Question

What is the unit of work;?explain whether the unit of work is a fundamental or drived unit.

Answer 1

Answer:

Most of the other answers point out (correctly) that, as we have currently defined the base units, energy (work) is derived. But it’s important to understand that our current setup is totally arbitrary. We consider length (meters) to be fundamental because we (used to) think that length was easy to define and measure. Now, length is defined in terms of c (the fundamental constant known as the speed of light). So, if we decided that energy was fundamental and therefore a base unit (the joule) and, given that mass and energy are equivalent—related by c^2—then length would no longer be a base unit but would be derived from time and mass/energy.