- #1
StephenPrivitera
- 363
- 0
In my text, it says that the conservation laws alone do not suffice to predict the motions of two particles if the collision occurs in two dimensions. It is generally required that we know one of the final quantities in order to predict the rest. Does this mean that it is impossible to predict the outcome of a two dimensional collision using only the initial quantities? That is, is there some other unknown quantity (ie, other than velocity and mass) that would allow one to predict the outcome?