Science is concerned with the investigation of phenomena in nature and the explanation of those phenomena using basic principles. Science is more than an accumulation of facts. In the words of the famous French physicist Jules Henri Poincare, "A collection of facts without a unifying theory is no more a science than a heap of stones is a house." A science needs a central, coordinating structure. If you attempt to learn physics, or any science for that matter, by memorizing facts without understanding the basic principles explaining those facts, you are almost certainly doomed to fail. Instead of attempting to memorize isolated facts and relationships presented in the text, try to understand the underlying theory and the central unifying concepts. Use the Chapter Outline as a guide to identify the topics to be considered in each chapter. Try to find the answers to the questions posed in the outline as you read through the chapter.

Careful observation and testability are two critical elements of science. To be considered as a scientific theory or hypothesis an idea must make predictions that can be checked or tested by observations or experiments. A scientist must be willing to modify a theory if the results of experiments indicate that the predictions of the theory do not agree with the results of experiments testing the theory.

In a sense the best way to learn physics is to use the scientific method on yourself by considering the questions at the end of the chapters and using your understanding of the concepts presented in the chapters to provide the answers. If your understanding of the principles does not allow you to provide the correct answers to the questions, go back and modify your understanding of the concepts just as a scientist would modify a theory if the results of an experiment did not agree with the predictions of the theory. Then try again. When you believe you have sufficient understanding that you can answer all the questions, proceed to the exercises for which more mathematics is required.