Introduction


Can each day be headlined by a word (or two) and represented by a single sentence?

Will they, in turn, weave together to form a tapestry of the year?

It may be more mundane than momentous, but it’s mine to share.

Tuesday, 1 April 2014

Mechanics

Today’s maths mentoring required dredging up more physics, this time the calculation of forces, energy, work and power, which I used to enjoy doing on the basis the words meant something and the concepts could be visualised quite readily, however with the “s.i.” units (new-fangled things when I was a lad) now completely replacing the old imperial units it took a moment or two before I could relate newtons, joules and even watts to good old pounds force, foot-pounds and horsepower, and even longer to work out that under this terminology weight (being a force) is measured in newtons not kilograms (which measure mass not weight); confusing -  but so were the old days when pounds were both used as (different) units for mass and force.

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