Many people think that objects will slow down and come to rest if no resultant force acts upon them but really…
Category: Mechanics
Mechanics Refutation Question #5
Galileo showed that two balls of different weights accelerate at the same rate when dropped. Before this people thought heavier objects fell faster but this is wrong because…
Mechanics Refutation Question #6
Some people think the International Space Station has no forces acting upon it because it is in Space, the evidence that they are wrong is…
Mechanics Refutation Question #7
Some people think that an object’s change in kinetic energy is always equal to its change in gravitational potential energy, this is not always true because…
Mechanics Refutation Question #8
When a helicopter is hovering it is very common for people to think that the weight of the helicopter has an equal and opposite force that is the down-force from the rotors. This is wrong because…
Mechanics Refutation Question #9
Many people would assume that when a mosquito is hit by a car the mosquito experiences a much greater force but actually…
Mechanics Refutation Question #10
Many students identify the normal contact force as the Newton’s 3rd law pair force to the weight for a book on a table but actually…
Mechanics Refutation Question #11
It could be argued that when a horse pulls forward on a cart there is always an equal and opposite force backwards so the horse must not be able to accelerate…
Mechanics Refutation Question #12
After GCSE many students assume you find the resultant by adding their magnitude of two vectors together but…
Mechanics Refutation Question #13
Students often state that after opening their parachute the drag on a skydiver is always greater than before. Actually…