On one graduation day at Harvard in the 1980's, a sample of seniors were asked to explain why the seasons change and why the moon goes through phases. It was a startling revelation that many could not provide the correct explanations. This science literacy experiment was documented in "A Private Universe," a video produced by the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics. In this course, enrolled students ("students") will examine and learn the applicable scientific concepts and test how well a sample of other Williams undergraduates ("volunteers") understand the reasons for these observed phenomena. In the process, students will educate volunteers so that the latter gain true understanding. During the first week, we will watch the original video, and students will study these phenomena intensively and confront their own misconceptions and misunderstandings. They will use computer animations and hands-on demonstrations, in addition to readings, to explore these concepts. Students will advance to the point where they will be able to demonstrate full and testable knowledge. Finally, we will develop a rubric for evaluating a volunteer's understanding, along with a template for interaction with each volunteer, including Socratic guidelines to advance the conversation at each step. Also during the first week, outside of class each student will recruit eight (anonymous) volunteers from the student body who are willing to spend 30-60 minutes participating in this investigation in individual sessions. Ideally, each student's volunteers will contain a mix of classes and of science and non-science students (excluding physics and astrophysics/astronomy majors). During the second week, each student's main activity will be the testing of volunteers, and writing up of each volunteer's case. Students will be equipped with computer animations and hands-on demonstrations. We will also meet together during the week to compare experiences and to troubleshoot any issues that arise. During the final week each student will write a summary of his/her results, and students will combine their results into a complete summary. Finally, the class will present one or more posters describing the results. Students will be evaluated on their own final mastery of the relevant concepts, on their participation in our group discussions, and on their write-ups and analyses of their volunteers, evolution through these concepts.
Prerequisites: None.
Enrollment limit: 10
Course meeting time: mornings, plus extra meeting times
Cost to student: approximately $10 for packet
The myth of Icarus illustrates the powerful attraction of flight. Some of us love the very notion of moving through the air with three full spatial degrees of freedom. While many of us do this routinely inside large aluminum tubes, personally flying an aircraft adds another dimension of excitement. Though we will not be flying full-size airplanes, we can do a great deal with miniature aircraft in an indoor setting. The course will be conducted in semi-tutorial fashion, with student presentations, construction sessions, flying sessions, and a few traditional lectures. We will cover the history and physics of heavier-than-air flight (balloons are boring!). No previous experience or coursework is required - students will learn the necessary fundamentals in class. On the practical side, students will start out building and flying simple gliders. Students will then move on to build a remote-controlled aircraft (fixed- or rotary-wing), and learn to fly it. The course will culminate with our own airshow. A 5-page paper on some aspect of the material will be required. Evaluation will be based on completion of projects, student presentations, and the paper.
Prerequisite: none, other than enthusiasm for flight and willingness to learn some basic physics
Enrollment limit: 6
Course meeting time: 3 mornings per week, plus extra construction and flying sessions
Cost to student: approximately $250 for materials
The first planets orbiting stars other than our sun were discovered more than a decade ago via a breakthrough technique and painstaking analysis. We now know of more than 220 exoplanets, though none you would enjoy vacationing on. But the hope is that with refinements in methods of exoplanet detection, including proposed space-borne missions like NASA's SIM PlanetQuest, the European Spaces Agency's GAIA, we might actually detect another Earth in the next decade or two. In this writing-intensive tutorial, students will investigate the principles involved in current and future exoplanet implications they carry for the development of life. Readings will include journal articles and meeting proceedings, some textbook material and web research. Tutorial assignments will include quantitative examination of relevant examples.
Pairs of students will meet twice each week giving alternating presentations, for a total of eight tutorial sessions. It is estimated that research, reading and writing will take students approximately 20 hours each week.
Evaluation will be based on tutorial presentations, responses and papers (with a total of 15-20 pages of writing).
Prerequisites: Mathematics 105 or 106, Physics 141 or equivalent. Not open to students who have taken Astronomy 102 or 207T. Enrollment limit: 6. In the event of oversubscription, preference will be given to students based on a brief statement of interest.
Cost to student: $25 for photocopies. Meeting time: mornings.
No prerequisites. Enrollment limited to 10.
Evaluation will be based on one five-page reserach paper, one five-page opinion paper, and attendance.
Cost to students: approximately $30 for the book
The repercussions of the International Astronomical Union's reclassification of Pluto from "planet" to "dwarf planet" have not settled down, with worldwide discussions continuing and books being published about the process and the result. In 2008, the outer dwarf planets were named Plutoids, to give Pluto some additional honor; the ones now known are Pluto, Eris, Makemake, and Haumea. Haumea is now undergoing eclipses and transits with its moon Namaka, which should lead to improved understanding of Haumea and its system. We will discuss not only the objects itself and related science (Williams College faculty and students have been studying Pluto's atmosphere with telescope observations) but also the philosophy of naming and of classification. Why is Europe a continent? Why is India a subcontinent? Classification problems extend into biological naming and into many other systems. And how should names be chosen? The Plutoids include names from Roman, Greek, Easter Island, and Hawaiian mythologies. In this Winter Study course, students will have flexibility to consider aspects of the overall subject that interest them. On a field trip to New York, we will visit the Rose Center for Earth and Space in its architectural wonder of a glass enclosure surrounding its Hayden Sphere, which contains the planetarium. The Rose Center was a first place where Pluto was "demoted," leading to a front-page article in The New York Times on the subject. We will also visit the Rubin Museum of Art, with its scheduled exhibition Envisioning the Cosmos: from Milky Ocean to Black Hole, to which Prof. Pasachoff is lending books. ["The exhibition spans a diversity of religions, cultures and epochs, examining the ways in which we have interpreted our place in the universe. The first part of the exhibition will display the theocentric cosmologies of Buddhist, Hindu, and Jain religions, which envision deities as creators, preservers, and primary players in the cosmic construct. The second section will trace how Western medieval anthropocentric cosmology, which envisioned humans at the center of a static universe, was replaced in the Renaissance by a heliocentric universe, which gave rise to the present evolving astrophysical world-view. The exhibition will include manuscripts, books, paintings, and sculptures depicting the various and frequently complex concepts, diagrams, systems, and stories that describe the creation and structure of the universe. In addition to original artworks, the exhibition will feature educational models of the universe. This will allow visitors better understand the cosmological objects presented in the show, but also how modern we view the cosmos in this age of science. There will be a room that allows virtual travel through the universe, using an interactive device produced by the American Museum of Natural History and adapted for the RMA show. There will also be a computer animation of the Buddhist cosmos (Kalacakra)."]
Students will be expected to participate in all activities, to read at least two books about the Pluto/dwarf-planet situation, and to write a 5-page paper and a concluding 10-page paper on a subject of individual choice.
Evaluation will be based on tutorial presentations, responses and papers (with a total of 15-20 pages of writing).
No prerequisites. Enrollment limit: 10. Preference awarded on the basis of a brief email letter, if oversubscribed.
Cost to student: $100 for the field trip to New York; optional $25 for books. Meeting time: Monday and Thursday mornings, with the week surrounding January 15 replaced with individual work.
