Re: textbook touchstones

["Bernard G. Cleyet & Nancy Ann Seese" <georgeann@REDSHIFT.COM>]

"Van E. Neie" wrote:

> "Richard W. Tarara" wrote:I suppose we also need to decide how what is "right" is
> decided.  I've seen
> several postings on this list that essentially take the stand "everybody always
> gets this wrong", meaning, I suppose,  "I know what's right and all the other
> people don't."  I think it's entirely appropriate to voice objections to
> something that you don't agree with, but it has to be done in a way that
> doesn't put other people down because they think differently.  I learn a lot
> from these discussions, but I suspect several "lurkers" on the list remain just
> that for fear of being made to look foolish.

Hey, this is e-mail. I'd think the anonymity would liberate the thin skinned.

Re. Bradley.  I think there's a move to slight history in recent texts.  About a page is
spent on Bradley in: Richtmyer, et al. "intro. to modern PHYSICS", 1955; Ditchburn,
"LIGHT", 1963; and Jenkins and White, 1957.  I remember Wm. Walker (UCSB) lecturing to us
budding sophomore atomic physicists (1957)  about stellar aberration, the name Bradley,
and water filled telescopes.  I don't remember if he was in the text, or much else.

Also I suspect indices are not necessarily created by the author.  McGervey's "intro to
MODERN PHYSICS"'s index (1971) has Aberration of starlight, but not Bradley, Fizeau,
Fresnel, Hoek, or any other person's name, unless it's attached to an experiment (e.g.
Michelson-M. and Trouton-Noble) and then not all of them.  McG. devotes eight pages to the
above mentioned scientists (Experiments preceding the theory of relativity).



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