Physics C Mechanics but not Electricity and Magnetism

[1NJParent]

@ucbalumnus

@1NJParent

You don’t need MVC to understand E&M, although math helps. Physics is about understanding how the world works. It’s much better to understand why something work the way it does physically and intuitively, than based on some mathematical formula.

Then why does physics for physics majors use more math than physics for biology majors or non-majors? Physics majors are expected to understand how the world works both intuitively and mathematically.

Yes, they’re. Believe it or not, the mathematical part is relatively easy. A physics student is better off understanding the physics in physics than relying on the mathematical formulation of it. For example, most of the (classical) E&M is contained in a set of Maxwell equations (the reason for MVC), but a true understanding of it is far beyond those equations.