Maths and Theoretical Physics Course Thread TR031 TR035

dabh

Following up on the theme of textbooks:

Recently-published mathematics textbooks from well-known academic publishers tend to be expensive.

The most important text for any module is that which you copy down from the blackboard, or that which the lecturer supplies in the form of printed notes. That is the text upon which you will be examined.

It is commonplace for lecturers to include textbook recommendations on their module descriptions. They do not necessarily expect the majority of students in their modules to buy such books.

Some lecturers though will specify a particular textbook, which they expect students to acquire.

Many mathematics professors worldwide make their course notes freely available for download on the Internet.

Some textbooks are regarded as classics, and deservedly so.

A good mathematics textbook does not go out-of-date. And there is no reason why a textbook on an established area of mathematics published in the last few years should be better than a well-regarded textbook first published forty or fifty years ago.

If you buy that glossy, massive, expensive 'Calculus with Algebraic Geometry' tome, chances are that you would not find time to work through it in your first year. And you are probably unlikely to return to it in later life.

The textbooks you would be likely to return to in later life, if you continue into mathematical research, are those relevant to degree level courses (third and fourth year).

TCD has an extensive library, and some of its books may be borrowed by students.

The Dublin University Mathematical Society (Mathsoc) has a library of its own.

If you are thinking of buying a particular textbook, it probably makes sense to examine a library copy before shelling out.

asdfghjz

You can get through your degree without buying anything. But anyway, the book stores are open all year, if you find that you actually need to buy something, well then you can just go buy it. There's certainly no reason to do it now.

fh041205

Aoibheann wrote: »

Actually, did you have many timetable clashes last year/the year before? If so, did you just vary which you went to/get notes off others/something else?

Yea I remember the timetabling being a nightmare. Especially with CS courses and MA courses since neither department seemed to be aware of what the other was doing.

If I ever had two lectures at the same time, I felt it would be unfair to favour one over the other, and thus attended neither. Although if you had someone else with the same clash as yourself, you could go to one and they could go to the other I guess.

sponsoredwalk

Yo, so starting next week (well, the week after!)!

01: What's this computer C+ class like? Any possible youtube videos
anybody could recommend that would go into similar topics would be
awesome :cool:

02: How come the 'advanced calculus' class has been moved to the
second semester?

03: What about differential equations? I know it's done in second year
with emphasis on systems & existence/uniqueness etc... But I mean the
more elementary kind isn't so easy either! For example the contents of
this book contain a heckload, each topic of which can be gone into in far
more detail which I don't see being done in any of the courses.

04: What about classical differential geometry? I'm looking into it in
small steps & I know there isn't that much to the course, & I know you
do find parts of it in vector calculus books, but still there's a lot you
could do there, a lot that would provide motivation for the manifold
stuff. Is it a waste of time to do the old style diff geom because it's more
than covered in the available course or what?

05: I know people put a lot of emphasis on the fact you can switch from
TP to math but not the other way around, but I mean don't you get
enough physics to choose from in 3rd & 4th year in the math course so
that you could do graduate work in QFT, GR etc...?

Maybe_Memories

sponsoredwalk wrote: »

05: I know people put a lot of emphasis on the fact you can switch from
TP to math but not the other way around, but I mean don't you get
enough physics to choose from in 3rd & 4th year in the math course so
that you could do graduate work in QFT, GR etc...?

This is the only question I can really give a proper answer to.

It really doesn't matter which you do. You can become a theoretical physicist through the maths course if you wanted. I emailed some university in England about a M.Sc in TP, particularly in Quantum Mechanics and related areas, and they said if you got a 2.1 in Maths from Trinity you'd be fine.

To be honest if you wanted to be a TP you might actually be better off with the maths degree; more tools for the job, so to speak.

sponsoredwalk

Maybe_Memories wrote: »

This is the only question I can really give a proper answer to.

It really doesn't matter which you do. You can become a theoretical physicist through the maths course if you wanted. I emailed some university in England about a M.Sc in TP, particularly in Quantum Mechanics and related areas, and they said if you got a 2.1 in Maths from Trinity you'd be fine.

To be honest if you wanted to be a TP you might actually be better off with the maths degree; more tools for the job, so to speak.

Sweet, thanks. And thanks for the JNF post, motivated me this week to
learn as much as I could about it. I still can't exactly solve any problems
:rolleyes: But at least I understand why direct sums, invariant subspaces, Jordan
blocks, jordan bases are used & how they are developed & which is all I
really want to know for now. Tough stuff!

dabh

A clue to what the JF TP changes are about is the inclusion of MA1262.

And if you want to get a feel for how the TP programme was structured for much of its existence, check out the 'Modules from previous years' on the Maths website, and take the time machine back a decade or so ago.

PurpleFistMixer

sponsoredwalk wrote: »

05: I know people put a lot of emphasis on the fact you can switch from
TP to math but not the other way around, but I mean don't you get
enough physics to choose from in 3rd & 4th year in the math course so
that you could do graduate work in QFT, GR etc...?

