On the origin of the anomalous precession of Mercury’s perihelion

Firstly, we recover an ancient work of Gerber in 1898 as a precursor of the retarded theories, see [Gerber P. Die räumliche und zeitliche Ausbreitung der Gravitation (Space and temporary propagation of gravitation). Z Math Phys 1898;43:93–104]. In that paper Gerber gave an explanation of the anomalous precession of Mercury’s perihelion in terms of a velocity-dependent potential. In the present paper an explanation of the anomalous precession of Mercury’s perihelion is given in terms of a simple retarded potential, which, at first orders, coincides with Gerber’s potential, and which agrees with the author’s previous works [Giné J. On the origin of quantum mechanics. Chaos, Solitons & Fractals 2006;30(3):532–41; Giné J. On the origin of gravitational quantization: the Titius–Bode law. Chaos, Solitons & Fractals 2007;32(2):363–69].