How to move an object in a circular path?

Can an object move in a circular path without being accelerated?

• Answer:

  "yes move a remote controle car on a patch of low friction ground and move it in a circle. basic physics" I believe the answer above is not true. Newton's first law (basic physics) states: Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it. A circular path is not a uniform motion. Moving a car around in a circle means that it is being accelerated towards the center of the circle. If you could do the above experiment under perfect "frictionless circomstances" then the toy car would eventuall come to a stop, without using the brakes (provided the car is not being propelled forward by its engine). I'm no scientist, but I do not think it is possible for an object to move in a circular path without having to accelerate it towards the center of the circle, unless you can somehow bend time-space (like gravity does). When an object is moving in a circular path, it's constantly changing it's direction. thus the velocity is changing. Change is velocity states that the object is accelerating. ======================================= The problem that everybody above this line is having is: They're trying to stay consistent with the universally held but mistaken idea that 'acceleration' means 'speeding up'. It doesn't ! 'Acceleration' means 'any change in speed or direction of motion'. That could mean speeding up, slowing down, starting out from a stop, rolling to a stop on grass, or moving along any path that's not a straight line. They're all 'acceleration'. An object moving in a circular path is constantly changing its direction of motion, so there's acceleration there. An object can not move in a circular path without acceleration, because the very bending of the path away from a straight line is acceleration. Regardless of what's happening or not happening to its speed.