My Favorite and Least Favorite Undergrad Physics Classes

In this video I talk about which physics courses I enjoyed and disliked the most throughout my undergraduate degree. I also talk about which ones I'm looking forward to in gradschool!

[@finthechat7134]

My favorite physics teacher is Andrew Dotson and I like all of his classes.

[@eyoelgashaw5089]

So cheesy

[@cicciobombo7496]

Your hair is more discontinuos than the dirichlet function smh

[@AndrewDotsonvideos]

My hair is not a function but a distribution

[@bartubmaiden]

I legit laughed out loud to this, wp.

[@1987joey1987]

@@bluj7514 it's not a function

[@tasheemhargrove9650]

2:33 made me laugh so hard. he'd build a particle accelerator lmao too funny

[@celestial410]

I had to work with Jackson at the undergraduate level in my electrodynamics course and, to be honest, I still have PTSD because of it.

[@Newtonissac6]

Jadifer Wow Jackson for undergrad. I feel your pain.

[@xx5288]

Luckily for us, we use Griffiths'. One professor from my school described the problems in Jackson's to be "legendary."

[@dagkouta986]

Same... at this point, why not use Lifshitz and Landau's "The Classical Theory of Fields"? Or even better, Schwartz's "Quantum Field Theory and the Standard model", just for a light breeze or skim into Quantum Electrodynamics. XD We didn't even do introductory electromagnetism course on the level of griffiths or purcell... this makes me question my decision to study theoretical physics XD oh well at least i can make fun of dem experimentalists.

[@puffthemagiclepton7534]

Spherical Bessel's Functions are my trigger.

[@javiereduardosanchezromero6918]

What does it mean PTSD?

[@Newtonissac6]

The theory content of Jackson is actually not that bad if you spend a little extra effort. But the problems are a different thing. I wasn't a big fan of those problems to be honest. Why don't you try out a couple of problems just to gauge what you think of their difficulty and usefulness? I hated experimental physics for exactly the same reason as you. Decided to become a theoretician. All the best for your graduate studies.

[@AndrewDotsonvideos]

That's comforting! And yeah I should go through some exercises. Thanks!

[@skat3r430]

It is easy to see that...

[@theflaggeddragon9472]

I'm a rising sophomore math major, but I came in as math-physics double and after taking experimental physics, decided I would never ever in my life take a lab class ever again. I'm still taking hella physics courses, hopefully getting up to GR and quantum field theory, but I won't get a physics degree sadly. I'm more of a mathematician at heart regardless.

[@theflaggeddragon9472]

I'm at Carnegie Mellon, how about you?

[@Therealtyler7765]

The Flagged Dragon how can you take advanced physics classes if you are not even majoring in physics? Can I do the same with computer science?

[@davisjohn1517]

Oh Ya Ya no

[@charliedawson8192]

@@Therealtyler7765 you would take a double major

[@soulsofwar8985]

@@Therealtyler7765 3 years late, but maybe someone else can benefit Absolutely. You have elective classes, use them for what you find interesting. Most schools don't require you to be a (X) major to take (X) classes (except for maybe really competitive majors, physics isn't exactly a competitive major, most people are scared of it like with math). If you want, you can even take more classes than your electives allow, but make sure you are still taking 12 creidts a semester that go towards your degree plan so you can get scholarships, grants, etc as a full-time student. Taking extra classes could mean you are taking more than the recommended 15 credits a semester, but I take 18 credits or more every semester and gety by and enjoy my college experience You can also double major! Walk away with either 2 degrees or 1 degree that has 2 majors listed on it. I am double majoring in mathematics and computer science, it is possible, and with the right planning it isn't too hard! You can also of course just teach yourself physics if you don't plan on doing anything physics related for your future career, there are plenty of resources online to teach yourself, not to mention you can just buy some textbooks on Amazon and read through them yourself. Might be harder than having a professor there to help, but certainly possible! Hope this helps someone lol

[@faizanattique5571]

I'd really love to see you talk about the different topics that are taught in different grades and levels in the USA

[@dandoe2461]

great video Andrew. keep up the good work

[@jarlemlopezmorel4463]

I know this was a year ago but this video actually motivated me a lot! Thank you for that. I will start a physics BS next fall and lately I've been feeling intimidated by the courses and the math. But this video and many of your other videos have motivated me a ton!

