I Movement of a guitar string at relativistic speeds

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The discussion centers on the movement of a guitar string at relativistic speeds, exploring whether this can be understood without delving into String Theory. The original poster seeks guidance on classical relativistic strings, expressing concern about the complexity of String Theory and its requirements. Participants clarify that while any object, including a guitar, can move at relativistic speeds, the concept of an unbreakable string is problematic due to implications of infinite speed of sound. They suggest looking into relativistic continuum mechanics and provide resources for further study, emphasizing that the string's behavior can be modeled without engaging with String Theory. The conversation highlights the distinction between mechanical relativistic strings and those in String Theory, ultimately guiding the poster toward accessible resources.
  • #61
If anyone sees this, I'd like to ask another question:

How do we know that the Nambu-Goto action is the one we want to minimize to get the correct equation of motion for the string?
 
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  • #62
Joda said:
If anyone sees this, I'd like to ask another question
Maybe it can be seen better, if you start for the new question also a new thread with a headline, which asks specifically for the Nambu-Goto action.

Eventually you could ask a moderator, if the new thread should be issued here in the relativity forum or better in the quantum theory forum. I think, formally it belongs to the relativity form, because it is in literature discussed regarding classical (non-quantized) relativistic strings. But eventually, you find in the quantum theory forum more users, who have better knowledge about it, because of the D-dimensional Minkowski space and also the additional dimension of the particle.

Joda said:
How do we know that the Nambu-Goto action is the one we want to minimize to get the correct equation of motion for the string?
I don't know. I can only provide additional links:
https://www.damtp.cam.ac.uk/user/tong/string/string.pdf
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nambu–Goto_action
 
Last edited:

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