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Math for the Physical Sciences


by


Robert G. Brown


Duke University Physics Department
Durham, NC 27708-0305
rgb@phy.duke.edu




Copyright Notice
Copyright Robert G. Brown 1993, 2007



Notice

This is a ``lecture note'' style review guide, originally designed to support my personal teaching activities at Duke University. It is freely available in its entirety to all the students of the world in a downloadable PDF form, or it can be be read online at:


http://www.phy.duke.edu/$\sim$rgb/Class/intro_math_review.php


and will be made available in an inexpensive print version via Lulu press as soon as it is in a sufficiently polished and complete state.

I make this available for free for personal use only so that the text can be used by students all over the world regardless of their means or ability to pay. Nevertheless, I am hoping that students who truly find this work useful will purchase an (inexpensive) copy of this text, if only to help subsidize me while I continue to write more inexpensive textbooks.

Be warned: As a ``living'' document that I actually use to teach, these notes may have errors of omission or commission. Expect them to change without warning as I add content or correct errors. Purchasers of any paper version should be aware of its probable imperfection and be prepared to either live with it or mark up their own copies with corrections or additions as need be (in the lecture note spirit) as I do mine. The text has generous margins, is widely spaced, and contains a number of scattered blank pages for students' or instructors' own use to facilitate this.

Note well that this is an ``odd'' book in that it isn't intended to be used as a textbook ever for any course even though it may well prove to be better than any real textbook for learning or relearning the material it covers quickly. This is in part because this book has no homework problems in it. There are no exercises. There is no possibility of a student being given ``the assignment on page 23'' to complete by Monday.

Yet to learn something it is essential to do something and not just read a book or listen to a lecture. Tough. Maybe one day I'll write up an associated book of problems. Or (if you're using it to teach or learn math anyway) you can always make up problems of your own. Or best of all, it can be used for its intended purposes - to be the book in your left hand while your right is working out homework problems in something else - physics, economics, chemistry, or even algebra, trigonometrics, calculus. Math as mindless manipulation of empty symbols doesn't appeal that much even to most mathematicians. Math as a process of reasoning about problems with meaning on the other hand, can be a real pleasure!

I cherish good-hearted communication from students or other instructors pointing out errors or suggesting new content (and have in the past done my best to implement many such corrections or suggestions).



Books by Robert G. Brown




Physics Textbooks




All of these books can be found on the online Lulu store here:


http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fAcctID=877977


Both The Book of Lilith and The Fall of the Dark Brotherhood are also available on Amazon, Barnes and Noble and other online booksellers, and one day from a bookstore near you!





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Robert G. Brown 2009-07-27