Available online
Description
The classical physics of Newton is in total accord with our 'everyday experience' of the world - that's why you don't have to be a physicist to play snooker. Classical ideas extend up to phenomena... on the scale of the solar system, yet they break down at the scale of the atom. Graham Farmelo takes these ideas and puts our 'everyday world' into perspective on a conceptual map, which shows size and speed over a wide range. Our experience is based upon a small region and we should not be surprised to find that common-sense does not apply everywhere on the map. Our only sure guide is experiment. After demonstrating the schizophrenic nature of electrons, John Walters and Graham Farmelo lead on to the De Broglie formula linking wave and particle behaviour for all particles. John Walters tries to observe a wavelike behaviour for billiard balls, only to conclude that it is masked by the extremely small value of Planck's constant, h. Electrons deviate from billiard ball behaviour in other ways - the outcome of an experiment with a single electron is not always predictable, putting experimenters in much the same position as a roulette player. This idea is quantified using the wave-packet concept which leads to the Heisenberg Uncertain Principle. Again, John Walters shows how the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle is totally masked on a snooker table by the small value of h. After pointing ahead to the need for a relativistic form of quantum mechanics, the programme ends with a warning - beware of preconceived ideas.
The classical physics of Newton is in total accord with our 'everyday experience' of the world - that's why you don't have to be a physicist to play snooker. Classical ideas extend up to phenomena... on the scale of the solar system, yet they break down at the scale of the atom. Graham Farmelo takes these ideas and puts our 'everyday world' into perspective on a conceptual map, which shows size and speed over a wide range. Our experience is based upon a small region and we should not be surprised to find that common-sense does not apply everywhere on the map. Our only sure guide is experiment. After demonstrating the schizophrenic nature of electrons, John Walters and Graham Farmelo lead on to the De Broglie formula linking wave and particle behaviour for all particles. John Walters tries to observe a wavelike behaviour for billiard balls, only to conclude that it is masked by the extremely small value of Planck's constant, h. Electrons deviate from billiard ball behaviour in other ways - the outcome of an experiment with a single electron is not always predictable, putting experimenters in much the same position as a roulette player. This idea is quantified using the wave-packet concept which leads to the Heisenberg Uncertain Principle. Again, John Walters shows how the Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle is totally masked on a snooker table by the small value of h. After pointing ahead to the need for a relativistic form of quantum mechanics, the programme ends with a warning - beware of preconceived ideas.
| Module code and title: | S271, Discovering physics |
|---|---|
| Item code: | S271; 14 |
| First transmission date: | 01-09-1982 |
| Published: | 1982 |
| Rights Statement: | |
| Restrictions on use: | |
| Duration: | 00:24:00 |
| + Show more... | |
| Producer: | John Stratford |
| Contributors: | Graham Farmelo; John Walters |
| Publisher: | BBC Open University |
| Keyword(s): | Billiard balls; De Broglie; Electrons; Heisenberg Uncertainty Principle; Planck's constant; Quantum mechanics; Wave/particle behaviour |
| Master spool number: | HOU3845 |
| Production number: | FOUS235X |
| Videofinder number: | 1793 |
| Available to public: | no |
