Question

By the 15th century, people on ships and boats solved the problem of finding out what direction they were
sailing in and, perhaps even more importantly, what direction they needed to go to get back home. Before
that time, sailors rarely ventured out of sight of land and instead relied on visible landmarks to get from
place to place. This limited traders and navies to routes close to shore, but the invention of the compass
changed all that.
The magnetic compass contains a magnetic element that aligns itself with the earth’s magnetic field.
Think of the earth as a big magnet. It has two magnetic poles, oriented north and south that are very close
to the geographic North and South Poles. When a magnet or a magnetic element (such as the mineral
lodestone or a ferrous metal that has been magnetized) is allowed to float freely, it will effectively point
north and south, thus showing you which direction you are going in relation to that axis.
Question 21
The compass always point towards the north. Which one of the following is the correct explanation for
this?
a) The Earth is a magnet and therefore it attracts the metallic needle of the compass.
b) The magnetic needle of the compass aligns itself with the Earth’s magnetic field.
c) The Earth’s south pole does not have a magnetic pull hence the compass points towards the
north.
d) The needle of the compass always points in the upwar

Answer 1

Answer:

the required answer is c.