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Brahmagupta (c. 598 – c. 668 AD) was the first Indian scholar to describe gravity as an attractive force: [38] [39] [failed verification] [40] [41] [failed verification] The earth on all its sides is the same; all people on the earth stand upright, and all heavy things fall down to the earth by a law of nature, for it is the nature of the ...
1911 – Max von Laue publishes the first textbook on special relativity. [52] 1911 – Albert Einstein explains the need to replace both special relativity and Newton's theory of gravity; he realizes that the principle of equivalence only holds locally, not globally. [53] 1912 – Friedrich Kottler applies the notion of tensors to curved ...
In physics, gravity (from Latin gravitas 'weight' [1]) is a fundamental interaction primarily observed as a mutual attraction between all things that have mass.Gravity is, by far, the weakest of the four fundamental interactions, approximately 10 38 times weaker than the strong interaction, 10 36 times weaker than the electromagnetic force, and 10 29 times weaker than the weak interaction.
The publication of the law has become known as the "first great unification", as it marked the unification of the previously described phenomena of gravity on Earth with known astronomical behaviors. [1] [2] [3] This is a general physical law derived from empirical observations by what Isaac Newton called inductive reasoning. [4]
The first new effect is the gravitational frequency shift of light. Consider two observers aboard an accelerating rocket-ship. Aboard such a ship, there is a natural concept of "up" and "down": the direction in which the ship accelerates is "up", and free-floating objects accelerate in the opposite direction, falling "downward".
In addition, general relativity is inconsistent with quantum mechanics, the physical theory that describes the wave–particle duality of matter, and quantum mechanics does not currently describe gravitational attraction at relevant (microscopic) scales. There is a great deal of speculation in the physics community as to the modifications that ...
This timeline lists significant discoveries in physics and the laws of nature, including experimental discoveries, theoretical proposals that were confirmed experimentally, and theories that have significantly influenced current thinking in modern physics. Such discoveries are often a multi-step, multi-person process.
The first observation of a decrease in orbital period due to the emission of gravitational waves was made by Hulse and Taylor, using the binary pulsar PSR1913+16 they had discovered in 1974. This was the first detection of gravitational waves, albeit indirect, for which they were awarded the 1993 Nobel Prize in physics. [98]