Why does something heavy dropping into a container sometimes make the container jump upwards?

Question

I saw a TikTok of the contents of a huge can of refried beans all entering into a pot below the can at once, which caused the pot to jump upwards about half an inch. Why is that?

In: 1

Answer 1

The physics involved are explained by Newton’s third law.

For every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction. The statement means that the size of the forces created by the first object (the beans,) equals the size of the force on the second object (the pot.) The force, which is energy, is directly down on the pot. That energy has to go somewhere, it can’t go down so it bounces the pot up.