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XIX.—A Theory of Regraduation in General Relativity

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  14 February 2012

A. G. Walker
Affiliation:
Department of Pure Mathematics, University of Liverpool

Extract

1. It was remarked by me a few years ago that temporal regraduations, other than trivial changes of zero and unit, had not so far been considered in General Relativity. An interesting paper by Dr G. C. McVittie has now appeared in which regraduations are examined in certain spherically symmetric space-times. Under the assumptions made by McVittie it is shown that regraduations can exist for some but not all space-times, those for which they can exist being of a very special form which excludes many space-times generally regarded as significant or interesting. In the present paper I take the matter further and discuss the problem with more generality. It will be shown that the existence of non-trivial regraduations depends firstly upon which theory is being assumed for the derivation of the conservation equations There are two alternatives, and regraduations are found to be excluded by one, the “geodesic” theory, but not necessarily by the other, the “equivalence” theory.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © Royal Society of Edinburgh 1946

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References

REFERENCES TO LITERATURE

Eddington, A. S., 1930. The Mathematical Theory of Relativity, Cambridge.Google Scholar
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