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The SI unit of force is the newton (symbol N), which is the force required to accelerate a one kilogram mass at a rate of one meter per second squared, or kg·m·s −2.The corresponding CGS unit is the dyne, the force required to accelerate a one gram mass by one centimeter per second squared, or g·cm·s −2. A newton is thus equal to ...
Not all forces are contact forces; for example, the weight of an object is the force between the object and the Earth, even though the two do not need to make contact. Gravitational forces, electrical forces and magnetic forces are body forces and can exist without contact occurring.
A newton is defined as 1 kg⋅m/s 2 (it is a named derived unit defined in terms of the SI base units). [1]: 137 One newton is, therefore, the force needed to accelerate one kilogram of mass at the rate of one metre per second squared in the direction of the applied force.
Newton's second law is sometimes presented as a definition of force, i.e., a force is that which exists when an inertial observer sees a body accelerating. In order for this to be more than a tautology — acceleration implies force, force implies acceleration — some other statement about force must also be made.
In physics, a conservative force is a force with the property that the total work done by the force in moving a particle between two points is independent of the path taken. [1] Equivalently, if a particle travels in a closed loop, the total work done (the sum of the force acting along the path multiplied by the displacement ) by a conservative ...
The problem with this definition is that it does not give the direction of the torque but only the magnitude, and hence it is difficult to use in three-dimensional cases. If the force is perpendicular to the displacement vector r, the moment arm will be equal to the distance to the centre, and torque will be a maximum for the given force. The ...
An expanded definition appears in Economy and Society: A compulsory political organization with continuous operations will be called a 'state' [if and] insofar as its administrative staff successfully upholds a claim to the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force (das Monopol legitimen physischen Zwanges) in the enforcement of its order.
In physics, Hooke's law is an empirical law which states that the force (F) needed to extend or compress a spring by some distance (x) scales linearly with respect to that distance—that is, F s = kx, where k is a constant factor characteristic of the spring (i.e., its stiffness), and x is small compared to the total possible deformation of the spring.