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/sci/ - Science & Math

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4258784 No.4258784 [Reply] [Original]

hi /sci/, guy who lost concentration a lot back in school here

i'm trying to learn physics but some parts i get stuck on because i don't understand the maths

first of all i didn't understand how m/s/s = m/s^2. i learned that it's just a math trick (which i forgot btw). but what section of math is this and at what point of this section does it come up?

i also don't understand how when the guy in the video was converting miles/hour to miles/second he changed hour/second to hour.seconds then said 'the best way to remove the hour part is to multiply by something that has hour as the denumerator', then multiplied the whole thing by 1/3600 hour/seconds. i don't understand, why would you multiply it by something? i'm confused. maybe it's more maths that i don't know, in which case what section of maths is it and at what point in the section does it come up?

>> No.4258791

m/s/s is kind of like m/s?s, so m/s?.

>> No.4258796

you just need to practice converting and simplifying units

it's not math it's just unit simplification

>> No.4258814

(a/b)/c = (a/b)(1/c)

>> No.4258817

>>4258784
>, why would you multiply it by something?
technically you're multiplying by 1
since 1 hour = 60 minutes, 1 = 1 hour/ 60 min.
same for 1 minute = 60 seconds, 1 = 1 min/60 sec

1 = 1*1 = (1 hour/60 min) * (1 min/ 60 sec)
minutes cancel, so you get 1 hour / (60*60 sec) = 1/3600

>> No.4258837

i think i get what your asking, so ill try to give an example that you might understand.

m/s is speed- its distance divided by time
m/s/s is accelleration so thats speed (m/s) divided by time. OR m/s/s

this works out as m/s^2 as follows:

x/y/y = x/y^2

8/2= 4
4/2= 2

then again

8/2^2=2

so you see rather than dividing by the same number twice, you just divide by its square

we dont know the exact numbers involved that are represented by seconds, but considering they use the same units, they are also given the same generic pronumeral

>> No.4258858

Dimensional analysis. There should be a lot of stuff on the internet to find, it can get kind of complex to just put into one 4chan post, so try googling it.

The essence of dimensional analysis is to turn one unit into another (e.g. meters in centimeters, grams into moles).

As for the acceleration thing (m/s/s = m/s^2), it's just because of how division works. >>4258837 shows it pretty well with real examples.

>> No.4258879

Okay, so length is measured in meters. We can write a distance as x meters. Fine. Speed is a change in distance per unit time, therefore we can write a speed as (change in distance) divided by (change in time), which has units m/s. Now the next step up is acceleration, which is a change in SPEED per unit time. So we have the original thing (m/s) per unit time again, so we have (m/s) / s.

>> No.4259602

>>4258837
That example explains that. But is there an explanation of why it always works out like that?>>4258817
That works out but what area of math is that?>>4258858
OK

>> No.4259689

>>4259602
Dimensional analysis is it's own area of math (for as far as you can draw a hard line here), though it's closely related to algebra.