On the Physical Principles of Gravitation

Abstract

As is well known, the general theory of relativity (GTR) proceeds from the so-called equivalence principle according to which the dynamic effects of gravitation are identified with the kinematic effects of accelerated motion. In this theory, gravitation is associated with the Riemannian structure of the pseudo-Euclidean space-time (described by the metric tensor and the Riemannian connectivity and the curvature related with this tensor) specified in the four-dimensional space-time continuum. In the present work, it is first demonstrated that on the level of elementary particles (within the framework of the theory of quantized fields), the equivalence principle is violated. It is established that elementary particles with different masses (for example, electron and proton) move in the external gravitational field with different accelerations. In this connection, a new approach to the problem of gravitational interactions is suggested based on deformations of a latent dynamic system conditionally called ether that underlies elementary particle theory [2].