Theory and Experiment in Gravitational Physics 2nd Edition by Clifford M. Will (PDF)

Description

The 2015 centenary of the publication of Einstein’s general theory of relativity, and the first detection of gravitational waves have focused renewed attention on the question of whether Einstein was right. This review of experimental gravity provides a detailed survey of the intensive testing of Einstein’s theory of gravity, including tests in the emerging strong-field dynamical regime. It discusses the theoretical frameworks needed to analyze gravitational theories and interpret experiments. Completely revised and updated, this new edition features coverage of new alternative theories of gravity, a unified treatment of gravitational radiation, and the implications of the latest binary pulsar observations. It spans the earliest tests involving the Solar System to the latest tests using gravitational waves detected from merging black holes and neutron stars. It is a comprehensive reference for researchers and graduate students working in general relativity, cosmology, particle physics and astrophysics.

User’s Reviews

Reviews from Amazon users which were colected at the time this book was published on the website:

⭐Review of the earlier edition of this book, reproduced here:This book presents the “theory of gravitational theories” developed by the experimental gravitational community in order to systematically evaluate whether any given gravitational theory agrees with the myriad observations available. A comprehensive reporting of the gravitational observations and experiments employed is given as well, providing a complete source in one place for the subject of experimental gravitation. Clifford Will is a top leader in this field, having been a principal developer of some of the key methodologies employed (such as the PPN formalism). As this book is simply a reporting of this body of work developed over decades by the entire experimental gravitation community (a large body of researchers), it does not reflect any particular biases or assumptions made by the author alone. The book is NEUTRAL as regards general relativity (GR), as it is subjected to the same “evaluation system” that any theory must pass through to be considered observationally viable. An assembly of the most popular contenders are also subjected to the same “gauntlet” in this book. GR is the only theory that passes though the gauntlet in one piece (though there are some highly contrived parameter dependent theories that pass through if the parameters are adjusted such that they essentially reduce to GR). This is the primary reason why GR theory is favored to this day. All I can say to any budding theorists that either ignore or buck the experimental gravitation community’s evaluation system, and therefore this book, is “heaven help you.”Updated book:This welcome update not only reports the evaluations of observations/experiments performed since the earlier edition, it also updates the post-Minkowskian/Newtonian calculational method utilized into the “modern approach” (with Will one of the principal developers). This combined with “Gravity: Newtonian, Post-Newtonian, Relativistic” (Poisson & Will) for pedagogical and developmental background, provide everything that a theorist would need in order to observationally evaluate her/his pet theory.

⭐My goal is learning general relativity. When I get far enough along, this will fill in the important link between theory and experiment. For know, I am working through a basic text which happens to be a free PDF download. It is Spacetime Physics (2nd ed.) by Taylor and Wheeler. It is downloadable from Taylor’s website.

⭐This book is not suitable for viewing on a Kindle screen ( mine is a 6 inch ) as the all-important equations are almost impossible to see. I shall purchase the printed version when it comes out. It was a poor purchase by me.

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