Re: key concepts in physics ???

[Leigh Palmer <palmer@SFU.CA>]

It has always been of some concern to me that the public, from Joe
Sixpack to the "well educated person", has a greatly distorted idea of
what science is. I think that no body of internalized factual material
can properly define the well educated person in this area. He must
also know a great deal about the process by means of which those facts
were won from Nature, and he must know the epistemological stature of
the facts. In my teaching I emphasize the "how we know what we know"
aspect of physics and astronomy.

Certainly everyone who is scientifically literate should be able to
answer the nontrivial question "Does the Earth go 'round the Sun or
does the Sun go 'round the Earth?" It is my feeling that the well
educated person should be able to answer the further question "How
do you know that?" with considerably more than the rejoinder "Everyone
knows that!"

At 9:08 AM -0700 9/27/00, kyle forinash wrote:
> Our campus is undergoing a revision of general ed requirements for
> all students. Our dean of natural sciences asked each discipline to
> come up with the five most important concepts in our discipline that
> any well educated person in any discipline should know (a 'science
> literacy' list a la Hirsh).
>
> I came up with the following pie in the sky list (I tired to be as
> idealistic as possible); if anyone out there is bored and would like
> to amend the list or has a broader perspective I'd appreciate it.
>
>        1. There are conservation laws which are absolute.

If one wishes to be idealistic then one would never make a statement
like this one. The word "absolute" conveys the message that what is
to follow may be considered to be issued *ex cathedra*. It is important
for the well educated person to know that science (Real Science) is not
so pretentious as to assert proprietorship over Truth. Physics is our
best description of Nature at any given time. Science is the endeavor
which has as its object the improvement of that description.

In particular, we know the conservation laws are not absolute. There
are quantitative limits on these laws which provide an estimate of the
degree of nonconservation that can be expected in some cases. That was
an improvement on those laws which was made in the quantum revolution.
Nevertheless, the laws are excellent approximate descriptions of Nature
just as are Newtonian mechanics and the invariance of physical laws
under spatial inversion.

Now I do have some more minor quibbles with Kyle's list, but I would
have to devote days to producing a list which would satisfy me, and if
no one will pay me to do that then I'm going to do something else. It
does bother me that little attention was given to process in the list.

Leigh