Common Physics Misconceptions

The velocity approximation is used by engineers, technicians, and many others... you have bigger margins of error and tolerance to worry about in most situations. 99.99999% is often more than good enough. Just like how architects generally don't have to take the curve of the earth into account.

So we should start learning about Maxwell’s equations in grade 1, then start learning at Special relativity at grade 2, then learn Quantum machanics at grade 3, General relativity at grade 4, Quantum field theory at grade 5, M theory at grade 6, then everyone will have 10 more years to discover new theories.🎉

If approximations are misleading, isn't it misleading to talk about light getting "bent"? Doesn't light go straight, following space-time? Aren't we talking about gravity bending space-time rather than "attracting photons"?

your channel is a treasure chest of knowledge!

um the subtitles are broken

Somehow I find it hilarious that this video now carries the Flat Earth content flag. Minute Physics is now officially a Flat Earther channel! 😂😂😂

I am confused you are using mph and km in the same video. Are you trying to crash on Mars?

I dunno what schools y'all went to, but noone ever said any lies when I was in school. It was very clear from the get go that these are simplifications, that work well enough for the laymen and you only need the real stuff, if you decide to make a career around those, and go to university. I liked the video well enough, but to say that they are lying to us in school and to say that using assumptions and simplifications is not okay, because it's lying to the kids, is unhinged to say the least.

"Dad what is 3+7?"
"Ok son, lemme teach you about quantum mechanics"

That 12750 thing wasnt it the displacement.

Simplifications: The necessary evil of knowledge

So, universities need not exist because we can make all of that understandable to a grade school kid? You may know physics but you seem to have a poor grasp on the educational process.

I teach high school chem and physics. I ALWAYS tell my students when something is a simplification, and that the reality is a bit more complex. We do cover the quantum model of the atom, but the Bohr model "works" for most high school level chemistry concepts, especially bonding type. And for physics I always teach students that Newtonian Mechanics works "good enough" on our scale of life, but Quantum Mechanics covers pretty much everything much better.

When students ask for an explanation of something that involves concepts deeper than the curriculum covers, I will usually give them a simplified analogy, and then clearly tell them that it is a simplified analogy. My famous line is "If you eventually learn more about this topic I don't want you to think 'Mr. Smith didn't know what he was talking about'!"

All that said, I absolutely LOVE this channel. This is some excellent content. My formal education was in chemical (BS) and biochemical (MS) engineering, so although I've done a bit of formal training in things like statistical thermodynamics and relativity, I have been learning much watching the videos and have been inspired to dig deeper into the concepts.

That's why every esoteric or conspiracy speech starts with "x looks like y". You can prove anything with a false statement. However, in real science, there's nothing wrong if 1. you know you are using an approximation and 2. you know whether the accuracy is sufficient for the problem you are trying to solve

"Speaking of the moon, you probably also learned that if a sheep is moving..."
What?

0.000000000000001

This one really bugs me in science education. Teaching the concept of approximation early and explaining that things we teach are approximations to speed up calculation would be a great step forward in education. Human brains establish "fact" based more on when they heard something rather than if it fits reality so it's harder to unlearn lies taught as fact. And it's not any harder to tell students that they're only getting a small piece of the puzzle. Knowing that even helps get them interested in the larger pieces. It leverages the "forbidden fruit" psychological effect towards further learning.

Considering that the approximation of the speed is based on the expansion of the universe we can also predict the end of it. We don't teach that either..lol

When the difference in the answers between the simple, easy to understand formula and the convoluted, complicated formula amounts to 0.000000001%...

I don´t agree with the last statement. Newtonian mechanics is good enough for 99,999% of all our cases in life. Sure, do I need to know about relativity when constructing satellites. But how many of us are doing that?! My example is as follows: i you want to crack a walnut, which tool do you take: a sledgehammer or a nutcracker? You take the tool that is most suited to your situation. Especially as most people will never get in contact physics in their life after high school.

Another one... light really isnt the fastest thing in the universe, magnetic fields in the quantum aspect are theorized to be much faster

U domp

You think, its misleading because you could not possibly understand the limited nature the general average population sees the world around. Even though, you got a better understanding, the universe itself may not be ready to take it in,at that point of their time.

This is ridiculously stupid. You don't learn that the Earth is round but seems flat simply because teachers want to be scientifically accurate. It is the only way to explain day and night, changes in seasons, the phases of the moon.

This is just bolstering flat Earth bs.

OMG the first 20 seconds describe literally almost everything you've ever learned, and not just in physics…

POV you're learning about literally anything:
"Let's just pretend that there's no air resistance."

