Tuesday, 10 April 2018

general relativity - Relationship between Coordinate Time and Proper Time


While I was reading Ta-Pei Cheng's book on relativity, I was unable to derive the correct relationship between coordinate time dt (the book defined it as the time measured by a clock located at r= from the source of gravity) and proper time dτ from the definition of metric.


The book states that for a weak and static gravitational field, g00(r)=(1+2Φ(r)c2) (with the metric signature (1,1,1,1) and Φ(r) is the gravitational potential) and the proper time dτ=g00dt.


From the gravitational redshift result I know that the above result is correct (in a more unambiguous form dτ=g00(rτ)dt).


However, if I simply use the formula for spacetime interval ds2=gμνdxμdxν (assuming two clocks that measure proper time and coordinate time are at rest relative to each other), I have


ds2=g00(rτ)c2dτ2=g00(rt)c2dt2=c2dt2g00(rτ)dτ=dt This suggests that time flows faster with a lower gravitational potential which is incorrect.


I'm not sure why the above method lead to a wrong conclusion, did I misunderstood the the definition of proper time, coordinate time or spacetime interval?




Update:




  1. One mistake I've made is letting ds2=g00(rτ)c2dτ2, which should be ds2=c2dτ2 by definition. However, I'm confused about two definitions of ds2 now. ds2=c2dτ2=gμνdxμdxν, this suggests that g00 is always 1 for the frame that measures proper time, but in my problem g00 is a function of r which is only equals to 1 if r=, how could two both be true at the same time?

  2. Assuming ds2=c2dτ2 is true, as all the answers pointed out that dτ=g00dt. But by the definition of g00 and ds2 the g00 used here must be (1+2Φ(rt)/c2)=1, but I want g00 here to be (1+2Φ(rτ)/c2) so that dτ=g00dt=1+2Φ(rτ)/c2dt(1+Φ(rτ)/c2)dtdτdtdt=Φ(rτ)c2=Φ(rτ)Φ(rt)c2


Please correct me if I've made any mistakes!




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