What Happens When An Unstoppable Force Pushes An Immovable Object?

A popular question that has been around the internet for many years is the unstoppable force vs. an immovable object. Of course, the theory of relativity states clearly that an immovable item does not exist. 

There are many reasons for that: you can move any immovable item, even something like your house can be moved or even the Earth, if the force pushing it is immense and incredible. Either the immovable will move from its place, or the object will shatter due to the unstoppable force being applied to it.

As for unstoppable forces, all the fundamental forces in nature are produced by particles interacting with an object and changing its momentum like photons, gluons, or gravitons. The only way to avoid being influenced by force is to avoid interacting with it immediately, if possible at all. 

Let’s discuss this theory in detail.

Some Important Points Regarding This Theory

1. Explaining and Breaking Down The Two

From a normal man’s perspective, an unstoppable force is like a bold force that is perhaps more powerful and terrifying than an earthquake. It can take away any item regardless of size or mass coming in its path. 

The energy of the force should not diminish or decrease even slightly throughout its transfer from one object to another. Hence, as a result, to become unstoppable, an unstoppable force must have unlimited energy. 

On the other hand, an immovable item is impenetrable by a force of any size; whether it is even an asteroid strike, it will not move from its position at all. Hence that would appear to be the only logical explanation of an immovable item. 

2. Historical Events

Throughout history, there have numerous cases of such a thing being discussed or portrayed one way or another. Humans have always attempted to push the boundaries and limits of what they could do to discover and find answers. 

One such example is recorded in an extraordinary account from a 3rd-century philosophical book, “Han Feizi.” The story features a merchant of spears and shields who does his best to make the most out of his day’s harvest. 

When he gets asked about his spear, he replies that it could break any shield, and his shield can guard against whatever type of spear it comes across. The merchant becomes someone who cannot be challenged when confronted with the aftermath of his spear’s strike on his shield. This contradiction leaves doubts and creates an inevitable confusion.

3. Different Perspectives and Ideas

The paradox of unstoppable force vs. immovable object is usually brought up with different unsettling and mind-boggling facts of nature. Many responses have shed light on this matter, but none of them seem safe to consider. 

According to Dr. Christopher Kaczor, a professor of Philosophy at Loyola Marymount University, there is no conflict in itself. It is rather only a false dilemma because it develops by choice when a misunderstanding is used to clear a specific conclusion. 

Therefore, if we put the two ideas side by side, an unstoppable force or one with infinite inertia would be defined as an immovable item whose momentum cannot be altered in any way. It would stop any object traveling towards it, making it an unstoppable force.

4. Demonstration of Newton’s Second Law of Motion

You can make an immovable object movable by adding an external force or acceleration to it. According to Newton’s second law of motion, “acceleration is equal to force divided by mass (A=F/M).” Therefore, an accelerated object has infinite mass. 

The above can be easily demonstrated mathematically as A=F/M, where F is a finite quantity while M is not. As a result, A becomes zero. Hence, not accelerating an item doesn’t mean that it is not moving, but it cannot directly change its speed, ending the discussion of the immovable object. 

All kinds of tremendous forces in nature exist due to photons, gluons, gravitons, and many more things that interact with the object and change its momentum to create all kinds of tremendous forces in nature. 

The only way to not get influenced by force is to avoid interacting with it in the first place. For example, light is an irresistible force that every photon releases; it strikes your body and alters your momentum. At the same time, you have no control over it unless you are translucent or avoid the light entirely. Therefore, we can surmise that some forces that exist are already unstoppable.

5. An Unstoppable Force is Not Limited To One

You cannot avoid an unstoppable force such as electrogenic force and gravity or an item whose velocity cannot be changed by pressing on it, meaning that it cannot accelerate. It might be something that you haven’t heard about before. 

An unstoppable force must be equal to an unaccelerated object. It should lead to the logical conclusion that the unstoppable and immovable objects are the same but are viewed from separate reference frames.

As infinite mass requires infinite energy, we ignore gravity and imagine an unaccelerated object. The first thing we would need would be an endless supply of free energy, which would allow us to violate the second law of thermodynamics saliently. Therefore, if two such large unaccelerated, immovable objects are approaching each other and meet, the only danger they will cause is that they pass through each other with no impact.

Conclusion

If we observe it from a different perspective, we can conclude that for a force to be unstoppable, the force may require all types of energy from the Earth and consume all the radiations sources and the mass of Earth in its condensed state. Therefore, nothing would be left to build or revive an immovable object. Although the event’s aftermath could lead to a significant disaster; thus, this theory cannot be proved in real-time easily.