English

Lorentz from Galilei, deductively

High Energy Physics - Theory 2020-10-13 v1 General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology History and Philosophy of Physics

Abstract

I argue that in the Lagrangian formulation of standard, Galilei-invariant Newtonian mechanics there are subtle but concrete signs of {\em Lorentz} invariance. In fact, in a specific sense made explicit in the paper, Newtonian mechanics is more Lorentz-invariant than Galilei-invariant. So, special relativity could have been discovered deductively, before there were any indications---such as Maxwell's equations---that Galilei relativity had to be modified. To make this anti-historical exercise less academic, I derive certain velocity-dependent corrections to long-range interactions between spinless point particles. Such corrections are universal; in particular, they do not depend on the spin of the field mediating such interactions or on how strongly coupled such a field is. I discuss potential applications to the post-Newtonian expansion of general relativity.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2010.04743,
  title  = {Lorentz from Galilei, deductively},
  author = {Alberto Nicolis},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2010.04743},
  year   = {2020}
}

Comments

10 pages

R2 v1 2026-06-23T19:13:11.801Z