The satisfaction of understanding how rainbows are formed, how ice skaters spin, or why ocean tides roll in and out. phenomena that we have all seen or experienced. is one of the best motivators available for building scientific literacy. This book attempts to make that sense of satisfaction accessible to nonscience majors. Intended for use in a one-semester or two-quarter course in conceptual physics involving minimal use of mathematics, this book is written in a narrative style, frequently using questions designed to draw the reader into a dialogue about the ideas of physics. This inclusive style allows the book to be used by anyone interested in exploring the nature of physics and explanations of everyday physical phenomena.

Mathematics in a Conceptual Physics Course

The use of mathematics in a physics course is a formidable block for many students, particularly nonscience majors. Although there have been attempts to teach conceptual physics without any mathematics, these attempts miss an opportunity to help students gain confidence in using and manipulating simple quantitative relationships.

Clearly, mathematics is a powerful tool for expressing the quantitative relationships of physics. The use of mathematics can be carefully limited, however, and subordinated to the physical concepts being addressed. Many users of the first edition of this text thought that mathematical expressions appeared too frequently for the comfort of some students. In response, we have substantially reduced the use of mathematics and numerical examples in the body of the text. We have retained, but simplified, the boxed numerical exercises that provide quantitative illustrations of the ideas.

Although the direct use of mathematics has been reduced, we have retained the logical coherence that was considered a strong feature of the first edition. Formulas are carefully introduced after conceptual arguments, and statements in words of these relationships generally accompany their introduction. No mathematics prerequisite beyond high-school algebra should be necessary. A discussion of the basic ideas of very simple algebra is found in appendix A, together with some practice exercises for students who may need help with these ideas.

Other Features of This Edition

We have strengthened several pedagogical features of this book that elicited many favorable comments about the first edition. Each chapter begins with an illustration from everyday experience and then proceeds to use it as a theme for introducing relevant physical concepts. Physics can seem abstract to many students, but using everyday phenomena and concrete examples reduces that abstractness. Each chapter also includes an everyday phenomenon box. These boxes analyze common phenomena in more detail and include examples from sports, automobile collisions, the operation of a flat-plate solar collector or a television set, and natural phenomena such as the tides, lightning, and rainbows.

The chapter outlines, topic headings, and summaries provide a clear framework for the ideas discussed in each chapter. One of the difficulties that students have in learning physics (or any subject) is that they fail to construct the big picture of how things fit together. A consistent chapter framework can be a powerful tool in helping students see how ideas mesh. In this edition, we have added italicized summary paragraphs at the end of each chapter subsection to supplement the more general summary at the end of the chapter. These spot summaries reinforce the concepts as students read through the chapters. Subsection headings are often recast as questions to motivate the student and pique curiosity to read further. A few key concepts form the basis for understanding physics, and these textual features provide a foundation so that the reader will not be lost in a flurry of definitions and formulas.

We have expanded the list of carefully worded conceptual questions, found at the end of each chapter, that were also considered a strong feature of the first edition. These questions call for a short objective response about the direction, relative size, or existence of some effect, followed by a brief written explanation of that response. If these questions are made an integral part of the course, they can help students understand the key concepts more clearly than the typical numerical exercises or open-ended questions often found in other books.

The limited number of simple numerical exercises and somewhat more involved challenge problems found at the end of each chapter have been modified. The numerical exercises are useful in helping students get a feeling for the quantities involved and for performing simple computations involving physical concepts. The challenge problems are designed to provide those students who are more comfortable with quantitative ideas an opportunity to explore these ideas in depth.

Since many courses for nonscience majors do not have a laboratory component, we have also included a few home experiments and observations at the end of each chapter. The spirit of these home experiments is to enable students to explore the behavior of physical objects by using easily available rulers, string, paper clips, balls, toy cars, flashlight batteries, and so on. While no substitute for a well-conceived laboratory course, they can place students in the exploratory and observational frame of mind that is important to scientific thinking. This is one of our objectives in developing scientific literacy.

How This Book Is Organized

The organization of topics in this book is traditional, with some minor variations. The chapter on energy (now chapter 6) appears earlier, so that these ideas can be used in discussions of collisions in chapter 7. Wave motion is discussed in chapter 15, following the chapters on electricity and magnetism and preceding chapter 16 on optics, rather than including it in the mechanics section. The chapter on fluids (now chapter 9) has been moved forward to follow mechanics and lead into the chapters on thermodynamics. The first 16 chapters are designed to introduce students to the major ideas of classical physics and can be covered in a one- semester course with some judicious paring.

