Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Physics is fun - for whom?

1998; IOP Publishing; Volume: 33; Issue: 5 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1088/0031-9120/33/5/001

1361-6552

Jonathan Allday,

Science Education and Perceptions

King's School, Canterbury, UK I'm compiling a physics joke book. So far I have one entry. How do you tell the difference between a physicist and an applied mathematician? You do an experimental test. You get them to make a cup of tea. You provide water, a kettle, a teabag, a teapot and a cup. The physicist goes into the room, fills the kettle with water and boils the water. She then places the teabag in the teapot and pours on the boiling water - thus a cup of tea is made. You then restore the initial conditions and send in the applied mathematician. He proceeds to do the same thing. Now, you make the test slightly harder. You fill the kettle with water prior to the subjects arriving. The physicist notes this, boils the water in the kettle and makes tea as before. The applied mathematician sees that the kettle is full of water, empties the kettle so reducing the situation to the previous problem, which he has already solved. When I first heard this I thought that it was rather funny. Since then, observation seems to suggest that I may well be the only person on the planet who thinks that it is at all funny, so I do not anticipate great sales for my joke book - if I ever find another joke to put in it. I am having rather better luck with the book of physics cartoons. I have been collecting physics-related cartoons for about 15 years now and have a substantial stock. Surprisingly I used to find Punch a rich vein of such material. These days I tend to rely on Larson's Far Side for providing new samples. Students are still bemused by the fact that at least one of his cartoons can reduce me to helpless laughter. I have it pinned to the wall in my lab - two scientists are in animated conflict over a pile of burning machinery in the middle of a desert. A caveman is observing from a distance. The caption reads `tempers flair when Professors Carson and Lazell, working independently, ironically set their time machines to identical coordinates'. Rather more telling is the (modified) Punch cartoon. Marcie and Linus are discussing life: Marcie `Thank you for the Chocolate Sundae, Linus' Linus `You're welcome... Maybe we can do it again sometime?' Marcie `I don't think so... I don't find you very interesting.' Linus, wistfully and leaning against a tree - `Physics....' This cartoon the students find funny. The fact that the study of physics should be a block to a meaningful relationship seems to strike a chord with them. It takes them by surprise that physicists have a real life. Now I realize that any teacher having a real life often takes students by surprise. I remember visiting my mother's infants school when I was a sixth-former and the kids there found it unbelievable that Mrs Allday should have a son. Teachers, you see, cease to exist the minute the students walk out of the classroom. However, physics and its practitioners seem to be especially branded in this way. From time to time I show videos to my students. Well chosen ones (so I think) that reflect modern developments and show physicists enjoying what they are doing. One such tape shows the reaction to the first pictures coming down from the newly repaired Hubble Space Telescope. The control room is filled with whoops, delighted cheering and general bouncing up and down with enthusiasm. This always raises a laugh. However, one can tell that they are being laughed at, not with. Another tape is about the comet strike on Jupiter. The narrator spends some time talking with Gene and Carolyn Shoemaker (two of the discoverers of the comet) - a married team of astronomers. You can see that their married life in part revolves round their joint love of astronomy and physics. I have overheard comments like `can you imagine the breakfast conversations?' Why do students find it so difficult to imagine that physicists in real life have fun doing physics? Pondering this I have come to the conclusion that they do not see enough teachers having fun teaching the subject. Perhaps with all the time we have spent trying to modernize our syllabuses, introducing new interesting physics, making physics fun for the students, we have forgotten to think about ourselves. I have had a theory for some years which is that students are never naturally interested in a subject - they are interested in a teacher first, and then the subject follows. Goodness knows, these days with investigations, modular examinations and the general paperwork that flows in the job, it is hard enough to find enough time to breathe let alone have fun. However, I am becoming increasingly convinced that it is vital. I propose that we use the declining numbers doing physics to our advantage. With smaller set sizes we can spend more time doing things that we enjoy. In my department we regularly ask sixth-formers why they chose Chemistry and Biology as A-levels rather than Physics. The common answer is that Physics is harder. Yes, it is. That is the nature of the science. There is nothing we can do about it. Physics is difficult, otherwise we would not need people of the stature of Newton and Einstein to do it! However, it's a lot more fun. There is a nice story about Feynman. He was being shown round CERN and was brought into one of the underground experimental chambers. Faced with a giant detector he turned to his guide and asked what it was for. After some explanation the guide finally broke down and apologised - he had forgotten that the experiment was designed to test one of the theories that Feynman had had a significant hand in. `Really' said Feynman, `and how much did this cost?'. `Thirty million dollars' came the reply. Feynman turned to his guide, looked at him in all seriousness and said `don't you trust me?' Now there was a man that had fun doing physics - and he let everyone know it.