If photons don’t ‘experience time’ how do they experience space? ( kbin.social )

ShaunaTheDead , 11 months ago

It's a bit more easily understood if you look at a space-time diagram, but essentially it kind of boils down to the speed of an object through space and the speed of an object through time are related and they must add up to 1. So if you're traveling at 50% the speed of light through space, then you're traveling at 50% the speed through time compared to an object at rest. So if you're traveling at 100% the speed of light through space, you're traveling at 0% through time, or not at all.

Moogly OP , 11 months ago

I’ve read about this but it kind of loses me since it’s such an abstract model of what’s going on. It treats each dimension as equal but like, time certainly seems distinct from the 3 spatial dimensions too.

I know it’s legit and a proper way of understanding it though just nitpicking since it leaves me with a sense of fuzziness like, maybe a gross oversimplification?

Granted I know it’s only meant to explain what’s happening in a predictable way not actually address the nature of these values which I guess is what I naturally lead into wondering about

ShaunaTheDead , 11 months ago

I found this channel (Science Asylum) really helpful in explaining things very simply. He uses space-time diagrams in this video to explain how gravity is an emergent property of time and how the two are linked together.