He recalculated. He was wrong. He was grateful. At eighteen, Dmitri took a train to Moscow. He had no diploma, no formal education. He carried only the Bukhovtsev book, now held together by electrical tape, its margins filled with his own furious notes.
“A body is thrown vertically upward…” bukhovtsev physics
“A point mass moves in a potential field U(x) = -k/x^2. Describe its motion for all initial conditions. Is there a stable orbit? Why or why not?” He recalculated
The book had no color pictures. No inspirational quotes. Just line after line of stark, beautiful geometry and the terse voice of the author. At eighteen, Dmitri took a train to Moscow
“Dear Student, Your solution to Problem 467 (the rolling hoop on an incline) is incorrect. You assumed pure rolling, but you forgot the deformation of the surface. Recalculate with the hysteresis coefficient of 0.02. Then try Problem 468. Yours in inquiry, B. Bukhovtsev”