Maximizing Your Free Time: A Guide to Further Studying Physics

[Tom Segal]

Hello everyone.

I finished high school recently and I have 3 months of free time before I am to be recruited to the army.

I'd like to do something productive with those 3 months and study some more physics, since in school I was only taught the basics.

Other than articles on wikipedia, is there maybe a "tutorial" or an article of sort that teaches you physics-related things from the basics?

Thing is I've been trying to learn by reading discussions in these forums and reading articles on wikipedia, but these things always include more and more terms that are unfamiliar to me and so I can't understand the rest of the article.

I would really appreciate if you could point me to some good links for studying physics.

Thanks in advance,

Tom.

 

[Asphodel]

Have you read Feynman's lectures yet?

 

[Tom Segal]

No, could you please tell me where to find them?
I searched for "feynman" and "feynman lecture" using the search engine but that yielded many many results, I suppose he's either a famous physicist or an active forum poster.

 

[bob1182006]

If you only know high school physics (algebra based I'm guessing). You might want to try getting yourself a copy of Halliday & Resnik since that's the usual Calculus based Physics textbook, you can also get old editions and solution manuals.

The Feynman Lectures are pretty awesome but I think to learn from it would be pretty hard. They're transcripts from a freshman class he taught, and I think almost all freshmen dropped out? Class was full of graduate/faculty though.

 

[Tom Segal]

Thank you, I'll look for that book then.

 

[wildman]

I recommend that you look at "The Shape of Space" by Jeffrey Weeks. It can be difficult at times but it only uses high school algebra and it is an awesome exploration of some really wonderful math and ideas about how our Universe is put together.

 

[Poop-Loops]

Do you know any calculus? If not, get Stewart's Calculus: Early Transcendentals along with something like Giancolli's Physics for Scientists and Engineers. Not much calc in it, but it has the basic physics concepts. When you learn calculus, you'll automatically realize how it can be applied to a lot of the stuff you learned in the physics book.

Really, your physics journey is limited by the math you know at this point. Those two books should last you a while, though. I used Giancolli for a whole year of physics and Stewart for a year and a half. Lots of good info there.

 

[MathematicalPhysicist]

Israeli by any chance? (the army gives it away).
I have some recommendation for hebrew books if you are by any chance an israeli student.

 

[Tom Segal]

I am an Israeli, but I'd like to read books in English so I'll know the terms by their "real" names.
Calculus for instance is something I think I do know a tiny bit of, now that I've read about what it is, but I know it by a different name.
It would be much more comfortable to know the terms by the same names most people know them by.
Thanks for your suggestion though, I appreciate it.

And thanks everyone for your book suggestions, I have already started looking for some of them and, if its of any interest, I'd love to keep you updated with my progress. (Will provide an extra motivation boost for me as well)

Thanks again!