Re: optics of metals

"Charles Manoras" <inconnu@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> writes:
Knowing German is a formidable advantage if one wants to study "early
physics", mostly 19th century and early 20th.

True but, equally, having something one really wants to read is a formidable
advantage in learning a language. I knew a little French (are you francophone?)
but learned it much better when I decided I would move heaven and earth to
read Sierpinski's Hypothese du Continu. In mathematics and in physics, there
is so much information in the familiar context and in the notation that there
is much less one really needs to know. One can normally manage with just a
dictionary. At the same time, since you know what they must be saying, it
tends to resolve a lot of grammatical and usage issues painlessly, so one
really does learn a lot more about the language. It is just a matter of
not being in a hurry as the process runs its course, no matter how badly
one wants the information in the book or article right away. I adopted the
same approach with German.

I forgot to mention that if you want to download stuff from Google Books
in a library you need at the minimum a CD.
These downloads are typically 20 MB sometimes more, sometimes less.
I assume that your computer can read CDs. :-)

A flash drive can normally hold much more than 20 MB and I've used them
in the library for that purpose, just not from Google Books.
--
Ignorantly,
Allan Adler <ara@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>
* Disclaimer: I am a guest and *not* a member of the MIT CSAIL. My actions and
* comments do not reflect in any way on MIT. Also, I am nowhere near Boston.
.

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