Thread: What Are Vectors ???

I am new to this forum... nd Also new to physics... yesterday our teacher gives lecture about Vectors... but I can't understand any thing... doesn't know why ????
I want to ask that what are vectors and... Why we use vectors ?????

Vectors are quantities which have both magnitude and direction. You can picture them as arrows - an arrow has a certain length, and points in a certain direction. That's what a vector is.
We use them in physics because many of the things we investigate have not just magnitude, but direction as well. Trivial example : the velocity of an object. When an object moves it has both a certain speed, and it moves in a certain direction. You could of course treat those separately, but it turns out it is much easier to combine them both into a vector - the velocity.

what is mean by addition of vectors and it's components...

Originally Posted by Xidike

what is mean by addition of vectors and it's components...

You can add two vectors together - practically that means you line up to arrows end-to-end. Mathematically you do it by simply adding the respective components of the two vectors.

what are it's components...?

Scalar multipliers of a privileged set called "basis vectors".

Originally Posted by Xidike

what are it's components...?

One way to represent a vector is to give a set of standard numbers ("scalars"). For a 2D space, we give two, one for the x-axis and one for the y-axis. If you draw an arrow between the 0,0 point to the point given by your vector, you have an arrow of a certain length in a certain direction. These numbers are the components.