2 Chap. 17).

Key topics: hydrostatic pressure, barometers, siphons, weighing earth's atmosphere, barometric formula (PHY 201 folks)....see course materials for this unit.

Week 10

Read: Does Nature Abhor a Vacuum (ASGv2 Chap. 18); Mass, Momentum and Force (Chap. 19); and Absolute and Relative Motion (ASGv2 Chap. 20).

Key topics: Mass, momentum, inertia, force, centripetal force, absolute and relative motion, ...see course materials for this unit.

Week 11

Read: Newton's Laws of Motion (ASGv2 Chap. 21); watch all the videos for Chap 21 and for the Force and Rotation Lab!

Key topics: newton's laws of motion, force addition, action-reaction pairs, free body diagrams, ...see course materials for this unit.

Week 12

Read: Conservation of Momentum (ASGv2 Chap. 22) and The Third Law and the Power of Machines (ASGv2 Chap. 23).

Key topics: conservation of momentum, center of mass position and velocity, elastic and inelastic collisions, ...see course materials for this unit.

Week 13

Read: Centripetal Force and Acceleration (ASGv2 Chap. 24) and Newton's Rules of Reasoning (ASGv2 Chap. 25).

Key topics: rotational motion, centripetal force, centripetal acceleration, principle of parsimony, principle of induction, philosophy of nature....see course materials for this unit.

Week 14

Read: Planetary motion (ASGv2 Chap. 26), Universal Gravitation (ASGv2 Chap. 27), Hypothesis and Natural Theology (ASGv2 Chap. 28).

Key topics: Kepler's laws of motion, Newton's universal law of gravitation, natural theology, scientific apologetics, and Newton's argument from design....see course materials for this unit.

Week 15

Read: The principle of relativity (ASGv2 Chap. 29) and The absolute speed of light (ASGv2 Chap. 30).

Key topics: principle of relativity, speed of light postulate, relativistic time dilation and length contraction, ...see course materials for this unit.

Week 16

Read: Lorentz transformations (ASGv2 Chap. 31) and Relativistic energy and Minkowski space(ASGv2 Chap. 32).

Key topics: Relativistic energy and momentum....see course materials for this unit.

Week 17 Final exam

There will be a comprehensive final examination on week 17.

Here is a copy of the final exam from the spring of 2021.

And here is the final exam from spring 2022....see course materials for this unit.
Physics 1