Explainer: What’s the difference between mass and weight?

[rangerrebew]

Explainer: What’s the difference between mass and weight?
Though mass and weight are related, they’re actually quite different things. Jake Port explains.
 

We often use the words ‘mass’ and ‘weight’ interchangeably, but they mean quite different things. Your mass is the same no matter where you go in the universe; your weight, on the other hand, changes from place to place. Mass is measured in kilograms; even though we usually talk about weight in kilograms, strictly speaking it should be measured in newtons, the units of force.

Mass is a measurement of an object’s tendency to resist changing its state of motion, known as inertia. Left to its own devices, an object will stay put or move in a straight line - think of a puck on an air hockey table. Unless some force - like friction, or banging into a wall - acts on the puck, it will keep sliding on the same path forever. Mass is a measure of how much force it will take to change that path.

https://cosmosmagazine.com/physics/explainer-what-s-the-difference-between-mass-and-weight

[Elderberry]

Outside the SI system, other units of mass include:

    the slug (sl) is an Imperial unit of mass (about 14.6 kg).
    the pound (lb) is a unit of both mass and force, used mainly in the United States (about 0.45 kg or 4.5 N). In scientific contexts where pound (force) and pound       (mass) need to be distinguished, SI units are usually used instead.
    the Planck mass (mP) is the maximum mass of point particles (about 2.18×10−8 kg). It is used in particle physics.
    the solar mass (M☉) is defined as the mass of the Sun. It is primarily used in astronomy to compare large masses such as stars or galaxies (≈1.99×1030 kg).
    the mass of a very small particle may be identified by its inverse Compton wavelength (1 cm−1 ≈ 3.52×10−41 kg).
    the mass of a very large star or black hole may be identified with its Schwarzschild radius (1 cm ≈ 6.73×1024 kg).

[Oceander]

Mass is how much stuff is there.  Weight is the force needed to balance the gravitational force pulling on that stuff in a given gravitational field.

[Sanguine]

Gravity.

[Elderberry]

[Smokin Joe]

Funny, we learned it this way:

https://study.com/academy/lesson/gravitational-force-definition-equation-examples.html

[InHeavenThereIsNoBeer]

There was a short lived Sci-Fi show on a major network (I THINK it was Defying Gravity on ABC) which demonstrated the difference.  There was a scene where members of the crew were transporting a large object which was "weightless", which also ended up taking off someone's hand (or something like that).

[InHeavenThereIsNoBeer]

Funny, we learned it this way:

https://study.com/academy/lesson/gravitational-force-definition-equation-examples.html

Close, but the denominator should be delta-t^2, where delta-t is the time between now and last call.

[Smokin Joe]

Close, but the denominator should be delta-t^2, where delta-t is the time between now and last call.

I asked a question related to this formula and others which almost got me kicked out of a College physics class.