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Re: [Phys-l] teaching energy



I've found this discussion really interesting. I'd like to address one
point that I haven't seen mentioned yet, and am piggy-backing on Dan
MacIsaac's post (but I hope I'm not picking on him).

On 10/3/06, danmacisaac <danmacisaac@mac.com> wrote:


I really don't believe that energy resides in any single object, but in
its relationship to something else.


How does one address the rest mass energy of an object (I'm happy to limit
to fundamental particles)? When I say that an electron has rest energy
0.511 MeV, is that in reference to something else? I've seen lots of
interesting discussion about kinetic energy and potential energy. Where
does rest energy fit in?


--
regards
-Krishna

Krishna Chowdary
Department of Physics & Astronomy
Bucknell University