THE LAWS OF

PHYSICS ARE
UNIVERSAL
CHAPTER VII
■ What’s behind the motion of a freely falling
body and why does it behave in such a
manner as to fall in a particular direction?

■ What might cause one object to remain at

rest and another object to accelerate?
LESSON 7.1

Aristotelian versus
Galilean Views of
Motion
Aristotle's Ideas of Motion
■ More than 2000 years ago, Aristotle suggested that a force is necessary to produce
motion
■ He further explained that if there is no force, there can be no motion. Aristotle further
believed that in the absence of an external force, any moving body will ultimately
come to rest.
■ They agreed based on their observations from everyday experiences..
■ a body at rest will not move unless a force is applied to it, while a moving body eventually
stops moving unless a force is continuously applied to it.
■ However, there are also some cases of bodies which continue to move even without a
force acting on them. An example is a block of ice thrown along a very smooth surface. It
continues to move along the surface even if no more force is acting on the block.
■ One such idea was the argument that a falling body accelerates because its weight
increases as it approaches Earth's surface. Aristotle also explained that the motion of a
stone after it leaves the thrower’s hand caused the air to move and this motion of the air
carried the stone along!
 Galileo's Thought Experiment about
■Motion
For many centuries nobody seemed to be successful in challenging the ideas of Aristotle
■ He tested Aristotle's ideas through "thought experiments," experiments he did not
actually perform except in his mind.
■ He arrived at his conclusions through logical thought
■ Galileo argued that, in the absence of friction, an object would move continuously at a
constant speed along the straight line.
■ Galileo, with his clear logic and mathematical knowledge, showed that a body moving
along a frictionless horizontal surface does not need an external force to maintain its
uniform speed.
■ Galileo did not attempt though to explain why a body keeps on moving at a constant
velocity along a straight line
■ He simply showed that it is natural for a moving body to do so, just as it is for a
stationary body to remain at rest
• .A ball is released from position A to run down a bent rail. When
the rail is bent along ABC, the ball rises up to C, which is nearly the
same height as A.
• The difference in height is, of course, due to friction between the
ball and the rail surface. With the rail bent along ABD and ABE, the
ball again rises to nearly the same height as A from where it was
released.
• What happens if the rail is bent along ABF where BF is horizontal?
The ball would never be able to rise up to the level of A
Galileo Inferred that Objects in a
Vacuum Fall with Uniform
Acceleration
■ Aristotle’s viewpoint regarding the motion of freely falling
objects was that if there were several objects released from a
certain height at the same time, the heaviest will reach the
surface of Earth first.
■ Weight must be a factor affecting the speed of a freely falling
object.
■ Galileo disproved Aristotle's theory by pure reasoning and
logical arguments.
 In his thought experiment, he considered three objects of
equal weights
• The three objects A, B, and C were placed side by side. They were allowed to fall
at the same time.
• Using the theory of Aristotle, they will fall at the same time. If objects A and B
were tied together, and they were made to fall at the same time as C, will they fall
faster than C?
• Galileo argued that A and B together will fall at the same time as C.
• He argued that B cannot pull A down faster than C since B alone was moving as
fast as C.
• On the other hand, A cannot push B down because A alone was moving down as
fast as C. So, this only shows that A and B together, although twice as heavy as C,
will fall at the same time as C and reach the surface of Earth at the same time as
C.
Free Fall
■ Do heavier objects fall faster than light objects? do they fall at the same rate?
■ People had, for a long time, believed that heavy bodies fall at a faster rate than light
objects.
■ Popular account was said of Galileo dropping a small iron ball and a large cannon ball
from the leaning tower of Pisa (Figure 7.3) in the sixteenth century.
■ To the amazement of the spectators, the two balls hit the ground almost at the same
time.
■ In a vacuum, however, they fall at the same rate, as demonstrated by the "coin and
feather" experiment
Acceleration Due to Gravity

