Philosophy Were Used Interchangeably For The Science Whose Aim Is The Discovery and
Philosophy Were Used Interchangeably For The Science Whose Aim Is The Discovery and
Philosophy Were Used Interchangeably For The Science Whose Aim Is The Discovery and
Physics is the basic physical science. Until rather recent times physics and natural
philosophy were used interchangeably for the science whose aim is the discovery and
formulation of the fundamental laws of nature. As the modern sciences developed and
became increasingly specialized, physics came to denote that part of physical science not
included in astronomy, chemistry, geology, and engineering. Physics plays an important
role in all the natural sciences, however, and all such fields have branches in which
physical laws and measurements receive special emphasis, bearing such names
as astrophysics, geophysics, biophysics, and even psychophysics. Physics can, at base, be
defined as the science of matter, motion, and energy. Its laws are typically expressed
with economy and precision in the language of mathematics.
Both experiment, the observation of phenomena under conditions that are controlled as
precisely as possible, and theory, the formulation of a unified conceptual framework,
play essential and complementary roles in the advancement of physics. Physical
experiments result in measurements, which are compared with the outcome predicted
by theory. A theory that reliably predicts the results of experiments to which it is
applicable is said to embody a law of physics. However, a law is always subject to
modification, replacement, or restriction to a more limited domain, if a later experiment
makes it necessary.
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Faces of Science
The ultimate aim of physics is to find a unified set of laws governing matter, motion, and
energy at small (microscopic) subatomic distances, at the human (macroscopic) scale of
everyday life, and out to the largest distances (e.g., those on the extragalactic scale). This
ambitious goal has been realized to a notable extent. Although a completely unified
theory of physical phenomena has not yet been achieved (and possibly never will be), a
remarkably small set of fundamental physical laws appears able to account for all known
phenomena. The body of physics developed up to about the turn of the 20th century,
known as classical physics, can largely account for the motions of macroscopic objects
that move slowly with respect to the speed of light and for such phenomena
as heat, sound, electricity, magnetism, and light. The modern developments
of relativity and quantum mechanics modify these laws insofar as they apply to higher
speeds, very massive objects, and to the tiny elementary constituents of matter, such
as electrons, protons, and neutrons.
The scope of physics
The traditionally organized branches or fields of classical and modern physics
are delineated below.
Mechanics
In classical mechanics the laws are initially formulated for point particles in which the
dimensions, shapes, and other intrinsic properties of bodies are ignored. Thus in the
first approximation even objects as large as Earth and the Sun are treated as pointlike—
e.g., in calculating planetary orbital motion. In rigid-body dynamics, the extension of
bodies and their mass distributions are considered as well, but they are imagined to be
incapable of deformation. The mechanics of deformable solids
is elasticity; hydrostatics and hydrodynamics treat, respectively, fluids at rest and in
motion.
The three laws of motion set forth by Isaac Newton form the foundation of classical
mechanics, together with the recognition that forces are directed quantities (vectors)
and combine accordingly. The first law, also called the law of inertia, states that, unless
acted upon by an external force, an object at rest remains at rest, or if in motion, it
continues to move in a straight line with constant speed. Uniform motion therefore does
not require a cause. Accordingly, mechanics concentrates not on motion as such but on
the change in the state of motion of an object that results from the net force acting upon
it. Newton’s second law equates the net force on an object to the rate of change of its
momentum, the latter being the product of the mass of a body and its velocity. Newton’s
third law, that of action and reaction, states that when two particles interact, the forces
each exerts on the other are equal in magnitude and opposite in direction. Taken
together, these mechanical laws in principle permit the determination of the future
motions of a set of particles, providing their state of motion is known at some instant, as
well as the forces that act between them and upon them from the outside. From this
deterministic character of the laws of classical mechanics, profound (and probably
incorrect) philosophical conclusions have been drawn in the past and even applied to
human history.