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This book describes the subject of electrodynamics at classical as well as quantum level, developed as an interaction at a distance. Thus it has electric charges interacting with one another directly and not through the medium of a field. In general such an interaction travels forward and backward in time symmetrically, thus apparently violating the principle of causality. It turns out, however, that in such a description the cosmological boundary conditions become very important. The theory therefore works only in a cosmology with the right boundary conditions; but when it does work it is free from the divergences that plague a quantum field theory.
Sample Chapter(s)
A: From Newton to Gauss (148 KB)
B: Maxwell's Field Theory (303 KB)
C: The Formula for Delayed Action (242 KB)
Contents:
- Classical Electrodynamics:
- Historical Background
- The Problems of Classical Field Theory
- The Wheeler-Feynman Absorber Theory of Radiation
- Action at a Distance in Curved Spacetime
- Cosmological Models
- Response of the Expanding Universe
- Quantum Electrodynamics Non-Relativistic Processes:
- The Path-Integral Approach to Quantum Mechanics
- Perturbation Theory and the Influence Functional
- Absorption and Stimulated Emission
- Spontaneous Emission
- The Complete Influence Functional and the Level Shift Formula
- Relativistic Quantum Electrodynamics:
- Path Integrals for Relativisitc Particles
- Many Particle Interactions and the Quantum Response of the Universe
- Self Action
- Cosmological Cut-Offs to Radiative Corrections
- Concluding Remarks
Readership: Undergraduates and research students in physics and cosmology.
