The study of motion in two dimensions and Newton’s Laws are essential to an understanding of dynamics (the effect of forces on objects and how they move). This guided the development of machines and other structures, and ushered in the industrial revolution.

Instructions for this activity:

Discuss the social and environmental effects of utilizing mechanics principles. Consider the positive and negative effects of increasing industrialization on the environment.

Suggestions for Your Discussion

As mechanization progressed, especially in Great Br

itain and the United States in the 1800’s,

people (even children) worked long hours in the fac

tories. Coal was easily obtainable and that

had further implications, for workers and the gener

al public (consider smog, for example).

Lighting often used whale oil, and that had other i

mplications for sea life. Industries grew larger

and became monopolies. You might consider what “ve

rtical integration” and “horizontal

integration” meant for companies, workers, and cons

umers. Try Googling “economies of scale.”

More recently, the Gulf oil spill is certainly a co

nsequence of the industrial age (mechanization).

There are positive results of Newtonian mechanics.

Our lives are much easier, healthier and

longer than those of the farmers and serfs of earli

er ages. Slavery was an economic system for

thousands of years; mechanization was actually a ma

jor reason for its demise!