Page:Eddington A. Space Time and Gravitation. 1920.djvu/181

X] why in practice rotation appears to have reference to some worldwide inertial frame.

Thus absolute rotation does not indicate any logical flaw in the theory hitherto developed; and there is no need to accept any modification of our views. Possibly there may be a still wider relativity theory, in which our supposed plenum is to be regarded as itself an abstraction of the relations of the matter distributed throughout the world, and not existent apart from such matter. This seems to exalt matter rather unnecessarily. It may be true; but we feel no necessity for it, unless experiment points that way. It is with some such underlying idea that Einstein's cylindrical space-time was suggested, since this cannot exist without matter to keep it stretched. Now we freely admit that our assumption of perfect flatness in the remote parts of space was arbitrary, and there is no justification for insisting on it. A small curvature is possible both conceptually and experimentally. The arguments on both sides have hitherto been little more than prejudices, which would be dissipated by any experimental or theoretical lead in one direction. Weyl's theory of the electromagnetic field, discussed in the next chapter, assigns a definite function to the curvature of space; and this considerably alters the aspect of the question. We are scarcely sufficiently advanced to offer a final opinion; but the conception of cylindrical space-time seems to be favoured by this new development of the theory.

Some may be inclined to challenge the right of the Einstein theory, at least as interpreted in this book, to be called a relativity theory. Perhaps it has not all the characteristics which have at one time or another been associated with that name; but the reader, who has followed us so far, will see how our search for an absolute world has been guided by a recognition of the relativity of the measurements of physics. It may be urged that our geodesics ought not to be regarded as fundamental; a geodesic has no meaning in itself; what we are really concerned with is the relation of a particle following a geodesic to all the other matter of the world and the geodesic cannot be thought of apart from such other matter. We would reply, "Your particle of matter is not fundamental; it has no meaning in itself; what you are really concerned with is its 'field'—the relation of the