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CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
If spacetime has symmetries, such as a timelike Killing field, it allows for the definition of genuinely conserved, coordinate-independent energy.
Video
CJ
What is “Energy,” Actually?
@ Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
Related Takeaways
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
Most realistic cosmological spacetimes lack exact Killing vectors, limiting the applicability of the clean definition of energy in General Relativity.
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
Defining energy in general relativity is complex; pseudotensors can provide conservation but break covariance, while covariant definitions work under symmetry but fail in general spacetimes, hinting at a deeper structure yet to be universally interpreted.
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
In flat spacetime, energy-momentum conservation is straightforward, but in General Relativity, it becomes complex due to the need for a covariant derivative and additional machinery.
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
In the context of the expanding universe, the standard energy is not conserved as energy gets diluted, but a vector field can be found that satisfies conservation conditions, leading to a conserved quantity related to entropy.
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
Definitions of energy, such as mass in motion or the capacity to change, don't hold up in dynamically curved spacetime.
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
Einstein introduced the pseudotensor to represent the energy of the gravitational field, but it depends on chosen coordinates, which contradicts the principle of general covariance.
JL
Janna Levin
05/05/25
@ Lex Fridman
Spacetime can be visualized as a four-dimensional construct where time is treated as another dimension, but as three-dimensional beings, we struggle to fully comprehend this concept, including the curvature of spacetime caused by mass and energy. While I can mathematically suppress one of the spatial dimensions and draw it, we misrepresent spacetime in our drawings, even though we understand the rules for adding distances on this misrepresentation.
CJ
Curt Jaimungal
06/06/25
@ Curt Jaimungal
The energy associated with gravity is coordinate-dependent, raising questions about whether this is a valid justification for using the pseudotensor.
RP
Roger Penrose
09/29/24
@ Curt Jaimungal
Maxwell's equations are conformally invariant, meaning they depend on the space-time structure independent of scaling.