Related papers: Philosophy and Relativity
Einstein said that gravity is an acceleration like any other acceleration. But gravity causes relativistic effects at non-relativistic speeds; so gravity could have relativistic origins. And since the strong force is thought to cause most…
Lorentz [of the Lorentz transforms and Lorentz contractions fame] contended against Einstein that there had to be a medium in which electro-magnetic waves exist and propagate, and that that would of necessity be an absolute frame of…
Einstein presented the Hole Argument against General Covariance, understood as invariance with respect to a change of coordinates, as a consequence of his initial failure to obtain covariant equations that, in the weak static limit, contain…
This is an English translation of the Italian version of an encyclopedia chapter that appeared in the Italian Encyclopedia of the Physical Sciences, edited by Bruno Bertotti (1994). Following requests from colleagues we have decided to make…
It is very likely that the quantum description of spacetime is quite different from what we perceive at large scales, $l\gg (G\hbar/c^3)^{1/2}$. The long wave length description of spacetime, based on Einstein's equations, is similar to the…
One century after its formulation, Einstein's general relativity has made remarkable predictions and turned out to be compatible with all experimental tests. Most of these tests probe the theory in the weak-field regime, and there are…
This book is a philosopher's introduction to the idea that our universe is just one of many universes. I present and assess three versions of the idea: one version from philosophy, and two from physics. In short, they are: all the logically…
Starting from first principles and general assumptions Newton's law of gravitation is shown to arise naturally and unavoidably in a theory in which space is emergent through a holographic scenario. Gravity is explained as an entropic force…
The quantum-mechanical description of the world, including human observers, makes substantial use of entanglement. In order to understand this, we need to adopt concepts of truth, probability and time which are unfamiliar in modern…
Hubble's announcement of the magnitude-redshift relation \cite{Hub29} brought about a major change in our understanding of the Universe. After tracing the pre-history of Hubble's work, and the hiatus in our understanding which his…
The more precise definition and the more fundamental understanding of the concepts of time, energy, entropy and information are building upon the new, relativistic foundation of gravity. This lecture is an attempt to explain the basic…
We consider the interaction of gravity, as expressed by Einstein's Equations of General Relativity, to other force fields. We describe some recent results, discussing both the mathematics, and the physical interpretations. These results…
In glaring contrast to its indisputable century-old experimental success, the ultimate objects and meaning of quantum physics remain a matter of vigorous debate among physicists and philosophers of science. This article attempts to shed new…
Why is it interesting to try to understand the origin of the universe? Everything we observe today, including our existence, arose from that event. Although we still do not have a theory that allows us to describe the origin itself, the…
It is shown as experiments and theories about the nature of light led to the special theory of relativity. The most important facts for the emergence of the theory proposed by Einstein in 1905 are presented.
Scalar fields have had a long and controversial life in gravity theories, having progressed through many deaths and resurrections. The first scientific gravity theory, Newton's, was that of a scalar potential field, so it was natural for…
The equivalence principle was formulated by Einstein in an attempt to extend the concept of inertial frames to accelerated frames, thereby bringing in gravity. In recent decades, it has been realised that gravity is linked not only with…
For the last 100 years, General Relativity (GR) has taken over the gravitational theory mantle held by Newtonian Gravity for the previous 200 years. This article reviews the status of GR in terms of its self-consistency, completeness, and…
The Einstein theories of space-time and gravity as well the stander cosmology are reconstructed thoroughly in this paper based on flat reference frame. The rational parts of the Einstein theories are reserved while the irrational parts…
Relying on a fundamental empirical identity of heavy and inertial mass it is proposed to bring a status of general theory of relativity (GTR) of Einstein up to a level of Unified Field Theory. To do this, a thoroughgoing revision of…