>Not at all. Any computer can easily simulate N gravitationally interacting
>bodies using N^2 cycles. My computer could easily handle a thousand-body problem.
>The n-body-problem is "unsolvable" because the only way to get an answer is
>through an actual simulation. With other problems, you can plug time 't' into
>some equation and calculate the result directly.
I think he was asking if an nbody problem can be solved analytically.
I guess I am rephrasing you. So the answer is no, you cannot solve
it analytically. You can solve it numerically, though.
You may be interested in my nbody page. Researchers who do this
sort of thing professionally in the last 20 years have come with
a number of methods to perform nbody simulations. Those methods
approach O(n) in some cases.
http://www.amara.com/papers/nbody.html
And I wrote up something a couple of years ago in response to
a newsgroup question about the 3 body problem.
The restricted 3-body problem can be solved analytically, but the
general 3-body problem cannot. It really amazing how quickly one loses the
ability to solve these sorts of gravitational problems analytically.
http://www.amara.com/ftpstuff/threebody.txt
Amara
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Amara Graps email: amara@amara.com
Computational Physics vita: finger agraps@shell5.ba.best.com
Multiplex Answers URL: http://www.amara.com/
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