What causes warped spacetime according to general relativity?

It is here that Einstein connected the dots to suggest that gravity is the warping of space and time. Gravity is the curvature of the universe, caused by massive bodies, which determines the path that objects travel. That curvature is dynamical, moving as those objects move.

Why does energy warp spacetime?

Since matter carries energy (via Einstein’s famous relation that energy is mass times the speed of light squared), such objects will have a gravitational field and so they will distort space-time. This gravitational field is in addition to that produced by the matter of the charge or magnet.

Why does spacetime curve with mass?

According to Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity, gravity is no longer a force that acts on massive bodies, as viewed by Isaac Newton’s universal gravitation. Instead, general relativity links gravity to the geometry of spacetime itself, and particularly to its curvature.

What is the relationship between space-time and mass?

Einstein discovered that there is a relationship between mass, gravity and spacetime. Mass distorts spacetime, causing it to curve. Gravity can be described as motion caused in curved spacetime .

What does warping space mean?

It is easiest to describe it as simply following a path along spacetime, with the warp towards the more massive object being the path of least resistance.

Why does gravity warp space?

The Gravity of the Situation Gravity pulls on everything that has mass and warps space-time, the underlying fabric of the universe. When light passes close to a massive object, space-time is so warped that it curves the path the light must follow.

What is energy in space-time?

The presence of matter and energy in space tells spacetime how to curve, and that curved spacetime tells matter and energy how to move. But there’s a free parameter as well: the zero-point energy of space, which enters General Relativity as a cosmological constant.

What is special and general relativity?

Special relativity applies to all physical phenomena in the absence of gravity. General relativity explains the law of gravitation and its relation to other forces of nature. It applies to the cosmological and astrophysical realm, including astronomy.

How does mass affect the curvature of spacetime?

Mass or energy may be stored in various forms but they ultimately have the very same impact on the spacetime curvature (and other things). Some of the forms of mass-energy look more like mass, other looks like what we used to call energy but there’s only one type of quantity that curves the spacetime and one quantity that is conserved.

Why does matter warp spacetime?

The latter contains numbers, especially the density of mass-energy and momentum and their flux (which also depends on the local pressure). Because matter carries mass-energy, it makes spacetime warp. Any other form of mass-energy will do the same thing.

Why is relativity so different from classical physics?

Relativity has a different equation for (almost) everything. It’s like classical physics just isn’t good enough. There’s a different one for time (time dilation) and a different one for space (length contraction) and now there’s a different one for momentum (relativistic momentum) and another different one for energy (relativistic energy).

What experiments did Isaac Newton do to prove gravity?

Using experiments in which he filled wooden boxes with different materials and suspended them from strings to construct pendulums, Newton discovered that inertial mass and gravitational mass are directly proportional. Physicists have since customarily treated inertial and gravitational mass as numerically equal.