201S AST - Stars and Galaxies University of Toronto Mississauga Winter Term 2007-2008
Star and Galaxies is about science, but it is NOT for science students. This course is designed for students studying commerce, the humanities or the social sciences who are required to complete UTMs science distribution requirement for graduation. Students who have completed a university course in chemistry or physics (except PHY205 or PHY206) are excluded from taking this course because they would have an unfair advantage over the other students. Stars and Galaxies surveys our current understanding of astronomical objects ranging from the sun to the entire universe. This course tries to answer questions such as: What is our Sun like? How did it form and how will it change? How does our Sun compare with other stars? What is the Milky Way? Are there other Milky Ways? How did the Milky Way form? Has the Universe existed forever? To answer questions such as these we develop general methods that connect the distant objects that we can only observe with our direct experience on Earth. Because the purpose of this course is to fulll part of the science distribution requirement, its primary goal is to present the general methods of science, using astronomy as an example. The many facts that will be presented in this course, such as the direct answers to the questions raised above, are not the primary focus. The goal of this course is to show how we have learned the answers about objects that we can never examine directly. We concentrate on the logical connection between the physical cause, which is usually familiar from our experience on Earth, and the observed astronomical eect. WARNING: For some reason, it is widely believed that astronomy is a very easy subject. This is not true. The course evaluations done at the end of every term show that previous classes have found this course to be about as dicult as their other courses, but that it was harder than they expected. To do well, it is important to study as much for this course as for any other course. PREREQUISITES - No prior knowledge of astronomy is required to take this course. In fact, if you have learned some astronomy incorrectly, that can be a serious obstacle. In particular, AST 101 is not required before taking this course. Any material that was covered in AST 101 that is needed here will be presented here. We do need to use our experience gained on Earth (that is, results from physics and chemistry) to understand astronomical observations. Most of this was covered in beginning high school science 1
classes, and but essentially everything needed for this course will be presented in the lectures at the level needed to understand the astronomical material. MATH - All science, and astronomy in particular, is numerical, meaning that we need numbers, in addition to words, to describe the objects we observe. Words, such as big or cold, do not have enough information. Instead, we need to say how big, in kilometers, and how cold, in degrees, to reach rm conclusions about distant objects that we have not visited. Using numbers in this way may be unfamiliar. However, the actual math used in this course is just adding, subtracting, multiplying and dividing. Using these directly, and in basic algebraic equations such as y = bx, we can learn the methods needed to understand the solar system. Text: The text is The Essential Cosmic Perspective, third edition, by Bennett, Donahue, Schneider and Voit. This is the same text used last year, and it was used for AST101 in the fall term. While this text contains all the material for this course, it is often useful to consult other sources for alternative explanations of the same material. The UTM library has a large collection of introductory texts that can be used for this purpose. Lectures: The lectures for this course are from 1:10 to 2:00 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays in room 2072 of the South Building. Because the text contains more material than we have time to cover during the term, the lectures concentrate on the most important topics, and ONLY those topics covered in lecture will be included on the midterm test and nal examination. Because all of the information for this course is in the text, some students conclude that it is not necessary to attend lectures. While it is possible to pass this course without attending most of the lectures, experience shows that students who do not attend lectures generally do less well than the majority of students who attend lectures regularly. The lectures are a detailed outline of those topics you need to understand, and they attempt to explain the key concepts as thoroughly as possible. Tutorial: You have been assigned to a tutorial section on Monday at 10, 11, 12, 2, 3 or 4 in room 2062. The tutorial is a required part of this course. The tutorial is a smaller class where you have an opportunity to discuss the course material and to clarify dicult concepts. This is only possible if you take the initiative to ask questions. Therefore, it is your responsibility to make the tutorials as useful as possible. A teaching assistant leads each tutorial session. They will do a brief summary of the material from the lectures of the previous week, asking if you have any questions. Also, they may illustrate some of the key concepts using computer animations. In an eort to stimulate active discussion of course material, most tutorials have assignments on the material from the previous week that have to be completed during the tutorial period. These are NOT homework assignments to be done later, and they NOT are quizzes because they are done in groups of several students and with your textbooks open. The group members are encouraged to actively discuss 2
each question, trying to develop a consensus about the answer, but each students assignment is marked individually. During the discussion of each question, the members of a group should ask each other How do we know that? and Why is that true?. Accepting another persons explanation without understanding it completely prevents you from being able to answer a similar question on the midterm test or the nal examination. The assignment questions have the same format used on the midterm test and nal examination, to give you the opportunity to become familiar with the style of questions. Course Evaluation There are three components to the evaluation: 1. Tutorials. These constitute 25% of the course mark (note, this is equal to the midterm). There will be eight tutorial assignments, each worth 3%. The best seven of these will be used, for a total of 21%. The remaining 4% will be assigned for participation in the review session before the midterm, the discussion of the midterm and the review for the nal examination. 2. Midterm test. This is worth 25% and will cover the material up to about the middle of the term. 3. Final examination. This makes up the remaining 50%. The nal exam will cover the all the course material, but the majority of the questions will be on the material following the midterm test. The marking scheme above provides the evidence (see below) to assign a nal grade according to the University of Toronto guidelines. Note that these guidelines eliminate any bell curving of nal marks. A+ - Outstanding performance, exceeding even the A described below. Note that although the A+ no longer carries an additional GPA value, the + will be indicated on the transcript. A - Exceptional performance: strong evidence of original thinking; good organization, capacity to analyze and synthesize; superior grasp of the subject matter with sound critical evaluations; evidence of an extensive knowledge base. B - Good performance; evidence of grasp of the subject matter; some evidence of critical capacity and analytic ability; reasonable understanding of relevant issues; evidence of familiarity with the literature. C - Intellectually adequate performance; student is proting from the university experience; understanding of the subject matter and an ability to develop solutions to simple problems in the material. D - Minimally acceptable performance; some evidence of familiarity with the subject matter and some evidence that critical and analytical skills have been developed. F - Inadequate performance: little evidence of even supercial understanding of the subject matter; weakness of critical and analytical skills; limited or irrelevant use of literature. 3
Your need to show me that you have achieved an understanding of the course material that places you in one of these grades. Note, memorizing all the facts about the solar system would not show me that you are thinking originally about the material or that you have achieved the ability to analyze and synthesize the material. The most important skill to apply in this course is logical thinking. If you can understand that A leads to B, and that this can be used on Earth, on the Moon, on Mars, . . . , you have thoroughl...