Teaching physics via computation

July 5th 2023
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I'm probably going to get a chance to help write a
class that teaches physics majors how to code and
how computation integrates with physics.

This is actually a topic I love a lot and I've
been low-key thinking for years that I wanted to
write a textbook that teaches intro physics and
intro programming at the same time, to avoid the
panic-inducing nature of anything that requires
calculus.

It's not that I think learning calculus is
unnecessary! No, I think it's super important for
a lot of STEM applications, but my gut tells me
that it's going to be easier to introduce code and
intro physics together than it would be to teach
calculus and intro physics at the same time, at
least for people who aren't already on a solid
ground in symbolic thinking.

I was a pen and paper mathematician first, but
I've come to appreciate that there's a tactility
to programming, a way you experience the results
of programs with your senses interactively, that
helps people grasp things more intuitively.

So, yeah, I don't know it's one of the things I'm
going to get a chance to play with over the
summer.