When and Where

• Monday 13h15 -- 15h, Tuesday 12h15 -- 14h, room 119
• Starting Date: Monday September 18th

Lecture Notes

• GR Lecture Notes Website (overview)
• [newlecturesGR.pdf] (direct link to the pdf-file)
• Note: this new version has 900+ pages (!). Please save trees and don't print all of it at once, we will only cover some small parts of the notes in the course

Exercises and Solutions

• Assignments 01
• Solutions 01
• Optional Assignment + Solution 02
• Assignments 03
• Solutions 03
• Assignments 04
• Solutions 04
• Supplement: Variation of Determinants
• Assignments 05
• Solutions 05
• Assignments 06
• Solutions 06

Exams

• Oral Exams: February 2018 for Theory Master Students, any time for others
• individual appointments - contact me for dates

Highly Recommended Literature

• Excellent Introductory (Undergraduate) Texts


• N.M.J. Woodhouse: General Relativity
• J.B. Hartle: Gravity, An introduction to Einstein's General Relativity


• Elegant Modern Slightly More Advanced Books


• R.M. Wald: General Relativity
• S. Carroll: Spacetime and Geometry, an Introduction to General Relativity


• Classics


• C.W. Misner, K.S. Thorne, J.A. Wheeler: Gravitation
• S. Weinberg: Gravitation and Cosmology


• Other Personal Favourites


• R.U. Sexl, H.K. Urbantke: Gravitation und Kosmologie
• N. Straumann: General Relativity
• S.W. Hawking, G.F.R. Ellis: The Large Scale Structure of Space-Time
• E. Poisson: A Relativist's Toolkit


• Other Recommended Recent/New Books


• A. Zee: Einstein Gravity in a Nutshell

GR Lectures Notes on the WWW and related Online Resources

• Albert Einstein: Die Grundlage der allgemeinen Relativitätstheorie (Annalen der Physik, 1916)


• Einstein Papers Project


• Einstein Papers Project (The Collected Papers of Einstein)
• Digital Einstein Papers (including English translations)
• Schriften 1914-1917 (in German)
• Writings 1914-1917 (in English)
• The Field Equations of Gravitation (November 25 1015)
• etc etc (thank you to everyone involved in this project!)


• GR Lecture Notes: General


• Harvey Reall: General Relativity (Univ. of Cambridge Lecture Notes)
• Piotr Chrusciel: General Relativity I and II
• Don Marolf: Notes on Relativity and Cosmology
• Gerard 't Hooft: Introduction to General Relativity
• Gary Gibbons: General Relativity
• Sean Carroll: Lecture Notes on General Relativity [see also the links at the bottom of that page]
• Philippe Jetzer: General Relativity


• GR Lecture Notes: Black Holes


• Gerard 't Hooft: Introduction to the Theory of Black Holes
• Paul Townsend: Black Holes
• J.P. Luminet: Black Holes : A General Introduction
• For observational and astrophysical evidence for black holes see
• S.A. Hughes: Trust but verify: The case for astrophysical black holes
• A. Mueller: Experimental Evidence of Black Holes
• C. Bambi: Astrophysical Black Holes: A Compact Pedagogical Review
• For more mathematical discssuions see
• P. Chrusciel: The Geometry of Black Holes (includes discussion of advanced topics in mathematical GR)
• D. Christodoulou: The Formation of Black Holes in General Relativity (594(!) pages, mathematical general relativity, not for the faint of heart)


• GR Lecture Notes: Cosmology


• Mark Trodden, Sean Carroll: TASI Lectures: Introduction to Cosmology


• Was Einstein Right? (Ask Clifford M. Will!)


• Clifford M. Will: The Confrontation between General Relativity and Experiment (arXiv version)
• Clifford M. Will: Was Einstein Right? A Centenary Assessment (abridged version of the article above)
• Clifford M. Will: The 1919 measurement of the deflection of light


• GR Lecture Notes: Other


• Living Reviews in Relativity (high quality review articles on all aspects of relativity -recommended!)
• Ingemar Bengtsson: Anti-de Sitter Space
• List of Online GR Books and Lecture Notes (no warranty)


• Other Useful, Informative or Entertaining Online Resources


• Wikipedia: Equivalence Principle
• R. Wald: Teaching General Relativity
• Sean Carroll's No-Nonsense Introduction to General Relativity
• APS Journals: GR Centennial
• John Baez: the General Relativity Tutorial
• C. Lineweaver, T. Davis: Misconceptions about the Big Bang (highly recommended Scientific American Article)
• Visualisierung in der Relativitätstheorie (Uni Stuttgart), Studying null and time-like geodesics in the classroom
• Usenet Physics FAQ
• Einstein for Everyone (J.D. Norton)
• Einstein Archives Online
• RelativityBook.com Resources
• Picturing Black Holes (a nice introduction to Penrose diagrams, by J.D. Norton)
• A Peek into Einstein's Zurich Notebook( J.D. Norton)
• Einstein's `Zürich Notebook' and his Journey to General Relativity (N. Straumann, arXiv:1106.0900)
• Other Einstein Goodies (J.D. Norton)
• Terence Tao: The Cosmic Distance Ladder (pdf-file)
• Terence Tao: The Cosmic Distance Ladder (video of public lecture on youtube)
• Visualisation of Parallel Transport on the 2-Sphere (java applet)
• Gerard 't Hooft: Strange Misconceptions of General Relativity
• Wie man die Raumzeit krümmt
• Teil I
• Teil II
• TeilIII
• Teil IV
• Teil V
• Teil VI


• Is our Universe a Black Hole? NO And since I get asked this question again and again (as if there weren't more interesting questions), usually by people who understand neither cosmology nor black holes, here are some links:


• Answer from the Physics FAQ: Is the Big Bang a Black Hole?
• Answer from Cosmic Variance
• Answer from Lubos Motl
• And another one
• arXiv:1001.4795: Through the Looking Glass: Why the Cosmic Horizon is not a horizon (a more detailed and technical account)


• Important Advice (from Nobel Laureate Gerard 't Hooft):


• Gerard 't Hooft: How to become a good theoretical physicist
• Gerard 't Hooft: How to become a bad theoretical physicist

Contact

• Matthias Blau, Office 220a