■ If air resistance is negligible, a body falls freely under the influence of gravity with
uniform acceleration
■ This is called acceleration due to gravity, denoted by g The standard value of g is 9.8
m/s2.
■ As the ball rises, its speed decreases at the rate of 10 m/s every second until it reaches
the top of its flight where it stops momentarily to change direction.
■ As it falls down, its speed increases at the rate of 10 m/s every second.
Graphical Representation of Motion
■ The field of physics that specializes in the study of motion of objects is called
mechanics.
■ It is further divided into kinematics and dynamics. Kinematics deals with the
quantitative description of motion, while dynamics focuses on the forces that affect
motion.
■ Objectives
■ At the end of the lesson, you should be able to:
■ 1. Tell the difference between speed and velocity;
■ 2. Define acceleration;
■ 3. Discuss the graphical representation of motion; and
■ 4. Solve problems involving the equations of motion.
Speed and Velocity
■ Speed
  is the measure of how fast an object moves. If an object moves from one position
to another in a measured time, its average speed v is obtained by dividing the distance
(d) traveled by the time (t) taken to cover the distance or in mathematical form.

where v is the average speed

d is the distance traveled
t is the time taken to cover the distance.
■ The SI unit for speed is meter per second or m/s. For instance if a car has covered 1200
meters in 60 seconds, then its average speed is
■ v = 1200 m/60 s = 20 m/s
Example 7.1

A runner covered a distance of 100 m in 10 s. What was the speed of the runner?
■  In physics, the speed of a body at a certain instance of time is called instantaneous
speed
■ . It can be obtained by measuring the average speed over the shortest possible time
interval.
■ Speed in a given direction is called velocity.
■ Velocity is a vector quantity and is defined as the rate of change of displacement.

■ A car traveling at 100 km/hr. north and another car traveling at 100 km/hr. south have
the same speed but different velocities.
Acceleration
■ When
  a car moving along a fixed direction picks up speed at the start of the journey and
slows down when coming to a stop, its velocity is not constant.
■ It may also move at constant speed but when moving around a curve, the direction of
motion is always changing
■ Thus, even if the speed is constant, the velocity may not be constant because of the
changing direction.
■ . When the velocity of an object is changing, we say that the body is experiencing
acceleration
■ Acceleration a is defined as the rate of change of velocity with time.

■ m/s2 or
Acceleration

■ Negative acceleration is also called deceleration. Like velocity, acceleration is a vector

quantity.
■ A car has at least two pedals, a gas pedal and a brake pedal. When the driver steps on
the gas pedal the velocity is increased, so it is also called an accelerator. On the other
hand when #he driver steps on the brake pedal, the car slows down to a Stop and so, it is
also called a decelerator.
examples

■ A car’s performance is often assessed by the shortest time required to accelerate it from
rest to 100 m/s2. The new Ferrari can achieve this is 5 sec. what is the average
acceleration of the car in m/s2?
Distance-Time Graph
■ Motion graphs are useful tools that can tell you how far a body has travelled, how fast it
is moving, and all the speed changes that take place.

1. Bus A travels at a constant speed of 50 m/sec. the graph is a straight line which
increases 50 m on the y-axis (distance) for each 1 s on the axis (time)
2. Bus B travels at a higher constant speed of 100m/s. the graph is a straight line which is
steeper and rises 100m on the x-axis.
3. Bus C is accelerating. The speed rises, so the bus travels further each second. The line
curves upward.
4. Bus D has stopped. It is parked 50 m from the starting point. So the distance stays the
same as time progresses.
• Bus A travels at a constant speed of 50 m/sec. the graph is a
straight line which increases 50 m on the y-axis (distance) for
each 1 s on the axis (time)
Bus B has stopped. It is parked 50 m from the starting
point. So the distance stays the same as time progresses.
• Bus C is accelerating. The speed rises, so the bus
travels further each second. The line curves upward.
Velocity-Time Graph

■ Bus E accelerates uniformly at 5 m/s2. The graph is a straight line which rises 5 m/s on
the y-axis (speed) for every 1 s on the x-axis (time). 2
■ Bus F is accelerating at an increasing rate. The acceleration rises, so the bus increases
speed each second. The line curves upward.
■ Bus G is accelerating at a decreasing rate. The acceleration falls, so the bus decreases
speed each second. The line curves downward.
■ Bus H is traveling at a constant speed of 20 m/s. The speed stays the same so the graph
is a horizontal line.
Bus E accelerates uniformly at 5 m/s2. The graph is a
straight line which rises 5 m/s on the y-axis (speed) for
every 1 s on the x-axis (time).
Bus F is accelerating at an increasing rate. The
acceleration rises, so the bus increases speed each
second. The line curves upward
Bus G is accelerating at a decreasing rate. The
acceleration falls, so the bus decreases speed each
second. The line curves downward.
Bus H is traveling at a constant speed of 20 m/s. The
speed stays the same so the graph is a horizontal line.