# Tag Info

### Why should Conservative forces have their curl equal to zero?(intuition)

"Curl" is a pretty well named mathematical term--it denotes the degree of "rotation" in the vector field. For this reason, if you go all the way around in a vector field, you'll find that the total ...
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### What exactly makes a force conservative?

All fundamental forces are conservatives and I would say that this is a postulate. Fundamental physics is constructed in such way that there is a quantity called energy which can be assigned to every ...
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### How can you conclude that gravity is a conservative force?

Are you looking for a mathematical proof (which has been given by others), or an experimental demonstration? If gravity is not conservative then that means there would two paths up a mountain that ...
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### What is a potential?

Electric potential and electric potential energy are two different concepts but they are closely related to each other. Consider an electric charge $q_1$ at some point $P$ near charge $q_2$ (assume ...
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### Is gravitational energy always conserved?

so net work done would be 0 Net work of all forces is 0, and that is why kinetic energy of the body does not change - it remains 0. This is an example of the general theorem \text{work of all ...
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### All central forces are conservative forces, but are all conservative forces central forces?

A constant force is conservative but not central. For example: $\vec F=F \hat x$ You can check that the curl of this force is $0$, hence it is conservative. Its potential energy function in 3D space ...
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### What is a non-conservative system?

Simply put: a conservative system conserves energy, a nonconservative one doesn't. In a conservative system: trajectories follow paths of constant energy - i.e., if you start the system with a given ...
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