HOW THINGS WORK

Catalog description

This course is designed to give a non-conventional view of science and scientific principles by first observing whole objects and then looking inside them to see what makes them work. Our everyday life is bombarded with technology from a coffee percolator to a computer. Most users of technology know how to operate technical devices without understanding how they work. This course will rely on the comfort of experience and instruction to understand physical laws. Topics include ramps, bumper cars, spacecraft, scuba diving, musical instruments, magnetically levitated train, digital recoding and playback devices, batteries, and etc. The mathematics necessary to formulate many of the ideas will be restricted to high school level algebra and geometry. The primary thrust of this course is to understand the usefulness of science.