Relativity
The Special and General Theory
XXIII
Behavior of Clocks and Measuring-Rods on a Rotating Body of Reference
HITHERTO I have purposely refrained from speaking about the physical interpretation of space- and time-data in the case of the general theory of relativity. As a consequence, I am guilty of a certain slovenliness of treatment, which, as we know from the special theory of relativity, is far from being unimportant and pardonable. It is now high time that we remedy this defect; but I would mention at the outset, that this matter lays no small claims on the patience and on the power of abstraction of the reader.
We start off again from quite special cases, which we have frequently used before. Let us consider a space time domain in which no gravitational field exists relative to a reference-body K whose state of motion has been suitably chosen. K is then a Galilean reference-body as regards the domain considered, and the results of the special theory of relativity hold relative to K. Let us suppose the same domain referred to a second body of reference K', which is rotating uniformly with respect to K. In order to fix our ideas, we shall imagine K' to be in the form of a plane circular disc, which rotates uniformly in its own plane about its center. An observer who is sitting eccentrically on the
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