Related papers: Precis of General Relativity
It is suggested that modern techniques of radio ranging when applied to study the motion of the Moon, can improve the accuracy of tests of relativistic gravitation obtained with currently operating laser ranging techniques. Other auxillary…
General Relativity is considered to be so far the best gravitation theory. However it is quite hard to use in real situations. The root of these difficulties lays in the non-linearity of the theory. Our aim was not to linearize the theory,…
We investigate the fate of determinism in general relativity (GR), comparing the philosopher's account with the physicist's well-posed initial value formulations. The fate of determinism is interwoven with the question of what it is for a…
In this note, we discuss the significance of the general principle of relativity for a physical theory that abandons the newtonian concept of force and, hence, uses an entirely different conception for the ``cause'' behind motions of…
We summarize the main ideas of General Relativity and Lorentzian geometry, leading to a proof of the simplest of the celebrated Hawking-Penrose singularity theorems. The reader is assumed to be familiar with Riemannian geometry and point…
If a clock, mathematically modeled by a parametrized timelike curve in a general-relativistic spacetime, is given, the radar method assigns a time and a distance to every event which is sufficiently close to the clock. Several geometric…
This review presents an overview of various kinds of models -- physical, abstract, mathematical, visual -- that can be used to present the concepts and applications of Einstein's general theory of relativity at the level of undergraduate…
We present several philosophical ideas emerging from the studies of complex systems. We make a brief introduction to the basic concepts of complex systems, for then defining "abstraction levels". These are useful for representing…
An extension of the theory of General Relativity is proposed, based on pseudo-complex space-time coordinates. The new theory corresponds to the introduction of two, in general different, metrics which are connected through specific…
We present three natural but distinct formalisations of Einstein's special principle of relativity, and demonstrate the relationships between them. In particular, we prove that they are logically distinct, but that they can be made…
This paper has pedagogical motivation. It is not uncommon that students have great difficulty in accepting the new concepts of standard special relativity, since these seem contrary to common sense. Experience shows that geometrical or…
Today, the motion of spacecrafts is still described according to the classical Newtonian equations plus the so-called "relativistic corrections", computed with the required precision using the Post-(Post-)Newtonian formalism. The current…
The motivation for relativistic world is built on robust common sense and on general physical principles which are accessible to even a school student. Author likes to call it a farmer's perspective.
The locality hypothesis is generally considered necessary for the study of the kinematics of non-inertial systems in special relativity. In this paper we discuss this hypothesis, showing the necessity of an improvement, in order to get a…
The extremely high precision of current astronomical observations demands a much better theoretical treatment of relativistic effects in the propagation of electromagnetic signals through variable gravitational fields of isolated…
The problem of characterization of Gibbs random fields is considered. Various Gibbsianness criteria are obtained using the earlier developed one-point framework which in particular allows to describe random fields by means of either…
The project SYPOR wishes to use the global navigation satellite system GALILEO as an autonomous relativistic positioning system for the Earth. Motivations and a sketch of the basic concepts underlying the project are presented. For non…
The principle which allows to construct new physical theories on the basis of classical mechanics by reduction of the number of its axiom without engaging new postulates is formulated. The arising incompleteness of theory manifests itself…
Reference systems and frames are crucial for high precision absolute astrometric work, and their foundations must be well-defined. The current frame, the International Celestial Reference Frame, will be discussed: its history, the use of…
A 4-dimensional relativistic positioning system for a general spacetime is constructed by using the so called "emission coordinates". The results apply in a small region around the world line of an accelerated observer carrying a Fermi…