Well, the TP courses in QFT/GR etc. are all in the maths department, so if you want to go into those you're fine (maybe even better set if you want to go into highly mathematical stuff). If you want to go into solid state physics/nanoscience/anything even slighlty applied I'm going to say you're better off doing TP. The common TP->Maths route is transferring before the start of third year, which means you miss out entirely on any solid state physics. This is probably why a lot of people do it (it is much more applied than most people seem to want) so it's not surprising, but imo* if there's any chance you might want to go into experimental/applied/not theoretical physics afterwards, TP is a safer bet.

That said, places that do postgrads are never too specific about what kind of degrees they expect, so in all likelihood you could go from a degree in maths into a postgrad in experimental physics without too much difficulty (though if you started in maths it could be hard, no labs and all that...), it just might be slightly easier with a TP degree.

*disclaimer: I am a person who almost transferred into maths in third year and was then convinced to stay in TP, so I feel slightly obligated to defend this somewhat underrepresented side.

Maybe_Memories

So, for anyone worried about the Linear Algebra schol exam being different since Vlad left, I emailed the school and here's the story;

It'll be the same syllabus but the style of questions will be different.
Timoney says there's not much point in sample papers for schol exams since the questions will probably be completely different but that we'll probably need some.

KarlD93

Anyone know what the PLLT place is on the JF timetable and where it is? Doesn't really say anywhere

PurpleFistMixer

Gonna guess it stands for "physics large lecture theatre" which probably means the Schrodinger lecture theatre.

larkin1993

How many physics modules are there in first year because my timetable is only showing "PHYSICS FOR THEORETICAL PHYSICS" and the hours seem to be only adding up to 21 or so?

Aoibheann

Would any of those 21 hours be a three hour lab session? If not, that's probably/possibly what's yet to be added. I think I had ~24 hours in first year TP.

larkin1993

We have our 3 hour lab on wednesday unless theres 2?

Aoibheann

Nah, you just have the one. You're probably missing out on a tutorial or two - you'll get a small group one for physics assigned to you soon enough, and possibly the problem solving class in maths too.

Tears in Rain

Anyone else totally pumped for second year TP? :> Gonna be boss!

Maybe_Memories

Tears in Rain wrote: »

Anyone else totally pumped for second year TP? :> Gonna be boss!

Hell yes!

Well, maths, not TP, but that's a minor detail... :pac:


Really looking forward to Advanced Mechanics and Equations of Mathematical Physics! Mostly because it;s an excuse to do some PDEs.

KarlD93

Mathsoc Doughnuts tomorrow, Yay!

larkin1993

Who would you talk to about getting some of the first year tp books second hand?

Phil92

There's a secondhand book sale on the 5th of October, and a lot of them can also just be loaned out from the library.

Maybe_Memories

I hear all the first years are being terrified by the epsilon-delta definition

Also, Mechanics, you're amazing, yet insane.

fh041205

Maybe_Memories wrote: »

I hear all the first years are being terrified by the epsilon-delta definition

Not much changes in the maths department!

Bottleopener

Oh analysis, how I love/hate thee =P

Maybe_Memories

Most of the second year Maths and TPs are pretty freaked out by Mechanics.
Could just be taking a while to sink in. All the stuff we did a week and a half ago I'm only understanding now.

Fringe

Did he do Noether's Theorem? That takes really long to sink in.

PurpleFistMixer

Maybe_Memories wrote: »

Most of the second year Maths and TPs are pretty freaked out by Mechanics.
Could just be taking a while to sink in. All the stuff we did a week and a half ago I'm only understanding now.

Welcome to the rest of your degree.

Tears in Rain

Fringe wrote: »

Did he do Noether's Theorem? That takes really long to sink in.

Yeah, he did Noether's Theorem, I still don't quite understand the derivation, though it's slowly starting to make sense the longer I stare at it.

I have no idea what the best way to learn for this course is, L&L seems a useful reference after you've already learned the material, but there doesn't seem to be much to help you understand the material in the first place. The best thing I've found so far is Chapter 19 of Vol.II of Feynman's Lectures which explained the derivation of the Euler-Lagrange Equations perfectly for me, but I've found nothing comparable for the rest of the course, or for solving problems

PurpleFistMixer

I believe Goldstein is recommended reading for the course. I only looked at it briefly though so I'm not qualified to judge its usefulness. In fact I can't remember how I learned mechanics, aside from tormenting myself weekly with the problem sets.

Maybe_Memories

Noether's Theorem explained itself to me last night in a dream.

Maybe_Memories

Figured I'd ask this hear instead of the schol thread.

So the schol exam in maths. How similar is it to homework problems/final exams?

I've been looking at old schol papers, and Real Analysis and Mechanics seem to be very much the same as homework/tutorials/theorems proved in class/definitions.

Is this a general thing for most of the modules?