Can you tell me what I must read based on this description?

[babaliaris]

Summary: I have a desctiption of the physics class and the topics of a book but I don't know how to connect them and know what to read from the book.

This is the description of the topics for the physics class which I'm attempting:

General curvilinear motion of point material. Reference systems and related movement. Point material dynamics. Central forces and dynamic energy. Pursuing momentum, momentum, and energy. Dynamic solid body. Gravity field. The special theory of relativity. Relativistic dynamics

These are the topics of the book which I own :

http://www.primeuniversity.edu.bd/160517/vc/eBook/download/fundamentals-of-physics-textbook.pdf

 

[vanhees71]

Sounds like the description of an entire physics curriculum. I'd think you should look at a general textbook like Halliday, Resnick, Walker or Tipler, but you should know at which level the physics class will be.

 

[babaliaris]

I have the book of Halliday & Resnick http://www.primeuniversity.edu.bd/160517/vc/eBook/download/fundamentals-of-physics-textbook.pdf which covers everything! But I don't have the time to read it all in one semester, I must focus on succeeding in this course.

From the desription do you think I need to read circuits, magnetic fields, and coulombs law? I believe this is out of the scope of this class, since I'm an electrical and computer engineer and will learn that in a class called Electromagnetism Physics.

 

[PeroK]

I have the book of Halliday & Resnick http://www.primeuniversity.edu.bd/160517/vc/eBook/download/fundamentals-of-physics-textbook.pdf which covers everything! But I don't have the time to read it all in one semester, I must focus on succeeding in this course.

From the desription do you think I need to read circuits, magnetic fields, and coulombs law? I believe this is out of the scope of this class, since I'm an electrical and computer engineer and will learn that in a class called Electromagnetism Physics.

Yes, the course you describe doesn't include EM. Looking at the book contents, I would say the following chapters are relevant for the course you describe:

1-9
10-11 (Probably)
13
15
16 (Possibly)
37 (*)

(*) I suspect you might be better with a separate textbook dedicated to SR.

 

[vanhees71]

The only question is, how to motivate and understand SR without electromagnetism?

 

[PeroK]

The only question is, how to motivate and understand SR without electromagnetism?

I didn't have any problems. It was learning SR (six years ago) that turned me on to studying physics. I think it stands as a theory of spacetime, that is beautiful and satisfying in its own right.

 

[darksilence]

From the course description i would guess it would be some type of classical mechanics / analytical mechanics course with some introduction to relativity at advanced undergraduate/ graduate level. On the other hand i don't believe many books outside of "Feynman's lectures" can cover so much material and still be usefull beyond freshman level. "Point material" suggests there will be no internal interaction and resulting mechanics will be deterministic (Newtonian). Pretty much all reference system and field related statements suggest course will be heavy on mathematics (on fields may or may not be limited to vector fields). Dynamic solid body most probably means rotation of rigid bodies, i would assume special relativity will be on super-introductory level for this course probably brief mention on Michelson-Morley experiment and including some Lorentz transformation without introducing any operators or tensors for that.
Focus on getting a feel for fields and learn basic of vector algeabra well (vector and scalar products etc) you will do just fine.

 

[babaliaris]

Thank you! You totally eased my frustration.

It makes sense to be a complete course on Newtonian physics and only an introduction to SR. When it comes to algebra, linear algebra - vectors, calculus, and diff equations I don't really have any problems. The only problems might be that I'm not that experienced on solving complicated integrals plus I don't know calculus 2 (Multiple integrations-double-triple integrals, closed path integration, that upside down delta )

Well, I'll just start reading. Also prepare yourselves cause probably I'm going to do a lot of posts in the homework help section

 

[Herman Trivilino]

Summary: I have a desctiption of the physics class and the topics of a book but I don't know how to connect them and know what to read from the book.

This is the description of the topics for the physics class which I'm attempting:

What's the title of the course? What are the prerequisites? Can you get the textbook and syllabus for the course? Have you asked the professor who teaches the course?

 

[babaliaris]

The course is called just Physics (We have another one called Electromagnetic Field 1 in the next semester and another one after that (next year) which is called Electromagnetic Field 2).

For prerequisites says only this, nothing else:

For the mathematical description, we will use vectors in 3D space, derivatives, integrals and some simple differential equations.

I haven't asked the professor since I'm a distant student. I would send him an email but since he didn't even bother to upload the curriculum why will he answer me back? Here in Greece, most professors don't answer back on emails...

There is a course textbook, but I didn't purchase it since usually Greek textbooks aren't really good and I already have one of the best books for physics. Also sometimes the books they give us do not even cover the entire curriculum (I know this sounds weird but its true).

 

[mpresic3]

The description for the physics course you supplied, … general curvilinear coordinates, reference frames etc, indicates this course is at the level of junior/senior physics or possibly engineering mechanics. The description of the book you have is freshman/sophomore level physics. You can expect the upcoming course to be in greater depth (and mathematical demand) on a limited number of topics rather than the more general treatment that you have with your current textbook.

 

[babaliaris]

The description for the physics course you supplied, … general curvilinear coordinates, reference frames etc, indicates this course is at the level of junior/senior physics or possibly engineering mechanics. The description of the book you have is freshman/sophomore level physics. You can expect the upcoming course to be in greater depth (and mathematical demand) on a limited number of topics rather than the more general treatment that you have with your current textbook.

Yes, I'm an Electrical And Computer Engineer undergraduate student. This is the only physics course about mechanical physics. After that, we have two more physics courses called "Electromagnetic field 1 and Electromagnetic field 2" (maxwells equations, coulombs law, gauss law etc).