Ask Science

155 readers

1 users here now

Ask a science question, get a science answer.

founded 1 year ago

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

submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]

6 comments fedilink hide all child comments

I have read that since photons have no valid reference frame they don’t experience time. They move through space at c so no time value, in essence.

But space and time are the same in relativity and space obviously affects photons ie they experience eachother. Photons redshift over distance and time, as the most obvious example.

So how is it that a photon can’t “experience time” yet it experiences space? Why isn’t redshifting over X ly considered experiencing time already?

I’m just a layman so I’m having a hard time reconciling a photon not experiencing time due to not having a valid reference frame; but that just doesn’t affect its deal with space? It gets a valid reference frame in space then?

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 year ago

Yeah I figure “experience” is sort of ambiguous and pop science-y, but it’s how I’ve usually had it explained.

That redshift depends on the observer is obvious now that you point it out and profound too since yeah, I suppose they’re not developing across space in the way I imagined.

This makes me wonder about a potential universe with nothing except photons/radiation in it. They’d just.. never change? Even though they could do things like affect spacetime they pass through or interfere with eachother?