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This topic is created for those members who might wish to discuss a specific physics text book:
Robert L. Sproulland (and 1 more author)
Modern Physics: The Quantum Physics of Atoms, Solids, and Nuclei: Third Edition (Dover Books on Physics)
This text is available as eText and plays on Kindle eReader.
The price is modest compared to many such texts.
I have confirmed that Google is able to translate small sections of text into a form that can be copied and pasted as a quote, so if there is a passage that anyone finds particular interesting, there is convenient way to show it here.
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Here is a quote of the opening paragraph from the introduction of "Modern Physics" by Sproulland.
Showing results for 1-1 INTRODUCTION An analytical introduction to much of the basic physics developed in the twentieth century is presented in this book. The new physics has been of great intrinsic interest, almost a new science in itself, and in addition has provided applications in engineering that are already considerable and are expanding rapidly. The study of modern physics has led to new devices and energy sources, to more convenient and accurate instruments, to new materials of construction, and to a clearer understanding of existing materials.
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Update 2024/02/14 .... I decided to invest in the eText vesion of this book.
It was first published in 1980. The book was in it's 3rd printing in 2015, but I think it is unchanged.
My impression is that it holds up well despite 40 years having passed.
What is a bit different about the approach I have in mind is that I'm hoping to enlist ChatGPT4 as a companion in this adventure.
The mechanism is a bit cumbersome.... I have the eText available on a Chromebook. The text can be captured with a screen capture utility, and the screen shot can be translated to text by lens.google.com. That text can be given to ChatGPT4 and we can discuss it. There are 666 pages in this book, with lots and lots of charts and equations that I suspect cannot be translated.
However, what I'm ** really ** interested in is the mechanism by which energy is stored in the nucleus and how it is constrained by forces at work there, and how it is released.
In a preliminary scan of all 666 pages today, I ran across text that describes how energy "hills" and "valleys" exist to various degrees in various nuclei, so that some are stable and some are not. It appears (and this is just a preliminary impression) that protons are bouncing round inside the nucleus, and they are vigorously negatively interacting with each other, but a force at the surface of the nucleus keeps them contained.
I ran across a paragraph about the fusion challenge that has stymied the world's best physicists for decades. The paragraph, while 40 years old, seems to me to perfectly describe the problem of trying to encourage fusion of bouncing atoms while trying to reduce the energy losses that occur naturally due to the bouncing.
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