Activity for gmcgath‭

Type	On...	Excerpt	Status	Date
Comment	Post #285294	This isn't a physics question, except in the sense that all questions about physical objects are. (more)	—	over 2 years ago
Comment	Post #285238	That's helpful. It clicked after realizing that tossing a ball into the air and having it slowed by gravity is the same as braking, just rotated 90 degrees. (more)	—	over 2 years ago
Comment	Post #285233	Thanks, and I'm sure that makes it intuitive to a physicist, but it's not quite what I was hoping for. Something like the discussion of the effects of a collision vs. the velocity going into it might provide more of a feeling for why kinetic energy is proportional to the square of the velocity. (more)	—	over 2 years ago
Edit	Post #285229	Initial revision	—	over 2 years ago
Question	—	How can the kinetic energy equation be intuitively understood? Momentum is proportional to an object's velocity, and kinetic energy is proportional to the square of its velocity $\dfrac{mv^2}{2}$. It's pretty intuitive that if object B is going twice as fast as object A and they have the same mass, B has twice the momentum. It's harder to grasp why it has four t... (more)	—	over 2 years ago
Comment	Post #285193	I'm very rusty on this topic, so I'm offering a comment rather than an answer. Feel free to correct anything that looks dumb here. In special relativity, there is no such thing as a "rest" frame of reference. All non-accelerated frames of reference have equal standing. But the classic Einstein equ... (more)	—	over 2 years ago
Edit	Post #284667	Initial revision	—	over 2 years ago
Answer	—	A: What is "order" and "disorder" in entropy? Order and disorder aren't scientifically precise terms. In this context, they're an attempt to make the idea of entropy more intuitive. A configuration could appear orderly just by chance, yet be high entropy. For example, you could roll a die 6 times and get 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 by chance. That would ap... (more)	—	over 2 years ago