Recent content by tolove

When we release a suspended object, we recover the potential energy due to gravity as the object travels back through the height raised. When we release an extended spring, we recover the potential energy as the object travels back through the distance stretched. But when we release a rotating...

How can we translate real-world positions into a computer language? An example would be to simulate a ball bouncing around in a closed box. How can we say with confidence that the program will represent reality? This is my current thinking on how to manage space. Any advise or critique...

Getting a 4.0 is a little unrealistic for most people, but definitely try for it. There seem to be two very special numbers. 3.5 and 3.0. If you get into grad school and your GPA drops below a 3.0, some schools will not award you a degree until you bring it back up, and you will go on academic...

Calc 1 was my first real college course! Things that will be new to you: Calculators will likely not be used, but if they are, you have to have it. Homework will likely not be graded, but I cannot emphasize enough how important it is. Work every problem multiple times. Ask for help if...

6 years, believe it or not, is a little under the average time (page 6): http://www.aps.org/programs/education/graduate/upload/Graduate-Education-in-Physics-Joint-APS-AAPT-Task-Force-Report.pdf edit: for physics

I'm only an undergrad, but, speaking on behalf of those undergrad classes, I don't know how you could get by without them. We get taught the "basics" three times. Electrodynamics, Mechanics, and Quantum. Once in the intro to physics course + something like "modern physics," then again as a two...

I'm going to type where I stand in life, and I intend to be a little open ended. I hope to learn from how you would proceed if you were in my shoes. I'm a junior in physics, older than average, and am about to start a second major in electrical engineering. I have an amazing tendency to...

Keep up the good fight, Mordred!

Thanks for bearing with me and continuously pointing me back to this idea. This kind of separation distance is meaningless unless there is a third frame that we can claim to be at rest. We have a separation distance with just two objects when thinking about the expansion of the universe...

velocity = distance / time.. a velocity means we apply the Lorentz transformations from our perspective? The Lorentz transformations break for v>=c... at least from my understanding of them. Is this something that is accounted for through dynamic geometries (I'm completely unfamiliar)?

In place of "space grows," we should use "things inexplicable separate." This is related to the Ether fallacies. But this separation isn't normal... why is it special? What is it? I don't think I have an understanding of what it means for a distant object to be swept past the speed of light.

This car model doesn't portray what's happening, though. In order for it to be a fair comparison, their distance after 5 minutes would have to be further than 10 miles apart. In which case, I would want to say that the highway grew.

My wording is very poor, thank you all for helping me fix it. I'm trying to focus on one thought at a time. Sorry for not replying to everything that's being said! This particularly is trouble for me: I asked two cosmology professors "does space grow" today. I got both a yes and a no. I...

Okay, I think I have a more accurate picture now, however this new picture is equally confusing. So, space is created? Is there any way to better understand this concept? I haven't touched quantum mechanics yet. In other words, the balloon model is serious business. We're inside an inflating...

Let our universe have two objects. Consider "us" to be at rest. As the second object "moves" away, we take the size of the universe to be the space between the two objects. I'd prefer this to be imagined on a 1D line, but I don't know if that breaks things. Where is the difference...