Axioms Argument

[quantpie]

I believe that the first student is right, if we consider the actual meaning of the word “prove”.
Since Newton’s Laws are mathematical expressions of natural occuring phenomenons, we cannot actually prove them but validate their existance through experimental measurements.
Nevertheless, the second student is not completely wrong as one law can be derived from another. For example we could derive the 1st law by simply using the 2nd and making the assumption that the acceleration is equal to zero.
To conclude, i think that the cause of this argument is the misplaced use of the word “prove” instead of “derive”.

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