Review
John L. Hubisz, Ph.D., Hubisz@unity.ncsu.edu
and the reviewers of the Second Report.

Understanding Physics by David Cassidy, Gerald Holton, and James Rutherford with Student Guide published by Springer Verlag, New York NY 2002, xxiii + 851 pp. ISBN 0-387-98756-8.

We were very pleased to see that the Project Physics course of 1970 had been redone. Unfortunately, while the original text and materials were a possible selection for a solid 8th or 9th grade course, all the reviewers felt that the new effort places it out of reach for these students. All reviewers, however, do recommend it strongly as a resource for the teacher and as an excellent choice for a pre-service physics course for any student, especially those considering teaching, at the college level.

Accuracy:
Great care has been taken in the writing of this book, and the errors are both minor and few and far between. Content, for the most part, has been reviewed and has stood the test of time over the decades since the original creation of the Harvard Project Physics (HPP), which this is an update of. There remain yet a few confusing/misleading diagrams from the old version such as the description of the AC/DC generator on pages 514/515. Generally principles and equations are represented in an understandable and accurate way.

Readability:
This book lives up to its title by providing a storyline narrative (rare in textbooks) that enables an adult who later regrets not experiencing physics in high school to learn about it. Because of this, adults should find the book highly readable. On the other hand, freshmen in high school, who are not typically psyched to appreciate the storyline by which physics developed, may find it wordy.

True to the original HPP, the text focuses on presenting the physics concepts simply and elegantly in the context of the historical setting in which they were discovered. The sometimes subtle, sometimes overt interplay of scientific discovery, politics and human interaction is engaging and captivating. Perhaps this is true, however, less for the 9th grade student who has not yet developed a sense of politics and society. For slightly older students the engaging quality of this text would be true, however.

Age and Sex Appropriateness: There is no sex-insensitive language, and photographs of female physicists are included to show the contributions of women to physics. Diagrams and photos tend to be historical and a bit drab for today’s youth. They, again, are fine for older students. As mentioned above, the historical focus of this text is inherently more interesting for older students who are aware of broader contexts and interested in science content embedded in human triumph and foible.

Mathematics Requirements:
There are no mathematical requirements beyond algebra, and -- in order not to interrupt the storyline of the text -- many of the algebraic derivations are presented separately, along with laboratory explorations, in the Student Guide. Math is kept to the minimum necessary to present a concept. There is not, however, enough quantitative practice to satisfy the needs of today’s demands in a standards based setting as an introductory physics program at grade 9, though it is entirely suitable as an elective in upper grades of high school or in college. Problem sets have many good thought questions requiring reflection and understanding, but not quantitative practice.

Overall:
This text is a captivating blend of history and physics. It will always be a classic favorite of many instructors, acclaimed for its insights and understandings of the historical development of physics. For the modern grade 9 student, however, there is not enough pertinence to their daily lives and educationally expected standards to be an effective text.

This book is quite large (850 pages) containing a tremendous amount of information, great historical, black and white pictures, and enough factual, familiar material to keep the reader’s interest. The authors make use of students in possible situations and an informal, narrative writing style to keep the reader engaged and focused. The paragraphs read easily keeping the subject matter from becoming too heavy. However, the book is not one for a 9th grade physics class. As the first sentence in the section on “Audience” in the “Preface” states “This book is “written primarily for undergraduate college students not intending to enter careers in science or engineering.” The book certainly fulfills its intention as a text for liberal arts college students taking a survey course in physics; the reading level is definitely not for ninth grade students. It is no longer a book designed to be an introduction to physics or the first contact with physics in high school except at the upper levels.

The book would be a wonderful resource for the teacher of the 9th grade physics course. Any reader selecting a topic is caught up in the wealth of information available and is carried along to explore related topics. This book certainly provides the historical and descriptive coverage of subjects which is often omitted from the usual textbook but which adds character and humanity to any class presentation. There is a series of pictures showing the vibration of a rubber “drumhead”. There is a picture of Tycho Brahe's observatory and one of the Babylonian clay tablet recording the observed positions of Jupiter, as well as one of a nineteenth century French cultivator. There is a discussion of alternative energy sources covering solar, geothermal, wind, and nuclear energy. Also, there is an historical accounting of World War II and the development of the fission and fusion bombs. Niagara Falls is used to introduce DC versus AC production. There is also an interesting diagram, showing the electric transmission lines in the United States. Feynman, Fermi, Oppenheimer, Chadwick, and Chandrasekhar are all highlighted as are Copernicus, Clerk Maxwell, and Leibniz. Rather than a text for ninth grade physics, the book lends itself to a behind the scenes reference book for the 9th grade teacher.

The book seeks to teach physics through an appreciation of general concepts without
much explicit mathematics. The topics are treated qualitatively and descriptively with only a minimal use of mathematics. A teacher planning to use this text for a physics course would find herself having to supplement it with mathematical treatments of concepts and illustrative problems since few are provided in the text. The teacher would have to supply homework problems since those suggested in the Student Guide would not be adequate.

One advantage to teaching physics in 9th grade is to help students understand the uses of mathematics, algebra and geometry, beyond the math classroom, to see that many of the elementary algebra problems are really physics problems.

