General theory of relativity clearly explained

aditya23456

I m new to general theory of relativity,so I would like to study it but wikipedia has so many links which is really difficult to sort..Anyone please suggest a better link so that I can learn GR without any difficulty.THANKS IN ADVANCE

George Jones

What background do yo have in physics and math?

aditya23456

physics...but can understand maths if explained a bit descriptively..I cant get manifold concept clearly..So a link with better mathematical understanding is what I m searching for..thanks if you help me out for this..

DrGreg

Do you already know much about the special theory of relativity? You need to know that before you move on to the general theory.

aditya23456

Yea..I understood lorentz transformation but with tensors it has been a mystery for me..I cant visualise the situation which is needed for learning application of GR

bhalodi.dhruv

please. can anyone post a link explaining stuff graphically and application point of view.!!

MiljenkoM

Try this this Lecture Notes on General Relativity.

pervect

I'd suggest Taylor's "Exploring Black Holes". You'll eventually have to buy the book if you like it, but you can find the first two chapters online at Taylor's website:
http://www.eftaylor.com/download.htm...ral_relativity

Also worthy of note is "General Relativity from A to B" by Geroch (which is also a book).

Ben Crowell, a sometimes moderator here, also has a free online book, I'm not quite sure where it's at.

Finally, if it's tensors that are the issue, and if you are already familiar with electromagnetism to some extent, you might try learning about them in the context of classical electromagnetism first. I think Griffiths and Jackson's E&M books both have at least a little bit about tensors.

[add]Jackson isn't particularly math-friendly (understatement), but it's still easier to learn tensors in a familiar context before trying to apply them to GR.

jtbell

Griffiths has what looks like a decent introduction to tensors in the context of SR and E&M, although I've never actually worked my way through it myself.

Naty1

Yale Relativitylectures here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pHfFSQ6pLGU


Ben Crowell's book here:

http://www.lightandmatter.com/html_books/genrel/


A summary of GR here:

http://brucel.spoonfedrelativity.com/

And a hodgepodge of links:

http://casa.colorado.edu/~ajsh/relativity.html

and Special Relativity http://casa.colorado.edu/~ajsh/sr/sr.shtml:

phyzguy

I suggest to get a copy of Misner, Thorne, and Wheeler - Gravitation. It's a big, thick book, but filled with clear explanations. There are copies available online.

pervect

I like MTW - it'll be a more advanced treatment than "Exploring black holes", however.