Newton's Second Law describes a force as proportional to acceleration, where the mass is the constant of proportionality. Free body diagrams are a method of visualizing and solving force problems.
Check out this NASA video introducing the concept of Newton's Second Law
Newton's Laws Of Motion (2) : Force, Mass And Acceleration
NASA also discusses the concept of Newton's Third Law
Newton's Laws Of Motion (3): Action And Reaction
Read the BoxSand Introduction and watch the pre-lecture videos before doing the pre-lecture homework or attending class. If you have time, or would like more preparation, please read the OpenStax textbook and/or try the fundamental examples provided below.
Prior to this section, we did not ask any questions about what causes the motion of objects to begin or to change. In this section, we will use Newton's second law to develop a cause and effect relationship between forces and motion. Newton's second law can be stated as follows:
Newton's Second Law
**NOTE: Just like kinematics, the rest of PH201 works under the point particle approximation. Thus, we will not need to worry about the center of mass yet. But in PH202, will will start to consider the physical shape of objects, requiring us to determine centers of mass.
Newton's Second Law
Gravitational Force
Hooke's Law
Now, take a look at the pre-lecture reading and videos below.
OpenStax has some great problem solving strategies
__________________________ Previous Relevant Material __________________________
If you haven't read the previous sections on forces, the below links are from the previous lecture materials and may be necessary to understand the section above on problem solving strategies.
Here is an introduction to forces from the OpenStax textbook
OpenStax develops the force concept
Read about Newton's First Law of Motion
The most important law in forces is Newton's 2nd Law of Motion
The last of Newton's laws is the 3rd Law which talks about symmetry in forces.
Check out the normal force and tension