Entry 14: Your Influence

Newton's Third Law states: "The mutual forces of action and reaction between two bodies are equal, opposite and collinear". How does this apply to relationships between people? In what ways are the actions and reactions between people equal, opposite, or collinear (whatever "collinear" means)? When you think of people that have influenced you, do you think that there was an equal influence the other way? An opposite influence? A collinear influence? What influences do you think you might have on other people? Will you ever end up on someone"s "influential person" college application essay? Would you want to be? Explain.

• An example of using Newton's third law to describe the relationship between people could be when one person treats another person a certain way, and in response the other person treats the first person back in the same way. Another way to describe this would be to say a person influences me, which changes me, and then I in turn influence the person back. I believe that the reactions between people are equal when two people treat each other with the same treatment. For most cases, when one person treats you in a friendly way, you would also treat that person in a friendly way. Reactions between people are opposite when the treatments differ extremely. For example, there are sometimes love and hate relationships that are really complicated (and I would prefer not to get involved into any one of them). As for collinear, I would say it's very similar to the treatments in equal reactions. When there are people who influenced me, there was an equal influence on the other party as well (in the case for my significant person essay), though it was a very subtle influence. In the end, the two of us maintained quite a friendly relationship, helping each other on occasions. My main influence on others involves academic aid for other students (when I can help). I don't think that I'll end up as another person's influential person and I also don't want to be because it's going to make things awkward.