What is the meaning of matter in physics? By defining matter in terms of mass and mass in terms of matter in physics, are we not forming circular definitions? Please give a meaning of "matter" in Physics that circumvents this circularity.
Answer
What is the meaning of "matter" in physics?
It doesn't matter. Sometimes matter means "particles with rest mass". Sometimes matter means "anything that contributes to the stress-energy tensor". Sometimes matter means "anything made of fermions". And so on. There's no need to have one official definition of the word "matter", nothing about the physical theories depends on what we call the words.
Discussing this any further is just like worrying about whether a tomato is really a fruit or a vegetable. A cook doesn't care.
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