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On June 28 David Dockstader posted this,in the thread on tidal bulges:
"Now the question is what do we do as educators? What do we teach? The tidal
bulge model is useful and does give a kind of a global average of the tides.
It explains pretty well such things as changes in the moons orbit. It is
simple and easy to understand. However, it isn't very useful for planning
kayak trips in coastal areas, and naive reliance on such a simple model could
easily result in death by drowning. When this comes up in intro physics,
astronomy, geology, etc. should we issue a disclaimer and explain that this
simple model is highly modified and complex at the local level and explain
qualitatively some of the factors that create these modifications? I've never
done this, but it does seem like a good idea.