About the lecture

In this mini-lecture we discuss Newton’s Three Laws of Motion. As we move through this mini-lecture we consider: (i) Newton’s First Law (also known as the Principle of Inertia), which states that an object will not change it’s motion unless acted upon by a force, and that if the object is at rest then it will stay at rest unless a force is present; (ii) Newton’s Second Law, which relates force, mass, and acceleration through the equation F = ma, where we refer to the mass m as the inertial mass; (iii) Newton’s Third Law, which states that when two objects interact they apply forces on each other of equal magnitudes but opposite directions; and (iv) an Example of Newton’s Second Law that illustrates the inverse relationship between mass and acceleration.

About the lecturer

David Berman is a Professor of Theoretical Physics at Queen Mary. His research interests include string theory and ideas in fundamental theoretical physics, including non-commutative geometry, black holes physics, and quantum gravity. He has contributed to the Radio 4 biography series Great Lives and the In Our Time podcasts, including Great Lives: Richard Feynman (2018), Great Lives: Galileo (2019), In Our Time: Emmy Noether (2019), and In Our Time: Paul Dirac (2020).