Quote:
|
Originally Posted by sudszy
I do feel however, though you have used the term inertia correctly(a very rare thing in this world), (though inertial mass would be even better) it will confuse the average person as most throw around the terms of inertia and momentum not realising there is a difference, just using "mass" and leaving the term inertia completely out of the discussion is much simpler for the "masses"
|
Yes I should have said
Inertial Mass. It seems like people are still getting it wrong. Even adding emotion in to the debate, like "how would you feel killing some poor person?"
It is
inertial mass! That's the cause! Mass on it's own doesn't do it. But mass affects inertial mass, which affects momentum. But momentum, velocity, acceleration or force are NOT needed here. If you drive a Kia in to a stationary bus, the bus will be ok, the Kia will become a pancake.
Inertial Mass is the difference.
Velocity: The bus has zero
It is not Momentum (because you need velocity to have momentum).
It is not force, because that only affects change in velocity / acceleration of the vehicle.
The personal injuries are as a result of the sudden change in velocity the person is experiencing (or g-force). The person is traveling at (say 60km/h) and suddenly the car is doing 0. The person keeps traveling that speed until they hit the dashboard or seatbelt. The vehicle with the larger inertial mass is going to be less resistant to a change in velocity than the smaller car (that's a scientific definition of Inertial Mass), so the occupants are experiencing less change in velocity than those that are in the smaller car. This is why the level of personal injury differs.