[@spencerallbritton9459]

Love your videos Andrew. I’m in my last semester at a community college taking Physics 2 (2nd Freshman Physics course) Calc 3 and intro to C++. I was majoring in EE but am planning on switching to Physics after my orientation at the State Uni I’m transferring to after this fall. I plan on going to grad school and am interested most in Experimental Elementary Particle Physics. Your videos are not only a big inspiration but also a big help. Wish you all the beat man.

[@stefanocannito6612]

Thank you for your video. I'm extremely interested in physics and and I'm going to have my first classes in a few months. Thank to you I know what I should expect from the subject and the different classes. You are a great stimulus

[@sploofmcsterra4786]

Honestly relativitistic electrodynamics reiginited my passion for physics. I was pretty sure I was going to end my physics studies this year but now I'm not so sure.

[@camilovillanueva1095]

so, what happened?

[@xmanavx1130]

Modern Physics and Electrodynamics are the one's that hook me up so well!! They contain all logically consistent theories of How universe works (if not everything about it). Classical Mechanics also develops the Core Understanding of daily physics (but for me only until I came to know we live in Electrodynamical Universe 😁)!!

[@__donez__]

Grad student here. The worst part about Jackson is the problem sets. My professor didn't usually take problems directly from Jackson, but occasionally based his problems on Jackson problems. There's a lot of detail in that book, and those problems can sometimes take a lot of work. And for me, I didn't have the strongest background on special relativity using tensor notation going into the class. (I also took three years off between undergrad and grad school, so I was extra rusty on E&M in general.) My class started with reviewing relativity (Ch 11 and 12 I believe) and used that formalism throughout the course. My biggest regret was not forming a study group early enough for that class. At my university Jackson and graduate Quantum 1 are taken in your first semester. If I had studied with people from the beginning I would've gotten a better grade. But yeah, "right of passage" yadda yadda....

[@mack_raymond]

Wish I found your channel sooner. Went through a rough patch with physics last year, took a semester off...now I am back. 1 more year!

[@SokarEntertainment]

My problem with Griffiths, is that it requires you to have a very fluid understanding of vector calculus in order to follow along (with the math). This is a subject that is severely under prioritized at Copenhagen University, and my god could I feel it when I had electro.

[@kylelogan3923]

First, Andrew Dotson is amazing, and biochemistry at my school is amazing even though I am not a chemistry major, im doing a chem minor just because I really like chem. Shoutout to the 757 in Virginia. I understand your passion for physics I can relate, I just can't major and take everything at college lol.

[@mattRRgraham1996]

My least favorite physics class is the one I took as a senior in high school because I had a terrible teacher and it totally killed my interest in Physics (which was HUGE going into my senior year). I was totally thinking about majoring in Physics too. That class made me think otherwise. I can't complain though, I am doing stuff I really enjoy now and it was important for helping me find what I wanted to study in college. That's nuts that in less than a month you're moving though, weird how time flies. I'm not ready to apply for grad school haha.... Best of luck with your internship and getting ready to move. I'm sure it's an exciting time.

[@tamarakhalaf9931]

The school I’m going on to has a modern physics course that we have to take in first year. It’s supposed to be notoriously difficult, so I’m really nervous for it!

[@electrobuzz7702]

My favorite was Thermo and Electrodynamics, even though it was the toughest course i took so far and for the most part of the semester i didnt understand shit but it had the biggest moment of enlightening I had so far like 1 Week befor the exam, espacially Maxwells equation just kinda klicked in one random moment during studying and afterwards it almost felt like a piece of cake

[@yeetskeet4657]

I’m a nursing student but just love your videos! Lol I’m pretty sure there’s a “physics of anesthesia” course in CRNA school and I’m looking forward to studying that quite a lot

[@dbgsdc3913]

What're you doing now,

[@mrnarason]

My 2nd semester e&m professor completely skipped relativity and potential theory. Though we spent a lot of time on applied topics like fiber optics, antennas, and lens instead since my professor used to work in industry. That classical mechanics is probably going to be a lot symplectic geometry and canonical transformations.

