Reviving Gravity's Aether in Einstein's Universe
Abstract
Einstein's theory of general relativity describes gravity as the interaction of particles with space-time geometry, as opposed to interacting with a physical fluid, as in the old gravitational aether theories. Moreover, any theoretical physicist would tell you that, despite its counter-intuitive structure, general relativity is one of the simplest, most beautiful, and successful theories in physics, that has withstood a diverse battery of precision tests over the past century. So, is there any motivation to relax its fundamental principle, and re-introduce a gravitational aether? Here, I give a short and non-technical account of why quantum gravity and cosmological constant problems provide this motivation.
Cite
@article{arxiv.1004.2901,
title = {Reviving Gravity's Aether in Einstein's Universe},
author = {Niayesh Afshordi},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1004.2901},
year = {2010}
}
Comments
4 pages, 1 figure, to appear in Physics in Canada