The equivalence principle in classical mechanics and quantum mechanics

1998/10/29 by Philip D. Mannheim, Mannheim, Philip D.
Physics and Astronomy · #FOS: Physical sciences #General Relativity and Quantum Cosmology (gr-qc) #Noncommutative and Quantum Gravity Theories #Quantum Mechanics and Applications #Relativity and Gravitational Theory #gr-qc

paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.gr-qc/9810087

LaTeX, 21 pages. Expanded Final Version. To appear in "Contemporary Fundamental Problems", Ed. Valeri Dvoeglazov (Nova Science Publishers), Spring 2000

openalex publication_date 1998/10/29 · arxiv created 2000/04/03 · arxiv updated 2009/11/30 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28

Abstract

We discuss our understanding of the equivalence principle in both classical mechanics and quantum mechanics. We show that not only does the equivalence principle hold for the trajectories of quantum particles in a background gravitational field, but also that it is only because of this that the equivalence principle is even to be expected to hold for classical particles at all.

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