Questions of size...

[Sampo A Syreeni]

On Mon, 11 Dec 2000, Ben Laurie wrote:

>Chambers defines geodesic as "the shortest line on a surface between two
>points on it" and that is precisely the meaning in general relativity.

No question about it. The term also doesn't mean a whole lot when applied
as-is in the many instances it is on this list. As Tim put it, it pretty
much equates to "cyberpunkish". What little I've grasped of RAH's usage
is that "geodesic" often translates as "distributed", one of the main
features of which is that it "operates based on locally available
information". Hence... Besides, if you know your Einstein (or Riemann, or
Minkowsky) even a little bit you will recognize that one of the prime
reasons for the development of a geometric interpretation of physics is the
need to have a solid theory not reliant on instantaneous transfer of
information ("local"). My interpretation is not unreasonable at all,
considering the alternatives. Wanna drop it?

>Saying that it has anything to do with distributed systems is making it
>up as you go along.

Ain't everybody?

>And if RAH is now going to claim that's what he meant then he's making
>it up as he goes along, too (well, we knew that anyway, but redefining
>geodesic in this way is going too far).

It's good to know you're hip to this.

Sampo Syreeni <decoy at iki.fi>, aka decoy, student/math/Helsinki university