Friday, 7 February 2020

Is special relativity a special case of general relativity, qualitatively?


Since Einstein name his theory Special Relativity and General Relativity, there should be some expected relationship between them, particularly "Special Relativity" being a special case of the more general "General Relativity". However, I can't seem to relate them in anyway; Special relativity concerns the fact that the speed of light is universal and General relativity is mainly about the curvature of spacetime.


BTW, there is already another similar question on Stackexchange: Reducing General Relativity to Special Relativity in limiting case , but I am in for a more qualitative explanation.




Answer



Yes, special relativity is a special case of general relativity. General relativity reduces to special relativity, in the special case of a flat spacetime. I.e., general relativity reduces to special relativity, in the special case of gravity being negligible, for example in space far from any objects, or when considering a small enough piece of space in freefall that gravity is unimportant to the problem.


Like special relativity, general relativity also assumes that the speed of light is universal. However, when spacetime is curved, the universality of the speed of light can only be applied locally, within regions of spacetime that are small enough that the effects of gravity aren't important within the region.


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