Postulates of General Relativity

[Savinainen Antti <antti.savinainen@KUOPIO.FI>]

Hello,

I have a question on postulates of the General Relativity (GR). I happened to read from a high school level book (Kerr, Kerr & Ruth 1999, 621) that the postulates of GR are:

1) Mach's principle -Inertial and gravitational forces are indistinguishable.
2) Four dimensional space-time is curved as a result of the presence of mass.
3) Objects take the shortest path between two points in space-time.

Are these postulates correctly stated? Is it really so that GR follows from these three postulates?

I have wondered what is the difference between postulates in physics and axioms in mathematics. Any opinions?

Regards,

Antti Savinainen
Kuopio Lyseo High School
Finland
homepage: <http://kotisivu.mtv3.fi/oma/physics/>

Reference:

Kerr, G., Kerr, N. and Ruth, P. (1999). Physics for use with International Baccalaureate. IBID Press, Victoria.

This posting is the position of the writer, not that of SUNY-BSC, NAU or the AAPT.