Published online by Cambridge University Press: 20 November 2018
Computation of the velocity of a given motion depends on measurement of nearby position changes only. Computation of acceleration, on the other hand, depends on measurement of nearby changes in velocity. But since velocity vectors are attached to positions so that even nearby ones are not a priori comparable, acceleration is not computable until a rule for comparison of vectors along a curve is given. Such a rule-parallel translation or linear connexion - exists automatically in Euclidean spaces. For motions in more general manifolds, for example (semi-) Riemannian ones, parallel translation is a less obvious consequence of the metric properties.