History and presentation of the Cavendish experiment in textbooks in the 20th century
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arXiv
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| Format: | Preprint |
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2025
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| _version_ | 1866913659104526336 |
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| author | Persson, Jonas R |
| author_facet | Persson, Jonas R |
| contents | The experiment performed by Henry Cavendish to measure the density of the earth, is in numerous textbooks described as a measurement of the universal gravitational constant, G, even if we know that this was not true. In this paper, a study on how common this "myth" is based on the checklist developed by Leite on a total of 84 textbooks. The prevalence of the myth in most textbooks throughout the 20th century indicates a focus on the contemporary interests of authors and the physics community in presenting the development of physics. An explanation of the prevalence of the myth and a different approach |
| format | Preprint |
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arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2501_11943 |
| institution | arXiv |
| publishDate | 2025 |
| record_format | arxiv |
| spellingShingle | History and presentation of the Cavendish experiment in textbooks in the 20th century Persson, Jonas R Physics Education History and Philosophy of Physics The experiment performed by Henry Cavendish to measure the density of the earth, is in numerous textbooks described as a measurement of the universal gravitational constant, G, even if we know that this was not true. In this paper, a study on how common this "myth" is based on the checklist developed by Leite on a total of 84 textbooks. The prevalence of the myth in most textbooks throughout the 20th century indicates a focus on the contemporary interests of authors and the physics community in presenting the development of physics. An explanation of the prevalence of the myth and a different approach |
| title | History and presentation of the Cavendish experiment in textbooks in the 20th century |
| topic | Physics Education History and Philosophy of Physics |
| url | https://arxiv.org/abs/2501.11943 |