Tuesday, Thursday 12:40-3:30, Room 1410 BioMedical & Physical Sciences Bldg.
The Integrative Studies courses are intended to illustrate and explore the methods, results, and limitations of scientific inquiry. ISP 205 uses astronomy as the science example. It takes non-science majors through an outline of what we do (and don’t) know about the universe on size scales from planets on up, and of what sorts of thinking has led us to these concepts. Major topics will include the scientific method, the laws of physics (and what happens when you break them), the solar system, how stars work, galaxies, and cosmology (the overall structure and evolution of the universe). Simple algebraic equations will be used.
Instructor: Jack Baldwin, Room 3270 BioMedical & Physical Sciences Bldg. (BMP),
Phone 355-9200, ext. 2411 (baldwin@pa.msu.edu)
Office hours: 2-3 Monday, Noon-2 PM Wednesday or by appointment.
Text: “VOYAGES THROUGH THE UNIVERSE (2ND EDITION)” by Fraknoi, Morrison & Wolff.
Web site: http://www.pa.msu.edu/courses/isp205
contains a copy of this syllabus, a set of links to movies and interactive
demos that are used in class, and sample quiz questions. It will also hold announcements, grade
curves, etc in the future. You should bookmark this site.
Quizzes: There will be a 20-minute quiz every Tuesday morning, covering the lecture material from the previous week. NO MAKEUPS. Instead, to allow for the possibility that some people will miss a quiz due to some sort of personal disaster, I will drop everybody’s two lowest quiz scores.
Final exam: This will be held on the last day of classes, in our usual classroom. About 1/3 of the questions will be from the material covered after the last quiz, but the rest will cover the rest of the course.
Extra Credit. From time to time there will be a 1-point extra credit question asked just before the end of class. These will be open-notebook, short answer questions. The goal is to encourage you to attend classes and to take decent notes. So NO MAKEUPS. These extra points will be added onto your final score in the course, and each will have the same weight as a quiz question.
Grading system: Average
score for best four quizzes: 2/3. Final exam: 1/3. The final course grade will then be based on a to-be-determined curve.
But the following grade scale is guaranteed. The actual scale may be curved
from these values, but it will not be raised. For example, you are guaranteed
to get a 4.0 if your score is above 90% no matter what:
0.0 - 0.0% to 47.5%, 1.0 - 47.5% to 55.0%, 1.5 - 55.0% to 62.0%, 2.0 - 62.0% to
68.0%, 2.5 - 68.0% to 76.0%, 3.0 - 76.0% to 83.0%, 3.5 - 83.0% to 90.0%, 4.0 -
90.0% and above.
Chapter numbers from the text are indicated in square brackets…. [8,9] means the material is covered in chapters 8 and 9, etc. The quizzes and final will be on the material actually covered in the lectures, but the lectures usually will be on material found in the book.
Background:
The Laws of Physics
May
13. The size of the Universe. The
scientific method, “laws” in physics, the four forces [Prologue].
May
15. Laws of motion: Ptolemy,
Copernicus, Kepler, Newton [1,2].
May 20. Quiz. Then: Radiation and spectra [4]. Telescopes [5].
The
Solar System
May
22. The Sun: an example of a star [14, 15.1,15.2,15.3].
May
27. Quiz. Then: The solar system
[6 briefly]. Earth as a planet [7]. The seasons, tides, phases of moon [3].
May
29. The Moon, Mercury, Venus, Mars
[8,9].
June
3. Quiz. Then: The giant
planets (Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune) [10]. Rings, moons and Pluto [11]
June
5. Comets and asteroids [12]. The
origin of the Solar System [13].
June
10. Quiz. Then: The birth of stars & the search for
planets [20]. Search for life elsewhere [Epilogue].
The
Rest of the Universe
June
12. Our Galaxy (the Milky Way)
[18.2,18.3,24].
June
17. Quiz. Then: Other
galaxies [25]. Quasars and active galaxies [26].
June
19. General Relativity [23]. Cosmology… the nature
and evolution of the universe [27,28].
June
24. Quiz. Then: Cosmology…
the nature and evolution of the universe [27,28].