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modern physics activities for non-science students



Dennis Krause asked:

I would like to enlist the help of all those on this list for
suggestions on how to make the topics of modern physics more real to my
students. What demonstrations, computer simulations, and/or other
activities have you found useful in illustrating (in a fun and stimulating
way!) the far-out concepts of relativity (special and general) and quantum
mechanics to non-science students?

I have written an activity for my introductory astronomy class in which we
determine the age of several hypothetical rocks and meteorites by first
measuring a radioactive decay curve. I would be happy to provide you (or
anyone else who is interested) a copy of the instructions. It is designed
to be done in a 70 minute activity session.

I have a question regarding this activity. In radioactive dating
measurements, one measures the relative amount of two different isotopes.
In the real world, how is this done? Is there some place (preferably on
the web) with detailed information about this from a practitioner? I tried
searching for "radioactive dating" +rocks in Altavista, but I get hundreds
of astronomy syllabi that aren't very helpful. I want to be sure that my
hypothetical data are reasonable.


Joseph Gress
Physics Department
Moorhead State University
Moorhead, MN 56563