About Resnick-Halliday's Physics book

[ABD13]

Which one of these--->>: (Resnick-Halliday-Walker) and (Resnick-Halliday-Krane) has coloured illustrations? or both of these 2 books are black and white ? I've uploaded pics of these 2 different books. Please state the key differences between the 2 editions of original Resnick-Halliday by walker and krane respectively.

 

[kuruman]

Go to the publisher's web page (wiley.com) and look at the sample chapters they provide. That should answer your question about color.

Please state the key differences between the 2 editions of original Resnick-Halliday by walker and krane respectively.

Which "original" do you mean? The first edition by Halliday & Resnick (no Krane or Walker) came out in 1960. It came in one volume, it had no "Extended" section, no color, no USA Today look and no more than 20 problems at the end of each chapter. The physics though was the same. From my experience with this and other intro physics textbooks, the differences between one edition and the next is page numbering, number of problems and auxiliary material such as online access to computer simulations or video lectures or homework management. The material is still the same. These superficial changes are made every 2-3 years so that more new textbooks are sold to the next generation of students. If you are asking because you need this for a class, get the one your professor has recommended. If you are asking because you want to learn physics on your own, any edition will do.

 

[ABD13]

Thanks for explaining that there isn't much difference in the matter of the book.

 

[ABD13]

It is just that coloured illustrations add some flavour while reading in contrast with plain black and white texts(even some blacked out pictures).

 

[kuruman]

If I remember correctly, I paid $10.75 USD in 1964 for a hardcover (two-volumes in one) copy of Halliday and Resnick, First Edition. Adjusted for cost of living, that would be about $88.00 in 2018. The two-volume 10th edition now sells for $250.00. Just like edible candy, mostly sugar with no nutritional value for the body, the eye candy added in the latter editions is all glitter and has no nutritional value for the mind.

 

[jtbell]

Halliday/Resnick/Krane is the direct "descendant" of the original Halliday/Resnick "Physics" that kuruman describes.

Halliday and Resnick later developed a slimmed-down version, "Fundamentals of Physics", which became more popular than the original book. I used it myself when I was an undergraduate in the early 1970s, and taught from it in the mid 1980s. This version later added Walker as the third (now primary) author.

Halliday/Resnick/Walker is much more widely used than Halliday/Resnick/Krane, and has had more new editions, mainly to discourage professors and students from using used copies of older editions for their classes.

 

[Vanadium 50]

I would be surprised if any legal edition did not have color illustrations in this day and age. Bootleg copies, such as one finds in developing countries, are another story.

 

[kuruman]

I would be surprised if any legal edition did not have color illustrations in this day and age. Bootleg copies, such as one finds in developing countries, are another story.

I've seen students with bootleg copies even in developed countries like the U.S. Once, a student showed me his copy asking if it was good enough for the course. He was so gratified when I told him "yes" that he explained to me how he got it, just in case I wanted one. I don't remember the details, but the method of procurement was very shady. Bootleg copies add to the price of the legitimate ones.

 

[Vanadium 50]

I am not making any judgement about bootleg copies. I am simply saying that it is 99.999% certain that any legal edition has color.

 

[MidgetDwarf]

Oftentimes colored images in modern day textbooks do not add much. For example, my first edition of the 3 volumes by Alonso/Finn:Fundamental University Physics.
Diagrams are few compared to recent editions of Ginacolli, the books mentioned in this topic, or Serway. Yet, the diagrams in Alonso are in crisp black and white, very thorough explanation in the paragraph, and allows one a way to visualize the physics. When I need to derive a formula or principle that I may have forgotten key details about, I draw out the diagram found in Alonso and derive everything. I am sure modern textbooks cannot do that for a student!

 

[Mark44]

It is just that coloured illustrations add some flavour while reading in contrast with plain black and white texts(even some blacked out pictures).

Aside from flavor, illustrations in color also add a lot to the price of the book.

 

[opus]

Aside from flavor, illustrations in color also add a lot to the price of the book.

I should say! My university physics text is $160 for loose leaf paper in saran wrap. I wanted an actual textbook that is good so I bought Halliday/Resnick/Walker and it cost $260!

 

[vanhees71]

Well, maybe I'm simply getting old, but often I've the impression that many textbook writers put more effort to find a professional colored-picture designer than they put effort in writing the really important content. For classical theoretical physics the best textbook I've ever seen is the 6-volume set by Sommerfeld with simple black-and-white figures, just illustrating with utmost clarity the carefully worked-out physics content of the text. Another example are the Feynman Lectures. These books didn't need colorful pictures to make their point. Of course, it's good that there are nice colorful illustrations nowadays, and there are examples for excellent new textbooks with very nice modern pictures in it (e.g., the brillant theory book by Bartelmann et al, which are in German only, but I can only hope that it gets translated into English, so that more students get access to it).

