Re: On electronics (was Computer Skills)

["Bob Sciamanda" <trebor@velocity.net>]

-----Original Message-----
From: Ludwik Kowalski <KowalskiL@Mail.Montclair.edu>
To: phys-l@atlantis.uwf.edu <phys-l@atlantis.uwf.edu>
Date: Friday, September 18, 1998 12:08 AM
Subject: Re: On electronics (was Computer Skills)


> I may add that one does not learn the laws of nature while examining a
> complex integrated circuit. The law of nature are certainly involved but
> the behavior of a system is governed by the laws imposed by inventors
> (do this when that happens, etc.)  The system is so complex that laws of
> nature are overshadowed by the "man-made" laws.
> . . .

This is too strong and may be "over-inferred".  All of the above might be
applied to optical systems involving  lenses, mirrors and diffraction
gratings.  There is fruitful BASIC physics learning in studying the
phenomena : np junction behavior;  bipolar  transistor action;  FET and
MOSFET transistors;  RC filtering - integrating - differentiating;
signal/noise considerations;  loading and impedance considerations;
amplification - feedback - oscillation; signal sampling -A/D conversion;
etc.

One partial answer to the TIME problem is to use these as examples in
physics expositions (rather than just D'arsonval meter movements, motors,
generators, etc. - they were used because they were the emergent
technology of their day  -  this is now!).

> . . .
> A system with
> too many simple components, even a heterodyne receiver build with tubes,
> is no longer appropriate for learning physics.

The frequency shifting of the heterodyne principle is pure physics (what
it does is also useful knowledge for the experimentalist).  The details
of just how it is done in a particular radio receiver are as irrelevant
as the details of a Ford car are irrelevant to the physicist's abiding
interest in the workings of the internal combustion engine.

I don't think it is useful to suggest the broad inferrance that if it is
complex then the physics is too buried to be of use to us!

> . . .
> > As for electronics I am no longer sure it is as important today as it
was
> > when I learned it, also in the 50's. In those days electronics was
really
> > applied physics. Today electronics means many things to many people.
> > To some it means what it used to be but most often it is defined
> > (implicitly) as a skill of connecting (or replacing) black boxes, such
as
> > operational amplifiers, etc. The components, usually hidden, are too
> > small to investigate.
> >                                                        Ludwik Kowalski


We all end up ultimately working with black boxes, in both theoretical
and experimental endeavors.  Apart from the understanding of the
PRINCIPLES behind the innards (addressed above) the 21st century
experimental physicist needs to be able to fruitfully use the "sand
boxes" of Silicon Valley (and even suggest new ones);  the theoretician
needs to understand what the experiment really did (and what its
variations might do).

We need to foster more tinkering, both with the mind and with the hands;
this must begin in the crib.

-Bob

Bob Sciamanda
Physics, Edinboro Univ of PA (ret)
trebor@velocity.net
http://www.velocity.net/~trebor