Customer Reviews

Modern Physics for Scientists and Engineers (Saunders Golden Sunburst Series)

5 star:		(6)
4 star:		(1)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(6)
1 star:		(4)

 

 

Andy Rex, one of the text's authors, was in my Physics Department when I attended the University of Puget Sound, so I naturally used this textbook when I took Modern Physics (taught by another professor). The book is not good for students who are in the process of learning the material it presents for the first time. It is history- and derivation-heavy, but nearly devoid of analysis and ignores "the big picture." It was a wonderful reference when I was doing graduate work -- I already had a very solid background in Calculus, dimensional analysis, Quantum Mechanics, and so forth -- but it is not a good textbook if you are learning the material for the first time.

I used this book as the text in my modern physics course last fall. I chose the book because it seemed to cover the material at a level appropriate for the students, there were some good examples, enough homework problems, and there was enough material for a two semester course. Unfortunately, problems were apparent within a week of the beginning of class. These problems include serious typos in the text and homework problems, different printings producing different problem numbering in different texts (i.e. one student's problem 29 was another's problem 31), and poorly worded homework problems (to the point of being nonsensical). Some of the student's texts, about 40%, had missing or illegible pages. In addition to the physical problems, there were some problems with the content. The explanations tended to be a bit terse and unclear. In summary, this book has a good layout and thoughtful organization but the devil is in the details. The detailed handling of various topics and the general production of the book make it a poor choice for an introductory modern physics text.

I'm about to finish the on-line course taught by one of the authors, Steve Thornton (University of Virginia).

The book lends itself to self-study and the 3rd edition is partly the result of Dr. Thornton's teaching an on-line course for several summers. Many of the students are traditional physics and engineering undergraduates, but many others are career high school physics teachers that give Dr. Thornton feedback from a teacher's viewpoint.

The publishers publish a Student Solutions Manual which shows worked out solutions for about 25% of the problems which I recommend. Answers to many other end-of-chapter problems are listed (without explanation) in the back of the text book. Dr. Thornton's course web site has additional worked out problems, streaming mini-lectures, syllabus, and simulations -- see .modern.physics.virginia.edu. There's also a Yahoo discussion group, "modern_physics" for the course (you have to be a student in the course to actually post questions).

Many of the end-of-chapter problems have a simple "twist" to them that requires some thought; you can't just mindlessly "plug and chug" your way through equations.

Previous reviewers have panned earlier editions for allegedly sloppy editing and errors. I've worked probably 200 examples and end-of-chapter problems and caught zero typos. The web site's errata page for the 3rd edition shows just 2 typos. That's about as tight an editing job as I've seen in any large science or engineering textbook.

This book can be used by any smart student that's had freshman physics and calculus. Where multivariable calculus or differential equations are needed, the authors walk readers through the mathematical calculations more thoroughly and with greater explanation.

I highly recommend the book, the solutions manual and the on-line course.

The history is nice, but that's something the professor should be interjecting. Also, this book is poorly manufactured. I bought it brand new and several pages had fallen out of the binding just weeks after purchase.

I used this book as my first book covering Modern Physics. Though other reviewers stated the book has typos, that's not what I remember about it. What I do recall is just how clearly these authors were able to present some of the difficult topics in modern physics. I have shared the book with other students preparing for boards, and they too felt like it was an excellent text that was very well written and easy to understand!

If you're considering buying this book, DON'T unless you already know most of the material and only want it as a reference. It's extremely overpriced for the clarity that it offers to anyone attempting to learn for the first time. I am using it in my Modern Physics course right now and find that it is void of details necessary to offer a thorough, precise introduction. Derivations are poor to nonexistent and the text assumes absolute mastery (and memory) of basic physics. It does contain a decent coverage of the historical side of quantum mechanics; however, this should be supplementary, not a main focus.

The authors spend far too much space devoted to history and they spend far too little time considering student conceptual understanding. There are better books on the history of modern physics and there are much better texts when dealing with modern physics concepts.

Downside
1) The problem and question sets leave much to be desired. I am hard pressed to find any question/problem that tests a student's conceptual understanding. Virtually all of the questions can be answered by skimming through the text and finding the appropriate sentences. They require little if any active thought from the students. The problem sets are for the most part simple plug-N-chug problems (there are also mathematical proofs). All most exclusively, the authors explicitly define each numerical value as opposed to describing a story or circumstance where students would have to determine this.
2) Often the key concept is lost. For example, the authors spend a great deal of space (with little explanation that students can follow) developing the Rutherford scattering equation. To me, the key issue is that the plum pudding model can not predict the large scattering angles observed in Rutherford's experiments and if one wishes to theoretically model the experimental results one requires a nucleus.
3) History stressed over physics. Great discoveries from the Cavendish Lab bear 2 pages with a neat table mentioning the discoveries and the Nobel prizes. Fourier Series and Gaussians (both later used to describe waves and wavefunctions) bears 1/3 of a page total.

Upside
1) I suppose its better than no text at all.

This has always been a very easy to read and up-to-date modern physics book, probably the best of the bunch of modern physics books that do pretty similar things. There's enough math but it's not overwhelming. You can tell that the authors have done a lot of work on this new edition including some of the most current discoveries. The introductory material on relativity and quantum theory is still very solid. What I noticed most in this edition compared with the last one is that there are a lot of new problems, and many of them are oriented to real-world or research-type applications.

Does a decent explanation and derivation of the basic ideas and equations necessary for relativity and modern physics. Especially if you're using it in class with a prof that goes over the material, there should be no problem following it.

I almost never feel I fully understand the chapters, but then again it's Quantum Mechanics which I hear is quite difficult to really understand.
That said, the book tries to ease the student in with broad introductions that tie in with chapters previous and to come... then it proves with the math and some figures.