The never ending discussion of REIFICATION of physics concepts gets old
very quickly. This is a list for educators--and I suspect most of us
primarily teach intro courses--at the HS level or in colleges and
universities. Many, like myself, may teach the general-ed (liberal arts)
course where the students cannot follow (much less, heaven forbid, actually
do) the math involved to analyze an elastic collision between two objects.
To those who would have us be PURE to the 'state of the art' understanding
of physics, I would challenge them to write a book for HS or for the
liberal arts student (Hewitt level text) in which mass, energy, photons,
(electrons?) are all just constructs without reality. OR--take this
challenge. Write a book to be used to teach about ENERGY (world energy
use) without reifying energy. Explain what it is we are really paying for
in gory detail. Explain how the entire technological society runs on an
imaginary quantity. Then see how such a text goes over. Sure no publisher
will touch it because it would be useless with the targeted students.
Reification of certain constructs IS NOT, IMO, a mortal sin and in the
context of the students that most of us teach, is a necessary step towards
the minimal understanding of the physical world that we are trying to
achieve. Those who want to preach sin and damnation for those of us who
don't heed their dogmatic message need to get into the classroom with 'our'
students and try to apply their preaching in our settings. Do that, show
success, show us that HS and gen-ed students have a better understanding of
the world with your approach, and then we will listen more intently.
Rick
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Richard W. Tarara
Professor of Physics
Saint Mary's College
Notre Dame, IN 46556
rtarara@saintmarys.edu
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FREE: Windows and Mac Instructional Software
www.saintmarys.edu/~rtarara/software.html
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