A First Introduction to Quantum Physics

Pieter Kok

John P. Killingbeck

These comments introduce a series of articles which are based on material presented by the author (at an invited lecture and in demonstration sessions) at the January 1986 Institute of Physics meeting on Computation and Physics Teaching, held at the University of Essex. The articles will appear one at a time in successive numbers of European Journal of Physics , and the first follows this introduction.

Kambiz Thomas Moazed

C. Becchi, Massimo D’Elia

Maurice Ebison

Edward G Harris Chichester: J Wiley 1975 pp Vol 1: xvii + 383, Vol 2: xvii + 384–780 price £13.50 each During the 30 years that followed its first publication the book Theoretical Physics by Georg Joos had three editions and 20 reprints. In the last decade, however, such attempts to provide a general and sound introduction to the main topics of theoretical physics have been rather out of fashion.

T. Buch

The shock to which students approaching quantum mechanics for the first time are exposed by the introduction of the postulates on which the mathematical framework of the theory is based, can be much smoothed by a discussion of a semiphilosophical nature about the connection between mathematical theories and the physical reality they are supposed to explain. The general outline of such a discussion is presented, with the purpose of making the introduction of operators to represent physical magnitudes more plausible to the students.