[Aayush28260]

This resonated with my own experience: exams rewarded recall, not understanding. I only really “earned physics when I started building things and breaking them. Curious how others here learned to move from memorization to intuition.

[WalterBright]

Caltech tests were not based on memorization, as they were "open book open note". You had to reason your way to a solution.

But I do agree that real world physics, like designing an actual electronic circuit, have behaviors that are not modeled by the usual mathematical models. For example, resistors vary widely from their marked resistance. And I was told, when building digital circuits, to make sure it worked with chips faster than the spec, as replacement chips are always faster, never slower.

[IAmBroom]

> For example, resistors vary widely from their marked resistance

Resistors are sometimes marked with their variance band (+/-1%, for instance) to account for this.

Engineers take these expected variances into account when designing circuits. If your design is sensitive to a 3% variance in resistor value, you'd better not be specifying gold-banded +/-5% lots.

[WalterBright]

Yes, I know. I also don't know any engineer who bothered doing it (yes, I'm sure some do in critical circuits).

Capacitors also vary, and degrade over time. Semiconductors also have variances and non-linear hard-to-model behaviors. Behaviors change with heat. Few people worry about it.

Vacuum tubes are known for their wacky behaviors, which are treasured by people who make guitar amplifiers. The Melotron is well known for being highly sensitive to humidity.

[toast0]

Resistors without a tolerance marking are speced at +/- 20%.

And they might not be temperature stable either.

[tekla]

I don't think I've ever experienced an exam that rewarded recall in college.

All my engineering exams were open book, open notes, and still >50% failed out by senior year.