Talk:Fundamentals of Physics

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The "most outstanding introductory text of the 20th century". WHICH??

The sources used in this articles are contradictory. There is not enough information to know for sure which of all the introductory Physics books was considered the "most outstanding introductory text of the 20th century".

Halliday and Resnick authored several introductory books.

'Halliday and Resnick'

1. "Physics for Science and Engineering Students" - Edition: 1st.

2. "Physics" (which superseded the one above.) - Editions: 1st. 2nd and, 3rd (1977 and 1978).

3. "Fundamentals of Physics" (a condensed version of "Physics") - Editions: 1st, 2nd and, 3rd (1988).

'Halliday, Resnick and Krane'

1. "Physics" - Editions: 4th (1992) and 5th (2002).

'Halliday, Resnick and Walker'

1. "Fundamentals of Physics" - Editions: 4th (1993), 5th (1997), 6th (Extended, 2000; Enhanced, 2002), and subsequent ones until 11th (2018)
- I think the 6th edition was the only one available in 3 levels: Base, Extended (https://www.amazon.com/WIE-Fundamentals-Physics-Extended-Sixth/dp/0471392227) and Enhanced (https://www.amazon.com/Fundamentals-Physics-Enhanced-Problems-Version/dp/0471259969).

2. "Principles of Physics": Identical to "Fundamentals" but sold in the international market, but I think there were not counterparts for the first editions as I have never seen them. I have seen the 9th, 10th and 11th editions.

The archived source, https://web.archive.org/web/20050301234315/http://www.rpi.edu/dept/phys/resnickbio.html, says

Textbooks, first published in 1960, are still being used worldwide in 2002 and being continually revised; 'the Resnick/Halliday text was cited at 100th Anniversary Meeting of the American Physical Society' as the outstanding introductory physics text of the 20th Century.

So it says two things:

As of 2002, textbooks (in plural, not only one) are still being used worldwide.
The Resnick/Halliday text ('which?') was cited at the 100th Anniversary Meeting of the American Physical Society as the outstanding introductory physics text of the 20th Century.

'The second statement implies that this distinction for one of the textbooks occurred in 1999 not in 2002.' Why? Because the 100th Anniversary Meeting was in March 20-26, 1999, in Atlanta, Georgia.^[1]

There is another source which contradicts the source above: the Obituaries section of Physics Today, Volume 67, Issue 5, May 2014. https://physicstoday.scitation.org/doi/10.1063/PT.3.2393 reads:

At his retirement from RPI in 1993, the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) helped organize an international conference on physics education in his honor that drew physicists from around the world. 'Many of them had been introduced to the subject through Physics and its iterations, which in 2002 the American Physical Society named the "most outstanding introductory text of the 20th century.'" (emphasis added).

So, I guess, the contributor who wrote that "Fundamentals of Physics" got this distinction in 2002 got that line from this other source that is never used in the article to back this statement but to support others. The problem is that the second source clearly says Physics and its iterations not "Fundamentals of Physics".

Both sources contradict each other regarding the year and the second mentions "Physics" not "Fundamentals of Physics". I already contacted the APS. I hope they reply with the final answer so we can update all related articles with the correct information. There are several web pages citing Wikipedia and repeating this, so far, dubious statement. We must do a lot better.

George Rodney Maruri Game (talk) 11:39, 6 May 2022 (UTC)[reply]

References

^ https://www.aps.org/meetings/baps/meeting.cfm?name=CENT99

[1] ttps://www.aps.org/meetings/baps/meeting.cfm?name=CENT99

[1]