Weight

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Claimed by mxu86 (Michael Xu)

A page about weight as a property of matter.

The Main Idea

In physics, weight describes the Gravitational Force upon a mass, usually relative to Earth or a planet. Depending on the source, weight may be defined as a scalar - the magnitude of the gravitational force on an object - or a vector equal to gravitational force. An object's weight is commonly confused with mass, but instead it is a force that depends on another body of matter, while mass is an intrinsic property of matter.

A Mathematical Model

A mass m's weight near the surface of the Earth is represented by [math]\displaystyle{ {\vec{W} = \vec{F}_{g} = {mg}} }[/math] where g is the gravitation acceleration of Earth, -9.8 meters per second squared.

[math]\displaystyle{ {\frac{d\vec{p}}{dt}}_{system} = \vec{F}_{net} }[/math] where p is the momentum of the system and F is the net force from the surroundings.

A Computational Model

A simple segment of code that calculates the both scalar and vector weight (gravitational force) exerted upon a ball.

     #Calculate the weight of an object

ball=sphere(pos=vec(0,0,0), radius=0.02, color=color.yellow, make_trail=true)

## Defining constants g = vec(0,-9.8,0) #gravitational acceleration ball.m=0.1 #mass of the ball in kg W = ball.m*g #weight of the ball on Earth

print("Scalar weight of the ball:", mag(W), "kg m/s^2 or N") print("Force of gravity exerted on the ball:", W, "kg m/s^2 or N")

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