In science, a force is any influence that tends to change the state of rest of a body or its uniform motion in a straight line. [1] In modern terms, forces are said to be mediated by particles or entities called "force carriers" or field particles. [2] Irish mathematical physicist William Hamilton, one of the founders of the science of dynamics, the study of the motion of bodies under the action of forces, defines the science of force as: [3]


References
1. Clark, John O.E. (2004). The Essential Dictionary of Science. New York: Barnes & Noble Books.
2. Ford, Kenneth W. (2004). The Quantum World, (pg. 46). Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
3. Hamilton, W.R. (1834). “On a general method in dynamics by which the study of the motions of all free systems of attracting or repelling points is reduced to the search and differentiation of one central relation, or characteristic function.” Philos. Trans. R. Soc. London, 124:247-308.