If gravity is created/produced/formed by energy and momentum and not mass
Then has earth , sun ,stars and black holes that momentum and energy ?
And do black holes may have maximum momentum and/or energy ? (By e=mc² black hole has very large mass and therefore very much energy but does this energy count {and what is this energy known as? Is it potential energy?}?)

Anyone else enjoyed sub?

Man sounded actually frustrated.

Why am I watching this I'm not in school anymore, bye

I think it's perfectly fine to strip away contingencies, complications, so on when teaching something at a lower level. Being exactly, 100% precise isn't necessary when teaching basic concepts or just the basics of a field, and is likely counterproductive in a world with scarcity, especially of time and thus human effort. You certainly don't need to try to teach grade-school students Riemann sums, linear algebra, and differential/integral calculus just to get the point across that m stands for slope and a quadratic curve has the form y=ax^2+bx+c. You also don't need to teach high school students collateralized debt obligations, futures trading, or the tens of macroeconomic theories to teach them household finance. Similarly, you don't need a masterclass in quantum physics and general relativity in order to teach kids that gravity exists.

Of course, I do think it's especially important to simplify, and not to outright mislead. I will happily admit that physics classes seem to be among the worst offenders of the "you know what you were previously taught? That's actually not true at all" situation.

I find it ironic how school is to blame for these misconceptions

School is NOT LIEING about physics. >:C
They are SIMPLIFYING

My undergrad physics professor said, on the first day, "Everything I teach you in this class will be some version of a lie."

“Imagine living the first 18 years of your life believing the earth is flat”
Steve the 17 year old flat-earther: mhmmmm
“And then when you go to college for the first time they show you a globe”
Steve: totally lost

Just divide monkey speed by pony skate speed plus Wilheimbrusser's conudrum to evisicate Plackard's square wheel of antimagnetic south thus obtrusticuly narrowing the imminent passage of U.R.X.U.E and subcreating the nylopanular Hubbs Thonksplorn inactivity.

Can only be a maximum of 12,500km from any place on Earth, huh? That reminded me of the Douglas Adams quote from The Hitchhiker's guide and how he got the number wrong for how far the furthest distance you can be from where you were born wrong. Presumably basing it on the distance across the Earth's surface (as I always had until seeing this video). Here's the quote, because you can never go wrong with a Douglas Adams quote, and context is a nice thing to have. Which, for those unfamiliar, this is taking place moments before the Earth is destroyed by alien construction workers to make way for a hyperspace bypass:
"The barman looked at it and then looked at Ford. He suddenly shivered: he experienced a momentary sensation that he didn't understand because no one on Earth had ever experienced it before. In moments of great stress, every life form that exists gives out a tiny subliminal signal. This signal simply communicates an exact and almost pathetic sense of how far that being is from the place of his birth. On Earth it is never possible to be further than sixteen thousand miles from your birthplace, which really isn't very far, so such signals are too minute to be noticed. Ford Prefect was at this moment under great stress, and he was born 600 light years away in the near vicinity of Betelgeuse." (3.29)

Very nice explaination.... 1 week class in just a minutes awesome

POV: you listened to your math teacher but still doesn't understand anything

btw are imaginary numbers to us is like fractions to the ancient egyptians? And will we make a rule someday allowing numbers to divide by 0 which itself will add a 3rd dimension to numbers as we know it? And will imaginary numbers becomes something of what elementary schools teaches as a normal part of math in the future like fractions?





























































































Is my privacy guranteed?

The big NO at the end caught me off guard

Diameter of The EARTH?

From when Earth has a spherical shape dear minute physics?

EARTH IS A GEOID AND TAKE THAT INTO CONSIDERATION TOO NO MATTER HOW COMPLICATED AND IMPRACTICAL THE EQUATION BECOMES

Huh

Reminds me of every time someone have tried to explain something about biology to me with the argument "it's 8th grade biology" and I'm like "What do you think I did for all those years studying biology at university?"

Like, 8th grade biology is simplified to be easier to understand, and often it's not completely true or not the whole truth. Biology is basically statistics about living things, and y'all know how statistics work, you can generalise things on population level, but you can't apply statistics to individuals.

I have repeatedly heard that photons were indeed massless particles with angular momentum that follow the curvature of space-time, which explains why they fall into black holes or produce the effect known as gravitational lensing. Is this wrong?

Cool, but significant figures dude

I think it’s fine because the majority of people don’t actually go into a career where knowing that is relevant, and most people don’t really care. It’s also complicated, which is why saying “we should teach kids the theory of relativity” sounds a bit bizarre

Not me searching "jumping in moving train" just to learn every rando fact I knew was a big fat lie