Abstract
The flowering of the tensor calculus and its application to differential geometry, mechanics, and physics was primarily because of the impact of Einstein's general theory of relativity. Einstein took from this chapter the mathematical inspiration he needed, baptizing this new tool the tensor calculus. Like Kepler, who found the mathematics required for his planetary theory in Apollonius's Konika, Einstein had come across a treasure trove that proved to be invaluable for his general theory of relativity. This geometrical interpretation appealed strongly to persons with an engineering mind like Schouten; it also was quite attractive to mathematicians of the Monge–Darboux school, accustomed as they were to thinking of analytical expressions (that is, differential equations) in geometrical form. To this school can be counted Elie Cartan, who contributed so much to differential geometry and tensor calculus. Geometrical interpretations of analytical expressions have more than once proven extremely productive in the history of mathematics.
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