Abstract
IT is a striking instance of the acceleration of ideas in the modern world that a theory which five years ago was known only to a narrow circle of mathematicians engaged on an abstract and abstruse problem, and until then unverified, should have produced already a flood of literature. The mere catalogue of the books and articles written on the principle of relativity occupies 290 pages, and an appendix of more or less associated mathematical works, another 47. A whole century elapsed before the hypothesis of Copernicus became the universally accepted Copernican theory, and at least one generation passed before Newton's gravitation formula received general recognition. Of course in neither case was the proof so dramatic and the conviction so immediate and the interest so intense as in the eclipse expedition of 1919. The nearest analogy to that was Pascal's experiment with the barometer on the Puy de Dome in 1648, which established the theory that the atmosphere has weight.
Bibliographie de la relativité: suivie d'un appendice sur les déterminants à plus de deux dimensions, le calcul des variations, les séries trigonométriques et l'azéotropisme.
Par Maurice Lecat, avec la collaboration de Mme M. Lecat-Pierlot. Pp. xii + 291 + 47. (Bruxelles: M. Lamertin, 1924.) 90 francs.
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Bibliographie de la relativité: suivie d'un appendice sur les déterminants à plus de deux dimensions, le calcul des variations, les séries trigonométriques et l'azéotropisme. Nature 114, 8 (1924). https://doi.org/10.1038/114008a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/114008a0