Overview

Abstract

Dynamics is the study of how things move. That seems fairly obvious. But there are fundamental principles that have to be understood, despite the detail being hedged around with some pretty forbidding mathematics. We are so accustomed to Newton’s laws that we cannot imagine life without them. They are easily put to the test of our experience and imagination. Yet youngsters are afflicted with pseudo-science in films that defies all reason, showing star-fighters zooming away in space just by tilting their wings or orbits ‘decaying’ with no air-resistance. It will be worth devoting an entire chapter to media howlers. Gyroscopes are regarded with the same mystique as zombies and vampires. The reputation of a very distinguished professor was tarnished by a belief that they could be used for space propulsion. But gyroscopes lead us unto another aspect of the theory. Newton was intrigued by linear motion, but we must also consider rotation. Just as the second law tells us to take account of linear momentum and forces, so we must additionally consider angular momentum and couples. This is where the lovers of mathematics can really come into their own!