The Motion of a Body in Newtonian Theories

Abstract: A theorem due to Bob Geroch and Pong Soo Jang ["Motion of a Body in General Relativity." Journal of Mathematical Physics 16(1), (1975)] provides the sense in which the geodesic principle has the status of a theorem in General Relativity (GR). Here we show that a similar theorem holds in the context of geometrized Newtonian gravitation (often called Newton-Cartan theory). It follows that in Newtonian gravitation, as in GR, inertial motion can be derived from other central principles of the theory.