On Sun, Jul 11, 2010 at 7:18 AM, Scott Stroz <boyz...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Had to look it up, could not think of the reference at the time that > proves this is physically imposible, its Newton's Third Law of Motion
I don't know anything about either the Mythbusters episode nor the m1911, however, Newton's 3rd Law deals with opposing forces. So if you are exerting a force, F, against a wall, the wall is exerting an equivalent force against you, in the opposite direction, -F. So when you fire a bullet, the force required to push the bullet forward also pushes the gun backwards. However, the result of that force is not identical. If you have venting on the back of the gun, the air that is pushed backwards will hit the back of the gun, but then by another application of Newton's 3rd law the back of the gun pushes back on the air that is hitting it and some of the air will then get redirected out the venting, which reduces the accumulated force. On the other end of the weapon, there isn't any venting or a wall so the bullet just keeps getting pushed forward. The initial forces were equivalent and opposite, but their effect is not. That being said, I would certainly believe that the force required to knock someone back with a bullet at a reasonable distance would also knock down the person holding the gun. But it isn't quite the simplistic application of Newton's 3rd Law. Judah ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~| Order the Adobe Coldfusion Anthology now! http://www.amazon.com/Adobe-Coldfusion-Anthology-Michael-Dinowitz/dp/1430272155/?tag=houseoffusion Archive: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/message.cfm/messageid:322849 Subscription: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/subscribe.cfm Unsubscribe: http://www.houseoffusion.com/groups/cf-community/unsubscribe.cfm
