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cosmik debris
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I heard a story from other relativists who were around at the time of the original Kerr solution that Kerr was in the UK, and was looking over Newman's shoulder when he made a mistake. Newman didn't notice the mistake, and Kerr didn't point it out, but rather rushed to complete his own solution and get it published quick smart in Phys. Rev. Lett.cosmik debris said:
I can't confirm the story, but it's believable that Roy would hesitate to correct Newman!Newman didn't notice the mistake, and Kerr didn't point it out.
"
Here is Kerr's own comments taken from [6]:-
Everybody who tried to solve the problem was going at it from the front, but I was trying to solve the equation from a different point of view - there were a number of new mathematical methods coming into relativity at the time and Josh [Goldberg] and I had had some success with these. I was trying to look at the whole structure - the Bianchi identities, the Einstein equations and these Tetrads - to see how they fitted together and it all seemed to be pretty nice and it looked like lots of solutions were going to come out. Then I hit a brick wall. Teddy Newman and Roger Penrose were working on a similar set of methods, but Teddy had come out with this as-yet unpublished theorem that basically 'proved' that my solution couldn't exist! Luckily, my neighbour, who was playing around with relativity, too, got hold of a preprint and I just scanned through it (I'm a lazy reader) and hit the crucial part which proved to me that my solution could exist! After that, I kept working like mad and found the solution in a few weeks.
"
(p.7: "
At this point I presented the results at a monthly Relativity conference
held at the Steven’s Institute in Hoboken, N.J. When I told Ted Newman
that (1.1) should have been identically zero, he said that they knew that
n1 was incorrect, but that the value for n2 given in the preprint was a
misprint and so (1.2) was still not satisfied. I replied that since the sum
had to be zero the final term, n3 must also be incorrect. Alan and I
recalculated it that evening, confirming that (1.2) was satisfied.
")
strangerep said:I heard a story from other relativists who were around at the time of the original Kerr solution that Kerr was in the UK, and was looking over Newman's shoulder when he made a mistake. Newman didn't notice the mistake, and Kerr didn't point it out, but rather rushed to complete his own solution and get it published quick smart in Phys. Rev. Lett.
Can anyone confirm or deny this story?
I always have morning tea, but I've never been in Canterbury. :-)cosmik debris said:do you people have morning tea?
Roy Kerr is a New Zealand mathematician and physicist who is best known for his discovery of the Kerr metric, which describes the gravitational field of a rotating black hole.
The Einstein Medal is an award given by the Albert Einstein Society in Bern, Switzerland to recognize outstanding scientific achievements in the field of physics.
Roy Kerr was awarded the Einstein Medal in 2013 for his groundbreaking work on the Kerr metric and its implications for our understanding of black holes.
Roy Kerr's work revolutionized our understanding of black holes and their properties, providing a crucial tool for studying these mysterious objects. His discoveries have had a profound impact on the field of physics and continue to influence research in this area.
In addition to the Einstein Medal, Roy Kerr has also been awarded the Hughes Medal, the Crafoord Prize, and the Einstein Medal of the Society for Natural Philosophy. He has also been recognized with numerous honorary degrees from universities around the world.