> ["Genius" by James Gleick is my source, generally regarded as
> the best biography of Feynman.
>
> Quote:
>
> "The course ... was not for freshmen. As the months went on,
> the examination results left Feynman shocked and discouraged...
> As the course wore on, attendance by the kids at the lectures
> started dropping alarmingly, but at the same time, more and
> more faculty and graduate students started attending, so the
> room stayed full, and Feynman may never have known he was
> losing his intended audience."(p.363)
I wonder what Gleick's sources are. Mine are Matthew Sands and other people that attended Feynman's Phys 1 & 2 lectures at Caltech, as well as other Phys 1 & 2 courses - these are required of _all_ Caltech students, not just physics majors. The attendance rate of such "big" courses at Caltech typically drop radically after a short time, as many students prefer to study by reading and practicing exercises - either alone or in "study groups." I would therefore be very surprised if Feynman was "shocked" that attendance dropped in his Phys 1 & 2. I also find it hard to believe (having sat in that cozy lecture hall - E Bridge 201 - many times) that Feynman could have been so unobservant to mistake faculty and grad students for freshmen and sophomores. I do not remember reading any statement of Feynman's in which he mentioned attendance in his undergraduate course (but perhaps you know of some source I am unaware of - I do not consider Gleick authoritative, unless he quotes an authoritative source).
> He adds that Leighton and Sands did some intensive editing to try and
> make the published lectures understandable to the "kids". But he adds
> the truth available from looking at lists of recommended textbooks from
> University sites:
>
> "Colleges and universities worldwide tried to adopt them as textbooks and
> then, inevitably, gave them up for more manageable and less radical
> alternatives."
FLP was never intended to be a textbook, but only a book of lectures (which does not include common textbook elements, such as exercises), and it was never intended to be used outside Caltech, where the standard of admission (particularly with regard to math and science) is unusually high (so the material could be aimed a bit higher than usual for freshmen and sophomores). The idea of turning FLP into a book came from publishers, and was snatched up by the Caltech administration, as a way to generate revenue for the physics department (which it continues to do to this day).
"Leighton and Sands" did more than 'make the published lectures understandable to the "kids".' Sands was in the first place responsible for FLP, because his was the idea of revising the undergraduate physics course to include more advanced and interesting material; Sands was also responsible for the idea of asking Feynman to give the lectures (and for talking Feynman into it!). Leighton was responsible for the program as a whole, which included not only his involvement in the editing and illustration of Feynman's lectures, but also in the creation of new labs and experiments, recitation sections (creation of homework, quizzes and tests), etc.
> I've looked at many such lists, recently. None recommends
> Feynman's lectures as course texts, but many highly recommend
> them as supplementary reading.
The Feynman Lectures on Physics is published in over a dozen languages. Did you check the lists in Russian, Chinese (simplified, and traditional), Korean, Czech, Polish, Italian, German, ... ? (More copies have been printed in Russian, alone, than in English.) FLP is getting close to 50 years old, and it is not a textbook, so it is not very surprising that it is not recommended, today, as a textbook. Nevertheless, it was used at Caltech as the primary text for Phys 1 and Phys 2 for almost 20 years, and it continues to be used at Caltech even today (piecemeal, in the form of chapters that are copied and passed out to the students).
> That's how I used them (many mooons ago) when studying UG physics.
> I read the course text, then, in the odd sections where it confused me,
> I read Feynman. Feynman often helped. But I didn't read cover-to-cover
> because Feynman also, quite often, confused me.
I read FLP (the first time) in 1999-2000, and found, on the points that confused me, that it was often because of some typo or other kind of mistake in the book. I found about 200 errors like that, which (after several years of campaigning) were corrected in the first printing of the most recent (so called "Definitive") edition. Since then another 80 errors have been corrected in print, while 260 more that have been checked by Caltech await correction; in addition, we have about 500 newly reported errors that have not yet been "officially" checked, and we continue to receive reports. The lists of errata can be found at The Feynman Lectures website,
http://www.feynmanlectures.info.
If you find yourself confused on some point in FLP, you might want to check the lists of errata to see if there are any errors that might be involved. If you find an error (which could include, for example, an unambiguously confusing statement) that is not reported in our lists, please write to
Michael Gottlieb
mg@feynmanlectures.info
