廣義相對論中的數學入門

向量

在數學、物理學及工程學中，歐幾里得向量（有時也稱為「幾何向量」、「空間向量」，或單稱「向量」）是同時有量值（長度）和方向的幾何對象。一個向量將點「搬運」至點；向量的拉丁文「vector」意思為「搬運東西的東西」。向量的量值就是兩點之間的距離，方向則為到的位移方向。很多實數的代數運算，像加、減、乘、邏輯非，和向量的運算很類似，運算也遵守相似的代數法則，如交換律、結合律、分配律。

張量

張量將向量的概念延伸至額外的維度。純量是沒有方向的量，是單純的數字，在圖上以點來表示，是零維的物件。向量則有量值和方向，在圖上以線呈現，是一維的物件。張量延伸了向量的概念，一個二維的張量稱為二階張量，可以看成一組相關的向量，在一個平面上的多個方向移動。

維度

廣義相對論需要用到四維向量，或稱四向量。這四維為長、寬、高、時間。其中的「點」代表事件，因為它同時包含地點和時間。類似向量，相對論中的張量也需要四維。其中一個例子就是黎曼曲率張量。

斜軸

An oblique coordinate system is one in which the axes are not necessarily orthogonal to each other; that is, they meet at angles other than right angles. When using coordinate transformations as described above, the new coordinate system will often appear to have oblique axes compared to the old system.

非張量

A nontensor is a tensor-like quantity that behaves like a tensor in the raising and lowering of indices, but that does not transform like a tensor under a coordinate transformation. For example, Christoffel symbols cannot be tensors themselves if the coordinates don't change in a linear way.
In general relativity, one cannot describe the energy and momentum of the gravitational field by an energy–momentum tensor. Instead, one introduces objects that behave as tensors only with respect to restricted coordinate transformations. Strictly speaking, such objects are not tensors at all. A famous example of such a pseudotensor is the Landau–Lifshitz pseudotensor.

曲線座標和彎曲時空

Curvilinear coordinates are coordinates in which the angles between axes can change from point to point. This means that rather than having a grid of straight lines, the grid instead has curvature.
A good example of this is the surface of the Earth. While maps frequently portray north, south, east and west as a simple square grid, that is not in fact the case. Instead, the longitude lines running north and south are curved and meet at the north pole. This is because the Earth is not flat, but instead round.
In general relativity, gravity has curvature effects on the four dimensions of the universe. A common analogy is placing a heavy object on a stretched out rubber sheet, causing the sheet to bend downward. This curves the coordinate system around the object, much like an object in the universe curves the coordinate system it sits in. The mathematics here are conceptually more complex than on Earth, as it results in four dimensions of curved coordinates instead of three as used to describe a curved 2D surface.

協變導數

The covariant derivative is a generalization of the directional derivative from vector calculus. As with the directional derivative, the covariant derivative is a rule, which takes as its inputs: (1) a vector, u, (along which the derivative is taken) defined at a point P, and (2) a vector field, v, defined in a neighborhood of P. The output is a vector, also at the point P. The primary difference from the usual directional derivative is that the covariant derivative must, in a certain precise sense, be independent of the manner in which it is expressed in a coordinate system.

平行移動

Given the covariant derivative, one can define the parallel transport of a vector v at a point P along a curve γ starting at P. For each point x of γ, the parallel transport of v at x will be a function of x, and can be written as v(x), where v(0) = v. The function v is determined by the requirement that the covariant derivative of v(x) along γ is 0. This is similar to the fact that a constant function is one whose derivative is constantly 0.

克里斯多福符號

The equation for the covariant derivative can be written in terms of Christoffel symbols. The Christoffel symbols find frequent use in Einstein's theory of general relativity, where spacetime is represented by a curved 4-dimensional Lorentz manifold with a Levi-Civita connection. The Einstein field equations – which determine the geometry of spacetime in the presence of matter – contain the Ricci tensor. Since the Ricci tensor is derived from the Riemann tensor, which can be written in terms of Christoffel symbols, a calculation of the Christoffel symbols is essential. Once the geometry is determined, the paths of particles and light beams are calculated by solving the geodesic equations in which the Christoffel symbols explicitly appear.

測地線

In general relativity, a geodesic generalizes the notion of a "straight line" to curved spacetime. Importantly, the world line of a particle free from all external, non-gravitational force, is a particular type of geodesic. In other words, a freely moving or falling particle always moves along a geodesic.
In general relativity, gravity can be regarded as not a force but a consequence of a curved spacetime geometry where the source of curvature is the stress–energy tensor (representing matter, for instance).  Thus, for example, the path of a planet orbiting around a star is the projection of a geodesic of the curved 4-dimensional spacetime geometry around the star onto 3-dimensional space.
A curve is a geodesic if the tangent vector of the curve at any point is equal to the parallel transport of the tangent vector of the base point.

應力-能量張量

The stress–energy tensor (sometimes stress–energy–momentum tensor or energy–momentum tensor) is a tensor quantity in physics that describes the density and flux of energy and momentum in spacetime, generalizing the stress tensor of Newtonian physics. It is an attribute of matter, radiation, and non-gravitational force fields. The stress–energy tensor is the source of the gravitational field in the Einstein field equations of general relativity, just as mass density is the source of such a field in Newtonian gravity.

史瓦西解與黑洞

In Einstein's theory of general relativity, the Schwarzschild metric (also Schwarzschild vacuum or Schwarzschild solution),  is a solution to the Einstein field equations which describes the gravitational field outside a spherical mass, on the assumption that the electric charge of the mass, the angular momentum of the mass, and the universal cosmological constant are all zero. The solution is a useful approximation for describing slowly rotating astronomical objects such as many stars and planets, including Earth and the Sun. The solution is named after Karl Schwarzschild, who first published the solution in 1916.
According to Birkhoff's theorem, the Schwarzschild metric is the most general spherically symmetric, vacuum solution of the Einstein field equations. A Schwarzschild black hole or static black hole is a black hole that has no charge or angular momentum. A Schwarzschild black hole is described by the Schwarzschild metric, and cannot be distinguished from any other Schwarzschild black hole except by its mass.