Homework Help: Physics

Posted by Tammy on Monday, March 28, 2011 at 11:08pm.

According to conservation of momentum, when two objects collide, the momentum lost by one object equals the momentum gained by the other. Give a common-sense, non-mathematical explanation of the connection between Newton’s 3rd law and momentum conservation. In other words,make an argument that Newton’s 3rd law and momentum conservation, though they seem different on the surface, actually “say” similar things. Again, we’re looking for conceptual, commonsense reasoning, not formal mathematical reasoning.

Physics - Nyakallo, Tuesday, March 29, 2011 at 10:08am
Well,since Newton's 3rd law states that "for every action,there is an equal but opposite reaction",we can see that it is similar to the conservation of momentum in that the momentum before a collision is equal to the momentum after the collision but in the opposite direction...hope this helps but I'm a math thinker so not having to explain things in mathematical terms is really hard.

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