Comment by rbanffy
15 years ago
It's soul-crushing to read this, isn't it?
Every day I am confronted with former students who have been taught like this. I took fluid dynamics 3 times, until I found a teacher willing to teach it instead of just letting us memorize the whole thing. When you really understand a subject, it's like hitting the light switch and realizing you were in a dark room.
I feel for those who live their professional lives in dark rooms.
OTOH, I am sure Mr. Feynman was no ordinary teacher himself. His students were very, very lucky. His bar was unusually high, impossibly high for many teachers.
See for yourself.
Richard Feynman - The Relation of Mathematics & Physics: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1SrHzSGn-I8
Richard Feynman - The Distinction of Past and Future: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_Kab9dkDZJY&feature=relat...
Richard Feynman - Law of Gravitation: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4s-wfpsmtyU&feature=mfu_i...
There are about 7 lectures total. They are all amazing.
(EDIT: Looks like they aren't all on Youtube. Watch them here: http://www.fotuva.org/news/project_tuva.html )
I let slip to one of my engineering teachers whose wife also teaches physics at the school that I desired Feynman to teach me electricity and magnetism since I feel the class has just been equations thrown at me and horribly contrived situations with "story" elements* that don't add to understanding. I believe he said something like "Well, there's limits with Feynman too" and I said "Yeah, he's dead." So I have to make due with the Feynman Lectures Volume 2, which is excellent but clearly designed for students with a different background in math and physics. (It's still way better than Giancoli.)
Ah well, that's often the case in college due to pacing and how it's structured. You do enough to pass the class and if you care you'll go further and reach understanding over the summer.
In addition to Feynman's excellent lectures (there are more than the other poster linked) there's also a lot of general videos on the nature of science, what it means to be scientific, and about Feynman himself. The Pleasure of Finding Things Out is one of my favorites: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=srSbAazoOr8
* When you find a Karate Girl who can jump kick a charged pole into a perfect semi-circular arc without transferring any charge to herself let me know.