 

[kuruman]

Color coding in diagrams can be very helpful to beginners. I once used a textbook (I think it was the first edition of Walker's algebra-based physics) in which arrows representing different vectors were color-coded, e.g. all forces are red, all accelerations are blue, all velocities are green, etc. This helped explain the distinction between a generic vector diagram, such as of a body undergoing uniform circular motion, from a free body diagram which must have only (red) force vectors as parts of it.

 

[gleem]

Well, maybe I'm simply getting old, but often I've the impression that many textbook writers put more effort to find a professional colored-picture designer than they put effort in writing the really important content.

All the books that I used in undergrad and grad school where black and white with only line drawings and very few photos. The list of acknowledgments was less than a dozen. The prefaces typically were one but no more than four pages leading into the table of contents.

I have the third addition(1990) of Serway's Physics for Scientists and Engineers which my wife used. Before the preface there is an acknowledgment of a dozen publication persons including editors, artists, designers, coordinators. The preface is seven pages including a two pages of a list of acknowledgments for critiquing, suggesting, reviewing probably over a hundred. There is four pages directed to the student on studying and problem solving, There is a page and a half on the meaning of the different colors used in the book. Finally four pages on the organization of the book. That is 19 pages before you get to the table of contents.

Today's students seem to want the latest texts on material that was developed decades ago. These new text often lose valuable insights of some of the most renowned physicists. Us older guys should continue to promote the "classics" and remind the young ones to study the masters and that you should not need fancy graphics to learn from these books.

Color coding in diagrams can be very helpful to beginners.

Around 1970 the physics undergraduate enrollment was dropping off. Did we need to attract students with this glitzy approach to the subjects presentation to attract students. Is this approach causing us to cast our nets too wide, attracting too many unqualified, or unmotivated students who while having their learning facilitated in the intro courses, cannot cope with the subsequent meaty courses that allow them to do what they thought that they wanted to do.

 

[kuruman]

Did we need to attract students with this glitzy approach to the subjects presentation to attract students. Is this approach causing us to cast our nets too wide, attracting too many unqualified, or unmotivated students who while having their learning facilitated in the intro courses, cannot cope with the subsequent meaty courses that allow them to do what they thought that they wanted to do.

Ah, here is where we part company. I don't think there is (was) a need to attract students. According to the AIP "More than 400,000 undergraduates took introductory physics courses in degree-granting physics departments during the 2007-08 academic year." (https://www.aip.org/statistics/reports/physics-enrollments). The number I heard at a meeting was closer to 800,000, which could be plausible if one counts institutions such as community colleges that offer intro physics courses but don't have a physics major. The actual number, to within a factor of 2, is unimportant. What's important is that around 2007 less than 6,000 bachelor's degrees in physics were granted. This number rose to under 9,000 in 2017 (https://www.aip.org/statistics/data...rees-earned-physics-classes-1981-through-2017). The number of students who continue on in physics is two orders of magnitude below the number of those who don't. My point is that one needs to consider facilitating the plight of the "unqualified, or unmotivated students" in introductory courses as best as one can because these students are highly unlikely to continue on to meaty courses. Moreover, intro physics and astronomy are money makers; determining which departments are making money and which are not has become a cherished pastime of U.S. college and university administrators.

 

[vanhees71]

Recently they made a study across German universities, why there's a high percentage of STEM students failing their studies without graduating at least with a BSc. The answer was little surprising: The main problem is math and the lack of its foundations the students get at high school. For me this is no surprise. I think the main problem is that instead of teaching math as a way to solve problems and to think one teaches it as a standard procedure to solve standard questions in exams. It's not recognized as a creative way of thinking about the world. Rather one introduces some pseudo-didactical ideas like "teaching competences rather than knowledge".

 

[gleem]

My point is that one needs to consider facilitating the plight of the "unqualified, or unmotivated students" in introductory courses as best as one can because these students are highly unlikely to continue on to meaty courses. Moreover, intro physics and astronomy are money makers; determining which departments are making money and which are not has become a cherished pastime of U.S. college and university administrators.

By casting a wide net I was primarily thinking of STEM students where recent stats show that about 50% of students leave the bachelors program and about 70% leave the associates program. What is the point of facilitating the plight of these students when they should not have been in the course in the first place?

 

[vanhees71]

Well, it's a waste of the students' live and a waste of "human resources", because many studies in education (although one has to take of course all studies within the humanities with a grain of salt ;-))) seem to indicate that it's bad high school education in math (and also the other STEM subjects of course, but mainly math) that leads to this failure. I think, it would be better to keep high standards in high school in this subject, so that those who "should not have been in the course in the first place" would have known before entering the university that a STEM subject is not for them. Nevertheless, I'm pretty convinced that more students would get interested in STEM subjects and also a higher percentage of them choosing such a subject at university would succeed if the high school education would be better. I think the most important measure would be to really push more money to education, have better educated high school teachers to begin with and also more of them to have smaller classes. I think this is the most promising ansatz to better the situation for STEM students. More modern equipment (like the in Germany heatedly debated importance of "digitalization of high schools", which is a shame for a developed country either) would of course also be desirable but not as important as good teachers who understand their subject and teach it with enthusiasm providing the fascination and fun STEM subjects also have besides the indisputed fact that it's most important for the economical welfare of any developed society.

