A relaxed spring has no EPE. It is then stretched.
Would we all agree in this condition that the spring
has experienced an increase of EPE? If this is so, how
pray tell did it acquire this energy if there was no
energy transfer to the spring??? It seems to me that
the clearest way to explain this process (at least to
the beginning student) is that the process of doing
work on the spring has increased its EPE and that this
energy came from whatever outside agent did the
stretching. No? John Barrere
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This posting is the position of the writer, not that of SUNY-BSC, NAU or the AAPT.