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RESEARCH PRODUCT

Classical Field Theory of Gravitation

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The classical field theories developed in the preceding chapters all have in common that they are formulated on a flat spacetime, i.e. on a four-manifold which is a Euclidean space and which locally is decomposable into a direct product M 4 = ℝR3 ℝR of a physical space ℝR3 x of motions, and a time axis ℝRt. The first factor is the threedimensional space as it is perceived by an observer at rest while the time axis displays the (coordinate) time that he/she measures on his/her clocks. This spacetime is endowed with the Poincare group as the invariance group of physical laws and inherits the corresponding specific causality structure.