[@harleyspeedthrust4013]

Computational physics seems cool. I love computer science and I love physics so much that I wrote a symbolic derivative calculator and used it on my physics homeworks to give me derivatives of a function formatted in latex

[@YC-iw2re]

great vid sir, loves this vids as always (nice beard bro)

[@ZaksLab]

I loved that Griffiths book, and I still do! I spent so much time in that book, I remember quoting something from a footnote during a physics argument among my office mates in grad school, then I found the footnote in a matter of seconds to back it up! BTW 05:21 "Magentism" is caused by destructive thin film interference near the middle of the visible spectrum. z

[@Dara-sz4tk]

I wish i had the same experience regarding electrodynamics (i did develop as a physicist, similarly to you but not to what i expected/desired) because your 2 semester course was crammed into a single semester in my Uni. We had a previous course 2 years prior that covered basics of coulombs and gauss law. This course also covered sound waves to an extent. The next course covered all of griffiths electrodynamics in a 12 week semester so didnt develop the appreciation and skills i hoped for, for electrodynamics

[@anubhav21dec]

I've been reading Schwartz for E&M you might want to take a look. I think it is well written as well. Sometimes even better than Griffiths.

[@richardcraig1573]

It was surprising to hear you say that you were afraid of E&M because of Jackson because I talked to some grad students yesterday and they were praising Jackson. They said it was difficult but Jackson taught them everything that they needed to know.

[@TheSucread]

If you already have an solid intuition for EM from Gryffiths, Jackson won't overload you with new material. But those problems man, they are hard, sometimes a little bit pointless work.

[@dionmann5397]

hi! i’m going into my senior year for highschool (college is getting close). one of my picks for college is UCLA; i’m hoping to go the theory route for physics. that being said, i’ve googled a bit about the UCLA physics undergrad curriculum and saw that they have two options that caught my attention: a b.s in physics and a b.s in astrophysics. which do you recommend going after as an undergrad? the b.s in physics one looks like it’ll provide a good base going into grad school, but the b.s in astrophysics looks like it’ll have me dive right into the interesting stuff (i’ve also already taken AP physics 1 and am taking AP physics c this year, which makes me lean toward the b.s in astro side). thanks a ton for the help! love your videos :)

[@EssentialsOfMath]

Dion Mann depends on if you know you want to be specifically an astrophysicist or not. The physics major is broader and general and definitely a safer option if you are not decided. But you don't have to have your major decided until a year or two years in, so just keep an open mind.

[@SamtheSWE]

My favorite classes are computational physics, mechanics, and E&M (even though I struggled w/ these)

[@Smonserratm]

You leave Computational Physics feeling like a demigod

[@thereccher8746]

Quantum and Atomic Physics scratched me where I itched. They had a heavy emphasis on Bra-Ket notation which is a win for me. My least favorite is experimentation and E/M. E and M was way too dry for me.

[@HolyMith]

I've finished my Masters in physics (not a PhD yet) but so far my favourite courses have been Quantum Theory and General Relativity. They sucked form the point of view that they only teach you a specific set of situations and the maths required to solve them, but they were also extremely useful for developing your intuition in two very different directions. My least favourite courses were Thermodynamics and Electronics. Call me a snob, but I found them to be both mundane and hard to understand. The Statistical Mechanics portion of thermal was quite interesting and the control theory parts of electronics were interesting (namely learning how to properly use integral transforms).

[@ethanhall1080]

Hey Andrew, are you planning on doing a week as a grad student series?

[@dyer308]

Hey, can i ask you, all the math classes you've done as an undergrad?

[@andreagiovannidemarchi9386]

My least favourite class was (actually is, I still have to take the exam) stat mech, not because it isn't interesting, but because I had the worst professor one can ask for.

[@JPFB-yp6pw]

lmao I'm thinking of going from physics major to minor (mainly because of money, I'm prob gonna switch to Mechanical Engineering) and I wanna do my minor with higher level physics classes hahaha) Might double major... Don't know. I'd like to double major but that's SO MANY EXPERIMENTAL CLASSESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS hate it

[@Nchinnam]

hey so im a physics major and finished my first year but i hated E&M and mechanics ( kinda didnt do that well either) but I enjoy higher level physics I got the griffith's book. So I'm super confused if I should be stressed out about my track in physics if I didnt enjoy and do well in basic physics classes and Calc 2.

[@theittsco]

Don't be stressed about Calc 2. It's typically a weed-out course for many universities and once you get past it, you should be all set.

[@Nchinnam]

cool so calc 3 shouldn't be too hard then? what about not doing well in E&M?

[@theittsco]

If it's first year E&M, then you're fine. It's a hard transition from mechanics, and much more math intensive. Your math 'toolbox' at that point probably hadn't been very developed, but now you know how to apply that stuff to other things. In summary, you'll be okay as long as you refuse to give up and have a willingness to learn from both success and failure.