The complete 20 chapters easily support a two-quarter course, and even a two-semester course in which the ideas are treated thoroughly and carefully. Chapters 17 and 18, on atomic and nuclear phenomena, would be considered essential by many instructors, even in a one-semester course. If included in such a course, we recommend curtailing coverage in other areas to avoid student overload.

Some instructors prefer to put chapter 19 on relativity at the end of the mechanics section or just before the modern physics material. Relativity has little to do with everyday phenomena, of course, but is included because of the high interest it generally holds for students. The final chapter (20) introduces a variety of topics in modern physics. including particle physics, cosmology, semiconductors, computers, and superconductivity. that could be used to stimulate interest at various points in a course.

One plea to instructors, as well as to students using this book: Don. t try to cram too much material into too short a time! We have worked diligently to keep this book to a reasonable length while still covering the core concepts usually found in an introduction to physics. These ideas are most enjoyable when enough time is spent in lively discussion and in consideration of questions so that a real understanding develops. Trying to cover material too quickly defeats the conceptual learning and leaves students in a dense haze of words and definitions. Less can be more if a good understanding results.

Acknowledgements

A large number of people have contributed to this second edition, either directly or indirectly. I extend particular thanks to those who participated in reviews of the manuscript. Their thoughtful suggestions have had direct impact upon the clarity and accuracy of this edition, even when it was not possible to fully incorporate all of their ideas due to space limitations or other constraints. The reviewers include:

Murty A. Akundi	Rahim Setoodeh	Charles Ardary
Edmonds Community College	Richard A. Atneosen	John Yelton
University of Texas, Austin	University of Hawaii	Richard L. Bobst
LaSierra University	Richard A. Cannon	John B. Laird
Edward H. Carlson	Michigan State University	Cary Caruso
Fayetteville State University	Rory Coker	University of Florida
Xavier University of Louisiana	Penn State University	David Donnelly
Southeast Missouri State University	Renee D. Diehl	Abbas M. Faridi
Orange Coast College	Clarence W. Fette	Penn State University
Sam Houston State University	Golden West College	Kenneth D. Hahn
Truman State University	John M. Hauptman	Iowa State University
H. James Harmon	Maria Bautista	Lionel D. Hewett
Texas A & M University, Kingsville	Robert C. Hudson	Roanoke College
Oklahoma State University	University of Alabama	Sanford Kern
Colorado State University	James Kernohan	Milton Academy
Western Washington University	Bernard Gilpin	Joel M. Levine
Orange Coast College	John Lowenstein	New York University
Milwaukee Area Technical College	University of Memphis	Paul Middents
University of Massachusetts, Amherst	Joseph Mottillo	Olympic College
Southern Connecticut State University	William J. Mullin	Ervin Poduska
Kirkwood Community College	Joseph A. Schaefer	Loras College
Sinclair Community College	John W. Snyder	Elwood Shapanasky
Santa Barbara City College	Lawrence C. Shepley	Bradley M. Sherrill
Michigan State University	Cecil G.Shugart	University of Memphis
Bowling Green State University	Robert R. Marchini	Thor F. Stromberg
New Mexico State University	Charles R. Taylor	Fred Thomas
Henry Ford Community College	Stanley T. Jones	Paul Varlashkin
East Carolina University	Douglas Wendel	Snow College
Western Oregon State College

I also wish to acknowledge the contributions of the editorial staff and book team members at WCB, particularly Carol Mills, whose commitment of time and enthusiasm for this work have helped enormously in pushing this project forward. In addition, I owe a huge debt of thanks to my colleagues at Pacific University for helpful suggestions as well as for their forbearance when this project limited my time for other activities. In particular, Chuck Taylor (now at Western Oregon State College) has used the first edition several times and carefully noted places where it could be improved. All of my colleagues have given their enthusiastic support to the project.

Finally, I owe a debt of gratitude to my family, who has suffered without complaint the time that this project has stolen from other activities. My wife Adelia and my boys Lewis, Clark, and Mark have also willingly served as guinea pigs as I have tested demonstrations or ideas. Their support has been constant and essential to this work.