Essential Relativity: Special, General, and Cosmological - Brossura

Rindler, Wolfgang

Brossura

ISBN 10: 3540100903 ISBN 13: 9783540100904

Casa editrice: Springer Berlin Heidelberg, 1977

Riassunto

From the reviews of the second edition: "It is the book par excellence for the nonrelativist who is at home with mathematics...What gives the book its outstanding quality is Professor Rindler's profound understanding of the ideas behind the formulas and his remarkable ability to share this understanding with the reader. In graceful prose he makes deep things simple. Under his guidance the basic concepts come vividly to life and acquire a force of their own so that the mathematics takes on a secondary role...With its combination of substantial mathematics, insight, and physical down-to-earthedness, the book is a delight in every way." American Mathematical Monthly

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Contenuti

1 The Rise and Fall of Absolute Space.- 1.1 Definition of Relativity.- 1.2 Newton’s Laws.- 1.3 The Galilean Transformation.- 1.4 The Set of All Inertial Frames.- 1.5 Newtonian Relativity.- 1.6 Newton’s Absolute Space.- 1.7 Objections to Newton’s Absolute Space.- 1.8 Maxwell’s Ether.- 1.9 Where is Maxwell’s Ether?.- 1.10 Lorentz’s Ether Theory.- 1.11 The Relativity Principle.- 1.12 Arguments for the Relativity Principle.- 1.13 Maxwellian Relativity.- 1.14 Origins of General Relativity.- 1.15 Mach’s Principle.- 1.16 Consequences of Mach’s Principle.- 1.17 Cosmology.- 1.18 Inertial and Gravitational Mass.- 1.19 The Equivalence Principle.- 1.20 The Semistrong Equivalence Principle.- 1.21 Consequences of the Equivalence Principle.- 2 Einsteinian Kinematics.- 2.1 Basic Features of Special Relativity.- 2.2 On the Nature of Physical Laws.- 2.3 An Archetypal Relativistic Argument.- 2.4 The Relativity of Simultaneity.- 2.5 The Coordinate Lattice.- 2.6 The Lorentz Transformation.- 2.7 Properties of the Lorentz Transformation.- 2.8 Hyperbolic Forms of the Lorentz Transformation.- 2.9 Graphical Representation of the Lorentz Transformation.- 2.10 World-picture and World-map.- 2.11 Length Contraction.- 2.12 Length Contraction Paradoxes.- 2.13 Time Dilation.- 2.14 The Twin Paradox.- 2.15 Velocity Transformation.- 2.16 Proper Acceleration.- 2.17 Special Relativity without the Second Postulate.- 3 Einsteinian Optics.- 3.1 The Drag Effect.- 3.2 The Doppler Effect.- 3.3 Aberration and the Visual Appearance of Moving Objects.- 4 Spacetime and Four-Vectors.- 4.1 Spacetime.- 4.2 Three-Vectors.- 4.3 Four-Vectors.- 4.4 Four-Tensors.- 4.5 The Three-Dimensional Minkowski Diagram.- 4.6 Wave Motion.- 5 Relativistic Particle Mechanics.- 5.1 Domain of Sufficient Validity of Newton’s Laws.- 5.2 Why Gravity Does not Fit Naturally into Special Relativity.- 5.3 Relativistic Inertial Mass.- 5.4 Four-Vector Formulation of Relativistic Mechanics.- 5.5 A Note on Galilean Four-Vectors.- 5.6 Equivalence of Mass and Energy.- 5.7 The Center of Momentum Frame.- 5.8 Relativistic Billiards.- 5.9 Threshold Energies.- 5.10 Three-Force and Four-Force.- 5.11 De Broglie Waves.- 5.12 Photons. The Compton Effect.- 5.13 The Energy Tensor of Dust.- 6 Relativity and Electrodynamics.- 6.1 Transformation of the Field Vectors.- 6.2 Magnetic Deflection of Charged Particles.- 6.3 The Field of a Uniformly Moving Charge.- 6.4 The Field of an Infinite Straight Current.- 7 Basic Ideas of General Relativity.- 7.1 Curved Surfaces.- 7.2 Curved Spaces of Higher Dimensions.- 7.3 Riemannian Spaces.- 7.4 A Plan for General Relativity.- 7.5 The Gravitational Doppler Effect.- 7.6 Metric of Static Fields.- 7.7 Geodesics in Static Fields.- 8 Formal Development of General Relativity.- 8.1 Tensors in General Relativity.- 8.2 The Vacuum Field Equations of General Relativity.- 8.3 The Schwarzschild Solution.- 8.4 Rays and Orbits in Schwarzschild Space.- 8.5 The Schwarzschild Horizon, Gravitational Collapse, and Black Holes.- 8.6 Kruskal Space and the Uniform Acceleration Field.- 8.7 A General-Relativistic “Proof” of E = mc2.- 8.8 A Plane-Fronted Gravity Wave.- 8.9 The Laws of Physics in Curved Spacetime.- 8.10 The Field Equations in the Presence of Matter.- 8.11 From Modified Schwarzschild to de Sitter Space.- 8.12 The Linear Approximation to GR.- 9 Cosmology.- 9.1 The Basic Facts.- 9.2 Apparent Difficulties of Prerelativistic Cosmology.- 9.3 Cosmological Relativity: The Cosmological Principle.- 9.4 Milne’s Model.- 9.5 The Robertson-Walker Metric.- 9.6 Rubber Models, Red Shifts, and Horizons.- 9.7 Comparison with Observation.- 9.8 Cosmic Dynamics According to Pseudo-Newtonian Theory.- 9.9 Cosmic Dynamics According to General Relativity.- 9.10 The Friedmann Models.- 9.11 Once Again, Comparison with Observation.- 9.12 Mach’s Principle Reexamined.- Appendices.- Appendix I: Curvature Tensor Components for the Diagonal Metric.- Appendix II: How to “Invent” Maxwell’s Theory.- Exercises.

Dettagli dell'edizione

• Editore: Springer Berlin Heidelberg
• Data di pubblicazione: 1977
• Lingua: Inglese
• ISBN 10: 3540100903
• ISBN 13: 9783540100904
• Rilegatura: Copertina flessibile
• Numero edizione: 2
• Numero di pagine: 308
• Contatto del produttore: non disponibile
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