Ask HN: How to get started with astrophysics

3 points by kspe 7 years ago | 1 comment

I've been reading a lot of Neil deGrasse Tyson, I watch Sixty Symbols and Deep Sky Videos and since being 10 years old I was interested in space/exploration. Not mentioning all the sci-fi books/movies/games I went over. I feel passionate about it, started my own observations with my first ever telescope (it is great!) and I would like to push it to the next level.

I wonder which books/courses are recommended to start with astrophysics more as a science then ad hoc hobby. I've started the edX program https://www.edx.org/xseries/astrophysics but there might be better resources (especially books as I'm more a reader than a watcher).

Phithagoras 7 years ago |

Welcome to HN! Normally this isn't the kind of post that HN encourages (try to stick to stuff that gratifies the intellectual curiosity of the community as per https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html )

Astrophysics relies on a lot of general physics, so many undergrad textbooks on these topics will be relevant to you. Most textbooks you could want are available on the Genesis Library at http://libgen.io Thermodynamics and mechanics (especially orbital mechanics) will be important. Choosing a good textbook is important, reviews on stackexchange and other googleable things will help you decide what you want.

It seems like most of your exposure to astrophysics has been fairly "popular science" stuff without loads of maths. Fun to hear about, but sort of surface level. For better or worse astrophysics is a LOT of math. You'll need strong calculus and algebra skills to really understand most of it. Hopefully I don't sound like a pedantic internet prick, I just don't know how old or educated you are. If you'd like to study astrophysics as a science, it might be worth taking a degree in it.