 

[opus]

Well, it's a waste of the students' live and a waste of "human resources", because many studies in education (although one has to take of course all studies within the humanities with a grain of salt ;-))) seem to indicate that it's bad high school education in math (and also the other STEM subjects of course, but mainly math) that leads to this failure. I think, it would be better to keep high standards in high school in this subject, so that those who "should not have been in the course in the first place" would have known before entering the university that a STEM subject is not for them. Nevertheless, I'm pretty convinced that more students would get interested in STEM subjects and also a higher percentage of them choosing such a subject at university would succeed if the high school education would be better. I think the most important measure would be to really push more money to education, have better educated high school teachers to begin with and also more of them to have smaller classes. I think this is the most promising ansatz to better the situation for STEM students. More modern equipment (like the in Germany heatedly debated importance of "digitalization of high schools", which is a shame for a developed country either) would of course also be desirable but not as important as good teachers who understand their subject and teach it with enthusiasm providing the fascination and fun STEM subjects also have besides the indisputed fact that it's most important for the economical welfare of any developed society.

Where I went to high school, in Nevada, we had to pass a state-wide standardized exam to graduate. If you didn't pass, you didn't get a diploma even if you met the credit requirements. However, science wasn't on the exam in any capacity (I guess it's not important to the Nevada school system), and the level of mathematics required to pass was basic algebra. When I graduated, I was under the impression that I was "ready" to go to college since I had graduated high school so I enrolled in a university and was shocked at the material that was given to us. Time and time again I heard "You should have learned this in high school", which I believe is true. I think my high school just gave us enough to get us to graduate to make themselves look good. Ultimately, I realized I was so far behind that I couldn't learn all the pre-requisites fast enough to keep up with the material being given to us so I dropped out.
Usually, I always say that it's the student's responsibility to be proactive and take control of their education if they want to be successful (which I am a firm believer of). But most really young students (myself included) don't/didn't know how to do this, or even that they have/had to. I always expected that I'd be given what I'd need to be successful and that wasn't the case. It was a good learning experience because now I am extremely independent and proactive in my own education and I don't expect ever that I'll be given everything that I need to be successful, so I go after it myself. Unfortunately, this is a lesson learned much too late for some people (if they even learn it at all).

 

[vanhees71]

Although we get somewhat off-topic, I think it's worth to think about this experience: That's another problem of the system! First of all, at least in physics, usually in the beginning semesters you have the problem that there's never "enough math" (I doubt that one can learn "too much math" to begin with ;-)), but it's also the responsibility of those making the plans for studying a STEM subject in universities to think about how to teach the necessary material. The problem, however, is that the preknowledge to be expected from a high-school student is practically unknown since there are no clear standards for passing a high-school diploma. At least in Germany neither in math nor in physics at least, I know about, because I've to teach the future high-school teachers in theoretical physics, and I made some effort to figure out, what are the prerequesites one can expect from a usual student who has passed the final exam in high school, which is the mandatory entrance prerequisite to study at a university. So I downloaded the official study plans for the high school in my state (Hesse). It's pretty complicated to draw conclusions from this official plan: In both math and physics there are parts that are dubbed "mandatory knowledge" and parts are "facultative knowledge", i.e., you cannot be sure that any subject is known by the most freshmen students to begin with. In addition in Germany we have a system, where the high-school students have to choose two subjects as a "Leistungskurs", which goes with a higher percentage into the final grade of the final exam (Abitur) and also has more hours than the other subjects called "Grundkurs". No matter which of the subjects you choose as "Leistungskurs", you are allowed to study any subject at the university (which of course is good since when entering university you should indeed have the free choice of which major subject you like to study). But even if you take the "Grundkurs" as the level for math and physics prerequisites for planning your lectures, it's not for sure which of these prerequisites the students really have learnt, let alone which ones they have learned at a level to be really usable in studying (theoretical) physics.

The German universities have already adapted to this problem and offer a 2-week course, consisting of lectures and most importantly exercises, on math before the 1st semester, where they summarize what is expected as common knowledge from high school. Of course, you cannot expect the students to learn within two weeks what should have been taught to them in 13 years of high school. So it's tough to start with any STEM subject, and the students cannot know, what they should know from high school and also not what the subjects really are they want to study at the university level, because the high-school curriculum is neither very systematic nor standardized, and I've the impression this got worse and worse over the recent years due to endless discussions an reforms in reaction of the infamous "PISA study", where (already in 2000) the desastrous level of preknowledge in math and other STEM subjects became very clear. The reaction, however, was exactly in the wrong direction: The standards were lowered and the teaching goals bent into the wrong direction of "rote learning" to get "competences" to solve standard questions in exams rather then thinking about a more systematic teaching of true knowledge usable for real problem solving rather then passing standard tests.

 

[opus]

A good point! One that I have no solutions to!