Inertia

Inertia is a force

• True

• False

Suppose that an astronaut throws a baseball in outer space at a location far from significant influences of gravity and air resistance. One would expect that the baseball would ____.

• eventually stop since all objects ultimately "lose their steam"

• eventually stop as its inertia slowly becomes used up

• continue in motion with the same speed and direction

• either a, b, or c -- depending on whether the astronaut continues to push it

Inertia is a force that keeps stationary objects at rest and moving objects in motion at a constant velocity.

• True

• False

When all individual forces acting on an object are balanced, it is the natural tendency of an object to _____. List all that apply in alphabetical order with no spaces between letters.

• maintain its state of motion

• eventually stop

• accelerate

• either speed up, slow down or keep the same speed

• keep its velocity constant (either at a zero or non-zero value)

The law of inertia (Newton's first law) applies _____.

• to moving objects only

• only to objects that are not moving

• to both moving and nonmoving objects

Inertia refers to _____

• the tendency of moving objects to remain in motion

• the force which keeps moving objects in motion with a constant velocity

• the force that keeps stationary objects at rest

• the tendency of stationary objects to remain at rest

A skateboard rolls down a hill, reaches the level surface and eventually comes to a stop. The fact that the skateboard ultimately stops is best explained by ____.

• an unbalanced force would be required to keep the sled moving forward at constant speed

• the presence of an unbalanced force (e.g., friction) can cause a moving object to stop

• the presence of inertia causes it to stop

• the natural tendency of any object is to ultimately stop

Inertia depends on ______

• Velocity

• Speed

• Distance

• Mass

All objects have inertia

• True

• False

List the objects in order from least to greatest inertia.

• CDBA

• ABCD

• BCDA

• CBAD