Transcript 01_BL_SPH4U_Intro Presentation

Grade 12
Physics
SPH4U
What is Physics?
Why study Physics?
“Poets say science takes away
from the beauty of the stars mere globs of gas atoms.
Nothing is ‘mere’. I too can see
the stars on a desert night, and
feel them. But do I see less or
more? The vastness of the
heavens stretches my
imagination - stuck on this
carousel my little eye can catch
one million year old light.”
“A vast pattern - of which I am a part... What is the
pattern or the meaning or the why? It does not do harm
to the mystery to know a little more about it. For far
more marvellous is the truth than any artists of the past
imagined it. Why do the poets of the present not speak
of it? What men are poets who can speak of Jupiter if
he were a man, but if he is an immense spinning sphere
of methane and ammonia must remain silent?”
(Richard Feynman, Nobel laureate in Physics)
Can you survive free-falling elevator by jumping up
just before it hits the ground?
What is the quantity of water drunk by Canadians in
a year? How many years of drinking water could
Lake Ontario provide without being replenished?
How much carbon dioxide is expelled into the air by
automobiles in Toronto each year?
How does the spin cycle of a washing machine use
circular motion to remove water from clothes?
How does the motion of a dancer leaping
horizontally off of a platform differ from that of one
who steps off of the platform?
Satellites revolve around the earth using circular
motion. What is required for them to travel in
geosynchronous orbit? (i.e. to be located over the
same spot on earth at all times)
How are the principles of energy and momentum
used in the design of vehicles and automobile
safety features such as child car seats and
airbags?
While hydroelectricity is renewable and generates
no greenhouse gases, what kind of adverse
environmental or social impacts can they have?
In terms of energy and momentum, how do sports
helmets reduce the number and severity of head
injuries?
How can radio frequency identification (RFID)
chips be used in inventory tracking in
stores and warehouses?
How can the gravitational attraction between
the sun and the earth, and between the
earth and the moon be described?
What is the relationship between gravitation,
electric and magnetic fields?
How can the property of interference between light
waves be used to create three dimensional
images (holograms)? How has the use of
holography made counterfeiting of currency more
difficult?
What is polarization? What do polarized glasses for
3D films do and how do they work?
How does global positioning system (GPS) use the
wave nature of light?
What is Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity, and
what does this theory predict about the passage
of time for objects traveling close to the speed of
light?
What is quantum mechanics and how does it affect
the way we understand the nature of matter?
What are some of the applications of quantum
mechanics in medicine and computing?
In what ways does light behave as both particles
and as wave? In what ways do electrons behave
as both particles and as waves?