Book:Allan M. Munn/From Nought to Relativity
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Allan M. Munn: From Nought to Relativity: Creating the Physical World Model
Published $\text {1974}$, George Allen & Unwin
Subject Matter
Contents
- Preface
- List of Symbols
- 1 Introduction
- 2 The primary experience that is to be modelled by the physical world picture
- 3 Primary experience is chopped up into percepts, and these are assembled into concepts and things
- 4 The concept of number is brought into the picture
- 5 The game of numbers
- 6 The essential structural form of any world picture
- 7 Time and distance numbers
- 8 The game of kinematics
- 9 The game is applied: How to snowball an author. The cathode ray tube and the glow on the TV screen
- 10 The concepts of mass and force are brought into the picture. The game of dynamics
- 11 The force of gravity is deduced
- 12 The force of friction is deduced. The game is applied to studying the motion of a toboggan
- 13 The game is applied to studying the motion of a rocket. The solution is not aesthetically satisfying
- 14 The Laws of Conservation of Energy and Conservation of Momentum are deduced. The laws are successfully applied to the problems of the falling body, and the ballistic pendulum
- 15 The Law of Conservation of Energy is disobeyed. The lost energy is accounted for ad hoc by introducing the concept of coefficient of elasticity
- 16 The Law of Conservation of Energy is properly restored to grace by defining the new concepts of temperature and heat energy.
- 17 The game of Mathematics is extended to differential and integral calculus
- 18 The more comprehensive world picture is applied to the operation of the heat engine. The Carnot cycle. Entropy, and the Second Law of Thermodynamics
- 19 The Theory of Theories. Empirical and metaphysical theories
- 20 Electromagnetic phenomena
- 21 The new experience is quantitatively structured by the theory of electromagnetism and integrated into the evolving world picture
- 22 The game is applied to ammeters, electric motors and generators
- 23 The Law of Conservation of Energy is once more disobeyed, and once more it is restored to grace: this time by introducing the concept of energy transmission by invisible waves
- 24 The game of mathematics is extended to trigonometry
- 25 The theory is applied to the problem of the vibrating string
- 26 Light phenomena
- 27 Light is shown to be a wave
- 28 The electromagnetic wave is deduced from the world picture
- 29 The corpuscles of micro-experience: electrons and protons
- 30 The attempt to deduce a model for atomic structure from the world picture fails
- 31 The photoelectric effect. The Compton effect. The dichotomy of complementary wave and corpuscle
- 32 The world picture is modified and a satisfactory model for the hydrogen atom is now deduced. A look at the structures of some multi-electron atoms
- 33 A closer look at the question of measurement leads to the Uncertainty Principle
- 34 The world picture is restructured to incorporate the Uncertainty Principle. Quantum mechanics. The new game is applied to the problem of a micro-entity trapped in a well.
- 35 The null result obtained in the Michelson-Morley experiment leads to the death of the absolute
- 36 The world picture is further modified. Relativistic mechanics. The new theory is confirmed by experience. Atomic energy
- 37 Space-time and General relativity. The geometrizing of the force of gravity
- 38 An attempt to deduce a model for nuclear structure
- 39 Fundamental forces and more fundamental micro-entities. Quarks?
- Index