A few topics are treated with some very basic equations: Kepler’s Laws of Motion, conservation of momentum, and forces on a moving charged body. Each chapter does have “Discovery Questions” and “Study Guide Questions “which are mainly conceptual.
Many of them are excellent in probing the extent of the understanding of the student and could be profitably utilized by any ninth grade teacher. The Student Guide, which accompanies Understanding Physics, contains some mathematical treatments which could be translated for the high school student. The book seems primarily for a student who has already had a high school survey physics course. Clearly auxiliary sets of problems would be needed to use the book as a general textbook

This textbook is quite acceptable and appropriate for use in the mixed classroom. The book does not try to show fair treatment of women by including staged pictures, except for one of a woman teacher on the back cover, or by artificially changing the language to use feminine pronouns. Instead Cecilia Payne-Gaposchkiin, who discovered that stars are primarily made of hydrogen and have varying temperatures, is featured on the opening page of Part Two. There is mention of Caroline Herschel who possibly provided the data for her brother William Herschel's discovery of the planet Uranus. Also there are pictures of Lisa Meitner with an account of the prejudice she endured. Einstein's first wife is figured in his biography, but there is no mention of her possible contributions to his work. There is also considerable information on Marie Curie. Many of the staged situations feature both John and Jane.

Any author selects what topics will be included and which concepts will be emphasized.
However, since the first high school course in physics is designed to be followed by a second physics course in high school, high school chemistry, or courses in college, certain background material is expected to be presented. One topic which needs to be part of the 9th grade course is buoyancy - the principle behind floating and sinking. This topic may be quite basic, but it is important for earth science and chemistry which will build on a physics background. Also, many students understand why objects sink and the math associated with sinking, but find the math and concepts for floating more involved and much more difficult to comprehend and utilize. There appears to be no mention of this topic. A second topic is centripetal vs. centrifugal force. Considerable space is given to centripetal force, but centrifugal force is mentioned only as a word in a list of “new concepts” with no attempt to explain this commonly misused term. The section on frames of reference could be expanded to explain the difference in centripetal and centrifugal force. Also, Bernoulli’s principle is dismissed quickly assuming that the reader is aware of its examples. Also missing is a unit on vectors and scalars with an exposition on the arithmetic of vectors to provide understanding of an important concept for physics.

Any text will contain its share of inconsistencies or mistakes. Here there is a lovely illustration of the five geometric regular solids with the statement that they figured in Kepler's work, but no reference as to how he used them or why there are only five. Also there is a picture of Stonehenge with no mention of its significance. In the chapter on motion, there is a picture of a man pushing a large truck loaded with snow with no caption. It is difficult to assess the accuracy of a text book until one actually teaches from it. However, there is certainly nothing that stands out as being inaccurate. This book, although a good resource leaves too much undone - left up to the teacher and student - to be a good text for 9th grade physics.

This is a remarkable book, the successor to the Project Physics Course funded by the Carnegie Corporation and the Sloan Foundation. The emphasis in this book is on the detailed development of physical thought in its historical and social context. There is little emphasis on laboratory work and problem solving and there are few quantitative problems provided in the book. The intended audience as defined in the preface consists of undergraduate non-physics majors such as pre-medical students and potential high school physics teachers.

The book is remarkable in the unusual care and detail with which the historical development of physical thought is carried out. As an example, the development of mechanics begins with the observations of ancient societies of the movement of the stars through the sky over the course of a year. It is pointed out that stars follow predictable paths through the sky, while the observable planets (Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn) look like stars, but appear to wander through regions of the sky with unpredictable paths. The ancients thus thought that the stars were inanimate objects, since their motion is predictable, but the planets were living beings, since they seemed to wander where they would. Being in the heavens, the planets were assigned the role of living gods. The contributions of Plato and Aristotle, Ptolemy, Galileo, Kepler, Copernicus, etc. are carried through in detail, so that by the time Newton’s work is described it is very clear that what we do in mechanics today is strongly dependent on work extending thousands of years into the past. The impact of observations of the natural world, such as astronomy, on religious and social thought is also unusually clear.

This care in describing the development of technical advances in their historical and social contexts is carried out throughout the book. The development of the steam engine is explored in detail, with explanations of the social needs that led to each improvement. The development of electricity and magnetism begins with a description of the properties of lodestone and amber. Theoretical developments are described in nonmathematical terms, and the mathematical development is kept very simple. Some more complex derivations are left to a supplemental Student Guide that accompanies the text. Some experiments are described in the text but such experiments are kept simple and mirror the historical material under discussion.

Problems at the end of each chapter are divided into qualitative, discussion type questions and quantitative questions requiring simple calculations. Problems are few, with perhaps a total of twenty at the end of each chapter, divided between qualitative and quantitative problems.

In its intended setting of college students, perhaps upperclassmen, in a seminar type environment, this book would be superb. The only reservation I would have is the almost complete lack of emphasis on mathematics; to me mathematics is almost inseparable from physics. On the other hand, for a group of students with no other need for mathematics than to appreciate physics, I can see that this book would be very useful.

I would think it very difficult to use this book at the high school level and particularly in a physics first setting. I do not believe that fifteen year old students will be sufficiently familiar with history and sociology to appreciate what the book is trying to do, nor do I believe that fifteen year old students will have the patience to appreciate the painstaking historical development that the book undertakes. The lack of problems, particularly quantitative problems, would be a severe handicap to the use of this book as a high school physics text. Supplementing this book with a problem book, such as Hickman, J.B., Problem Solving Exercises in Physics, Prentice Hall, New York (2002) might overcome this difficulty.

On the other hand, as a text or reference book for the teachers of high school or college students, this book would be outstanding. The historical and social setting background provided by the book would add immensely to the ability of the teacher to provide interesting sidelights to the students in any physics course. The book is well written and easy to read; it could be picked up and read very profitably by a physics teacher as a self-study project.

In conclusion, I cannot recommend this book as a text in a high school setting, but as a self study reference for high school or college teachers it would be an excellent addition to the library. As a text for a college level seminar course intended for non-majors it could be very useful. As a text for an advanced physics seminar course for high school physics teachers it would also be useful, but there is not enough emphasis on mathematical development to serve as a stand alone first course in physics for physics teachers.