Abstract
IT seems clear that, although gravitational radiation has not yet been detected, its existence is predicted by general relativity. Whether freely falling bodies, that is, bodies moving under gravitation alone, radiate gravitational waves is, however, quite unclear. This is an important question because most astronomical motion is free fall, and if radiation is not produced by this, there will be much less of it present than some investigators believe. The situation has been clearly explained by Ehlers, Rosenblum, Goldberg and Havas (unpublished). Briefly, the doubts arise because those approximation methods which quite convincingly predict gravitational radiation from certain moving systems do not apply to bodies in free fall.
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References
Szekeres, P., Commun. math. Phys., 41, 55–64 (1975); Phys. Rev., D, 12, 2941–50 (1975).
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BONNOR, W. Do freely falling bodies radiate?. Nature 263, 301 (1976). https://doi.org/10.1038/263301a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/263301a0
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