1. Home
  2. Electronics Design
  3. Comments on AAAS science lesson?

Comments on AAAS science lesson?

Take a look at this site.

THE LITTLE TRANSISTOR THAT COULD, AAAS sciencenetlinks

formatting link

The author suggests that teachers print out some pictures of transistors. Only trouble is... they give links to pictures of

*portable radios,* not to pictures of three-lead semiconductor devices. Yes, the lesson is about transistors, not about radios. And note that the page has been there since Sept 2000. Also note that the page has supposedly been checked by someone on their large board of editors at
formatting link

Hmmm. If "Sciencenetlinks" has this big a goof, I wonder how many other science errors it contains? I find such searches to be both fun and enlightening. The transistor page was the first one I inspected, and I haven't looked at others. Maybe I got lucky and found the only ridiculous error. Or... perhaps the large board of editors isn't enough, and it needs a thorough going-over by a few people with expertise in the topics covered. (But lots of the lessons are non-physics though.) See:

formatting link

(((((((((((((((((( ( ( ( ( (O) ) ) ) ) ))))))))))))))))))) William J. Beaty SCIENCE HOBBYIST website billb(O)amasci com

formatting link
amateur science, hobby projects, sci fair Seattle, WA 206-789-0775 unusual phenomena, tesla coils, weird sci

Reply to
Bill Beaty
Loading thread data ...

Well, surely you remember that in the late 50s all the pocket transistor radios were simply called, "transistors." Everybody used that terminology. I'll bet you did too.

--
 Thanks,
    - Win
Reply to
Winfield Hill

Not me! I didn't say anything at all until 1962, and by the time that I knew what a radio was I just called them "radio".

--

Tim Wescott
Wescott Design Services
http://www.wescottdesign.com
Reply to
Tim Wescott

As a kid, I had a transistor radio that had just *one* transistor. Basically a crystal radio with a single transistor amplifier.

Reply to
Sam Wormley

Not that this in any way excuses it, it's still a ridiculous error, but perhaps this EXPLAINS it: A few decades back (probably the 1950's and/or 1960's), transistor radios were often called by the shortened name "transistors." Perhaps the task of finding a couple of websites showing "transistors" was given to someone with this layman's understanding of the word.

Reply to
Ben Bradley

I was born in the late '50's, and as a child in the '60's was annoyed when I heard that misuse of the terminology. My father was a ham radio operator, I built my first Heathkit at age eight, I'd seen and touched both transistors and tubes, and I knew (generally) what they were. It was a transistor RADIO, NOT a transistor. And it's STILL a transistor radio, even if all the active devices are FET's on a single piece of silicon and there are no bipolars.

Reply to
Ben Bradley

No, nor did anyone I knew back then. Where did you hear this usage?

Bob

--

"Things should be described as simply as possible, but no simpler."

                                              A. Einstein
Reply to
Bob Cain

It was common enough that it has found its way into dictionaries:

formatting link
formatting link

Best regards, Spehro Pefhany

--
"it\'s the network..."                          "The Journey is the reward"
speff@interlog.com             Info for manufacturers: http://www.trexon.com
Embedded software/hardware/analog  Info for designers:  http://www.speff.com
Reply to
Spehro Pefhany

Feedback sent.

Graham

Reply to
Pooh Bear

I took a load of BC108's to high school one time and said to a few mates that I had a pocketful of transistors. They were gob-smacked until they saw what I meant (then I was, um, gob-smacked). :-)

Ken

Reply to
Ken Taylor

ElectronDepot website is not affiliated with any of the manufacturers or service providers discussed here. All logos and trade names are the property of their respective owners.