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Without doing any math, compare the acceleration of a 50kg ball to a 150kg ball if an equal force was applied to both objects.

A) The acceleration of the 50kg ball would be significantly less than the 150kg ball.
B) The acceleration would be the same because the net force is the same.
C) The acceleration of the 150kg ball would be significantly less than the 150kg ball.
D) You must know how much force was applied in order to know.

1 Answer

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Final answer:

The correct answer is C) The acceleration of the 150kg ball would be significantly less than the 50kg ball, since according to Newton's Second Law of Motion, with the same force applied, acceleration is inversely proportional to mass.

Step-by-step explanation:

When comparing the acceleration of a 50kg ball to a 150kg ball with an equal force applied to both, we can use Newton's Second Law of Motion, which states that the net force F on an object is equal to its mass m multiplied by its acceleration a (F=ma). That means if the same force is applied to both objects, the acceleration will be inversely proportional to the mass. Therefore, the acceleration of the 50kg ball will be greater than the acceleration of the 150kg ball because the 50kg ball has less mass and, thus, less inertia to overcome.

Considering the provided question options, the correct one is: C) The acceleration of the 150kg ball would be significantly less than the 50kg ball. This is because acceleration is inversely proportional to the object's mass when the same force is applied. We do not need to know the exact amount of force to determine that the lighter object will have a higher acceleration if the same force is applied to both.

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