1999/11/19 by Julian Barbour, Barbour, Julian, Niall O Murchadha +1
Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc) #gr-qc
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.gr-qc/9911071
arxiv created 1999/11/19 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30
The four-dimensional gauge group of general relativity corresponds to arbitrary coordinate transformations on a four-manifold. Theories of gravity with a dynamical structure remarkably like Einstein's theory can be obtained on the basis of a four-dimensional gauge group of arbitrary coordinate and conformal transformations of riemannian metrics defined on a three-manifold. This new symmetry is more restrictive and hence more predictive. Many of the difficulties that have plagued the canonical quantization of general relativity seem to vanish.