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Why Does the Geometric Product Simplify the Equations of Physics?

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Abstract

In the last decades it was observed that Clifford algebras and geometric product provide a model for different physical phenomena. We propose an explanation of this observation based on the theory of bounded symmetric domains and the algebraic structure associated with them. The invariance of physical laws is a result of symmetry of the physical world that is often expressed by the symmetry of the state space for the system implying that this state space is a symmetric domain. For example, the ball of all possible velocities is a bounded symmetric domain. The symmetry on this ball follow from the symmetry of the space-time transformations between two inertial systems, which fixes the so-called “symmetric velocity” between them. The Lorenz transformations acts on the ball Sof symmetric velocities by conformal transformations. The ball Sis a spin ball (type IV in Cartan's classification). The Lie algebra of this ball is defined a triple product that is closely related to geometric product. The relativistic dynamic equations in mechanics and for the Lorenz force is described by this Lie algebra and the triple product.

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Correspondence to Yaakov Friedman.

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Friedman, Y., Gofman, Y. Why Does the Geometric Product Simplify the Equations of Physics?. International Journal of Theoretical Physics 41, 1841–1855 (2002). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1021048722241

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1021048722241

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