The Physics of Everyday Phenomena: A Conceptual Introduction to Physics, 4/e
Thomas Griffith
ISBN: 0072509775 Copyright year: 2004
What's New
New to This Edition
We have made some significant additions and changes to the fourth edition. As this book has evolved, however, we have tried to remain faithful to the principles that have guided the writing of the book from the outset. One of these has been to keep the book to a manageable length, both in the number of chapters and in the overall content. Many books become bloated as users and reviewers request more and more pet topics. We have strived to maintain a carefully organized framework for building an understanding of basic physics. The changes include:
A New chapter on Light Waves and Color (chapter 16) has been added. It discusses the nature of electromagnetic waves and physical optics topics including color perception, interference, diffraction, and polarization. Although some of this material had been covered in other places, it has been pulled together and substantially expanded. The sections on color perception and polarization are completely new.
A section on the Physics of Music of a page from this section has been added to chapter 15, which covers wave phenomena. This section builds upon concepts of standing waves and sound waves introduced in sections 15.3 and 15.4. The new section discusses harmonic analysis, harmony and dissonance (including beats), and the structure of musical scales. It should be of particular interest to students with some background in music, but is intended to be accessible to all students.
A section on image formation by spherical mirrors has been added to chapter 17 (formerly chapter 16), which covers topics from geometric optics. This had also been requested by many users.
New Everyday Phenomenon Boxes
Each chapter includes one or more Everyday Phenomenon boxes. These boxes have been a popular feature of the book and we have had repeated requests to add more. In response, we have produced nine new Everyday Phenomenon boxes.
We have added more open-ended questions. Most of the questions at the end of each chapter call for brief, well-defined answers and short explanations. In response to requests from some reviewers, we have added a few questions at the end of each chapter that are more open-ended. They are intended to be useful for generating discussion and are marked with an asterisk.
We have added more exercises and challenge problems As in previous revisions, we have modified most of the exercises and challenge problems and have added some new exercises.
New Design – We have designed this edition to be more inviting by modernizing it with the use of soft and inviting colors, and braking up lengthy chunks of text with new designs of Everyday Phenomena boxes, Try This boxes and Running Summary Paragraphs. This new design also offers students an improved art program to learn with by isolating the physics concept in several art pieces.
Chapter Tools
The over-riding theme of this book is to introduce physical concepts by appealing to everyday phenomena whenever possible. Each chapter begins with an illustration from everyday experience and then proceeds to use it as a theme for introducing relevant physical concepts. Physics can seem abstract to many students, but using everyday phenomena and concrete examples reduces that abstractness.
The chapter outlines, questions, and summaries provide a clear framework for the ideas discussed in each chapter. One of the difficulties that students have in learning physics (or any subject) is that they fail to construct the big picture of how things fit together. A consistent chapter framework can be a powerful tool in helping students see how ideas mesh. Running Summary Paragraphs are found at the end of each chapter section to supplement the more general summary at the end of the chapter. The sub-section headings are often cast in the form of questions to motivate the reader and pique curiosity. A few key concepts form the basis for understanding physics and these textual features reinforce this structure so that the reader will not be lost in a flurry of definitions and formulas. Here is a closer look at the Chapter Tools:
The Case of the Malfunctioning Coffee Pot (Chapter 1)
NEW! Transitions in Traffic Flow (Chapter 2)
The 100-meter Dash (Chapter 2)
Shooting a Basketball (Chapter 3)
Riding an Elevator (Chapter 4)
NEW! The Tablecloth Trick (Chapter 4)
Explaining the Tides (Chapter 5)
NEW! Airbags and Seat Belts (Chapter 5)
Energy and the Pole Vault (Chapter 6)
An Automobile Collision (Chapter 7)
Achieving a State of Yo (Chapter 8)
NEW! Bicycle Gears (Chapter 8)
Throwing a Curveball (Chapter 9)
Solar Collectors and the Greenhouse Effect (Chapter 10)
A Productive Pond (Chapter 11)
NEW! Hybrid Vehicles (Chapter 11)
Lightning (Chapter 12)
The Hidden Switch in Your Toaster (Chapter 13)
Direct-Current Motors (Chapter 14)
NEW! Vehicle Detectors for Traffic Lights (Chapter 14)
A Moving Car Horn and the Doppler Effect (Chapter 15)
NEW! Why is the Sky Blue? (Chapter 16)
NEW! Antireflection Coatings on Eyeglasses (Chapter 16)
Rainbows (Chapter 17)
NEW! Laser Refractive Surgery (Chapter 17)
Electrons and Television (Chapter 18)
Radiation Exposure (Chapter 19)
What Happened at Chernobyl? (Chapter 19)
The Twin Paradox (Chapter 20)
Holograms (Chapter 21)
Key Terms
Questions
Exercises
Challenge problems
Home Experiments and Observations
Since many courses for non-science majors do not have a laboratory component, we have continued to develop the home experiments and observations found at the end of each chapter. The spirit of the these home experiments is to enable students to explore the behavior of physical phenomena using easily available rulers, string, paper clips, balls, toy cars, flashlight batteries, and so on. Many instructors have found them useful for putting students into the exploratory and observational frame of mind that is important to scientific thinking. This is certainly one of our objectives in developing scientific literacy.
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2004 McGraw-Hill Higher Education