Different Types of Forces

Different Types of Forces in Physics

A lot of the physics topics you will study revolve around the impact or effect of forces. Although there are many different forces, will learn some fundamental principles for approaching the problems and applications in physics no matter which force applies.

Physics is the study of the natural world and you probably know a lot more physics than you think. You see things happening everyday that are governed by the laws of physics but you probably aren't thinking about physics at the time. If you throw a stone up in the air it eventually falls to the ground. A lot of physics can be learnt by analysing an everyday situation.

We are going to learn about some forces in the next few sections but before we start lets describe an everyday situation in which they all play a role so you can visualise what is happening. You need a table and a three books that all have different masses. Take any book and put it on the table. Nothing happens, the book just rests on the table if the table is flat. If you slowly lift one side of the table so that the top of the table is tilted the book doesn't move immediately. As you lift the table more and more the book suddenly starts to slide off the table. You can repeat this with all three books and see how much you have to tilt the table before the books start to slide.

This real world situation illustrates a lot of the physics we want to learn about in this tutorial.