Statics is the action of one body on another. A force is either a push or a pull. A force tends to move a body in the direction of its action. The action of a force is characterized by its magnitude, by the direction of its action, and by its point of application. Thus, force is a vector quantity, because its effect depends on the direction as well as on the magnitude of the action. Forces are classified as either contact or body forces. A contact force is produced by direct physical contact; an example is the force exerted on a
Quantity the principal distinction between continuity (continuum) and discontinuity. Under the name of multitude comes what is discontinuous and discrete and divisible ultimately into indivisibles, such as: "army, fleet, flock, government, company, party, people, mess (military), chorus, crowd", and "number"; all which are cases of collective nouns. Under the name of magnitude comes what is continuous and unified and divisible only into smaller divisibles, such as: "matter, mass, energy, liquid, material"—all cases of non-collective nouns. Along with analyzing its nature and classification, the issues of quantity involve such closely related topics as the relation of magnitudes and multitudes, dimensionality, equality, proportion,