[@Nchinnam]

thank you you have given me much needed motivation

[@bartubmaiden]

keep pushing forward things get a lot more exciting and sensible when you move to your sophomore year than they do in freshman. you will begin to develop your own method of teaching yourself by then also; but surely, it takes dedicated work! but you'll be satisfied for sure so dont worry, it's all worth it!

[@cartermurphy1618]

i’m taking an experimental physics lab right now, virtually, we get magical measurements from some instrument I have no idea about and it sucks

[@dylantuttle7181]

I HATED E&M 1. I had a crappy professor who had awful unorganized lectures, I didn't understand any of the course material, and I didn't retain any of the knowledge from the course. Hopefully E&M 2 goes better?

[@juvinilebud]

really disliked my math methods courses. Also was not a fan of the first E&M course. Did physics to do Astronomy for grad though so I went in expecting to hate everything haha

[@BenjaminKuruga]

On your reasoning for why you disliked Experimental physics--lol--you just described the conundrum of being a Chem major.

[@mancaernst922]

speaking of experimental physics: i got to the national level of a physics competition and it consited of a theoretical and an experimental task. i got the results on the experimental so wrong my graph startedgoing backwards in time at some point and i have no idea how that was even possible. have a nice day

[@user-en5vj6vr2u]

Experimental equipment is seriously the antiparticle of smart people

[@kerPlanck]

The experimental physicist you talked to sounds like an incredible guy. What did you two talk about? And how can you "tell" that he can build a particle accelerator from scratch? LOL I'm just curious, because I have an interest in building stuff in the future. Thanks!

[@TheLory1809]

Is experimental physics the only experimental course you did in undergrad?

[@stydras3380]

Am I allowed to adopt you? Thx

[@dagkouta986]

5:30 yeh Jackson is absolutely a monster... poor me i have to read it as an undergrad.

[@Commanderdata-po6ym]

Is it usual that Electrodynamics is a two semester course in the US?

[@nestorv7627]

Yes

[@Commanderdata-po6ym]

Nestor V Is it like separated into theoretical electrodynamics and experimental?

[@nestorv7627]

@@Commanderdata-po6ym no. 1st semester entirely on Electrostatics ( electric fields, potentials, multipole expansion, images, electric field in matter) The 2nd semester is magnetostatics. (B field, Current densities, vector potentials, emf, relativity, B field in matter, Maxwell's eqs, waves and optics)

[@Commanderdata-po6ym]

@@nestorv7627 Interesting. Over here it's split up in two semesters, but they cover basically the same stuff but with a theoretical approach and experimental approach.

[@rocketsoccer1]

My computational physics course is one of my least favorite courses. It's much more like a pure statistics course with more advanced java/python coding, with very few actual direct physics applications. I understand the statistics is important, but for being labeled a physics course, it has very little actual physics.

[@javiereduardosanchezromero6918]

That's great, because there are more jobs in the outer than in the academy area.. :(

[@javiereduardosanchezromero6918]

You will have more opportunities knowing statistics and programming than knowing physics. :(

[@azathanai.]

About Experimental Physics, now that I'm doing a proper lab course, I believe that the main goal of this class is so that you figure out by yourself what all can go wrong in an experiment, and how to solve these problems on your own (with occasional inputs from the instructor, of course)

[@eeveelucy123]

What's with the background

[@hoth3232]

I have heard some people call Jackson a "math methods class dressed up in physics clothes". I believe this is a pretty accurate description. As mentioned in previous comments, it is the problems that you need to worry about. For some problems, it took me quite a while just to picture what Jackson was asking for, let alone actually working through all the math. As for graduate classical mechanics, I just hope you do not get Goldstein as a required text. That book is so dry in its presentation of classical mechanics, it is almost unbearable. And I believe most Goldstein problems are as difficult as Jackson problems. Good luck on your physics GRE test.

[@hoth3232]

I should add that there is a good side to learning Jackson. In case you have not seen this, you might want to take a look: scipp.ucsc.edu/~haber/ph214/EverythingNeededJackson.pdf

[@iwannacomein]

2:11 What is that 'steam' that seems to be coming off of the light bulb?

[@saassas5879]

looks like the shadow of a ceiling fan or something

[@gageskuxx9081]

UC Boulder Physics out here again cuh.

[@varunv2584]

I'm not American. What does "undergrad" mean? Bachelor's?

[@ace9924]

Undergrad is essentially your college up to your bachelors. Masters, PhD or just regular graduate level classes are grad.

[@alfredpianoman2543]

T W E N T Y - N I N TH