Question

Every action has a reaction. These action-reaction are
(A) Equal, opposite, and acting on the same body
(B) Equal, in the same direction and acting on the same body
(C) Equal, opposite, and acting on different bodies.
(D) Equal, in the same direction, and acting on different bodies.

Answer 1

Hint: - Newton’s third law of motion gives us a definition of action and reaction. Action is defined as the force that is being applied to a body. The reaction is defined as the force that is being produced by that body due to the action acting on that body. These are contact forces i.e. only arise when the bodies are in contact with each other.

Complete Step-by-step solution:
The correct answer is (C) Equal, opposite, and acting on different bodies.
Newton gave three laws of motion that govern all the types of motion occurring around us. Newton’s third law is related to the action on a body and the reaction produced by that body. It states that whenever a force is applied on a body then as a result of that force, another force is produced by that body to counter the force acting on the body. The force that is being applied to the body is known as the action while the force produced by that as a response to the action is known as the reaction to every action, there is always an equal and opposite reaction.
When action is applied to a body then the reaction is produced in such a way that it tries to cancel the action using it. Action acts on the body on which it is being applied while the reaction acts on the body which applies the force such that the direction of the reaction is opposite to that of action.
For example: When we apply force on a wall then our body is applying the action on the wall while the wall is applying a reaction on our body which is in the opposite direction to the action.

Therefore, the action and reaction tend to act on two different bodies such that their directions are opposite to each other. Hence, the correct answer is option C.

Note: The student should remember that the magnitude of action is equal to the magnitude of the reaction produced. The action and the reaction force are equal and opposite to each other. So, we can say that both the forces will cancel each other. But this does not happen because the action and the reaction forces act on different bodies.