I need to decide whether or not to go to Bryn Mawr tonight.
I'm supposed to derive the Clausius-Mossotti equation, relating the atomic polarizability of a nonpolar dielectric to the dielectric constant, for my 112 seminar presentation on Monday. There is a problem in Griffiths on this, and Carl suggested looking at Born and Wolf's Principles of Optics. Now, Cornell is supposed to have a copy of the latest edition, but it's lost. Cornell has several older editions, and it doesn't seem like there's much change between them, so it probably doesn't matter much. But... I do have an excuse to go to Bryn Mawr, and get that book out of Collier. Perhaps I'll go after dinner tonight. Or maybe I'll go tomorrow afternoon and get to dine in Erdman with Doublestar folk. There's also a BMC physics colloquium Monday night, and it appears that they serve dinner in Haffner before the talk. It's a Maryland neutrino guy talking, and given that the Swat physics colloquium series this fall has little to do with pure physics (all the talks advertised thus far are astrophysics or environmental science) I might want to go to this one. Especially if they serve a nice dinner beforehand. I could always catch the van after 112 seminar...
Anyway... while we're on the subject of old editions of books, I got the 1st edition of Purcell, for there is some experimental data in there, that's useful for my presentation, mentioned in a footnote in Griffiths.
( Nifty French book )
I should stop reading this and looking for the strangenesses therein. I really ought to stick with Griffiths for now, as far as preparing for seminar goes.
I'm supposed to derive the Clausius-Mossotti equation, relating the atomic polarizability of a nonpolar dielectric to the dielectric constant, for my 112 seminar presentation on Monday. There is a problem in Griffiths on this, and Carl suggested looking at Born and Wolf's Principles of Optics. Now, Cornell is supposed to have a copy of the latest edition, but it's lost. Cornell has several older editions, and it doesn't seem like there's much change between them, so it probably doesn't matter much. But... I do have an excuse to go to Bryn Mawr, and get that book out of Collier. Perhaps I'll go after dinner tonight. Or maybe I'll go tomorrow afternoon and get to dine in Erdman with Doublestar folk. There's also a BMC physics colloquium Monday night, and it appears that they serve dinner in Haffner before the talk. It's a Maryland neutrino guy talking, and given that the Swat physics colloquium series this fall has little to do with pure physics (all the talks advertised thus far are astrophysics or environmental science) I might want to go to this one. Especially if they serve a nice dinner beforehand. I could always catch the van after 112 seminar...
Anyway... while we're on the subject of old editions of books, I got the 1st edition of Purcell, for there is some experimental data in there, that's useful for my presentation, mentioned in a footnote in Griffiths.
I should stop reading this and looking for the strangenesses therein. I really ought to stick with Griffiths for now, as far as preparing for seminar goes.