

Art of approximation in science and engineering - agbell
http://mit.edu/6.055/

======
splat
Also check out Caltech's Ph 101, Order of Magnitude Physics:

<http://www.its.caltech.edu/~oom/index.html>

The course notes aren't nearly as good, but the homework sets have some really
fun problems.

~~~
mhartl
The similarity is no coincidence: Sanjoy Mahajan, the principal instructor of
the MIT course, did his Ph.D. at Caltech under Sterl Phinney, the instructor
for the course you linked. Moreover, half of Sanjoy's dissertation was an
order-of-magnitude physics textbook based on Sterl's course (taught for many
years with fellow astrophysicist Peter Goldreich, now a professor emeritus).

(N.B. I taught Physics 1 with Sanjoy when we overlapped at Caltech, and Sterl
was my Ph.D. advisor as well.)

------
agbell
This looks to be a good resource for back of the envelope style estimations

------
dedalus
I read [http://www.amazon.com/Guesstimation-Solving-Worlds-
Problems-...](http://www.amazon.com/Guesstimation-Solving-Worlds-Problems-
Cocktail/dp/0691129495/ref=pd_sim_b_7) and the attached link delves into far
greater theory than the book.

Thank you for sharing this with us :-)

------
sp332
There are whole fields of theory & practice where approximations are all that
are used. <http://www.wastedtalent.ca/index.php?view=341>

------
gcheong
Have the handouts been published together in book form yet?

