this post was submitted on 16 Jan 2025
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[–] [email protected] 226 points 1 week ago (2 children)

Oooh it's a bull's-eye! I was getting all sentimental with the twinkle in the eye and how even cows appreciate beauty... It's a freaking pun πŸ˜‚

[–] ZoopZeZoop 50 points 1 week ago

I'm glad you said something! What a great conclusion to his comic.

[–] [email protected] 45 points 1 week ago

I totally missed that. Honestly, it's a solid comic without the pun, but that kicks it up another level! Love it

[–] gibmiser 66 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Iv always loved the idea of animals enjoying beauty.

[–] disguy_ovahea 60 points 1 week ago

Your comment is a great example of an animal enjoying beauty.

[–] [email protected] 13 points 1 week ago

Studies have shown bears will stop and enjoy the scenery from time to time.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago

There's absolutely no reason to believe otherwise.

[–] [email protected] 57 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (1 children)

It's 20 years for us, but for the photon, no time passes from being ejected from the photosphere to hitting the cow's retina.

[–] disguy_ovahea 40 points 1 week ago (1 children)
[–] [email protected] 21 points 1 week ago

Reminds me of a relatively funny joke:

Why do photons have insomnia? Because they have no rest frame.

[–] [email protected] 37 points 1 week ago (3 children)

The Two-headed Calf

By Laura Gilpin

Tomorrow when the farm boys find this freak of nature, they will wrap his body in newspaper and carry him to the museum.

But tonight he is alive and in the north field with his mother. It is a perfect summer evening: the moon rising over the orchard, the wind in the grass.

And as he stares into the sky, there are twice as many stars as usual.

[–] [email protected] 15 points 1 week ago (1 children)

That's what's so weird about us humans.
We can write beautiful poetry about cows, then eat them.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

That's because humans can turn their empathy off when something is normalised by society.

[–] [email protected] 7 points 1 week ago

This, and the image accompanied by it, were one of the things that broke me when I was younger.

I legit cried because it was so beautifully put together.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 1 week ago

That is beautiful. Thank you.

[–] [email protected] 26 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

Fun fact: according to our models the photon doesn't exactly travel in a straight line and hit the eye of the cow. It's a probability wave that spreads out spherically across an astronomical range. It might as well "hit" Mars instead of the Earth. What actually happens is that the huge wave randomly interacts with the eye of the cow. At that time the probability collapses into a certainty (the photon), making it impossible for the wave to interact with anything elsewhere in the universe.

Edit: or if you subscribe to the many-worlds interpretation, the wave interacts with both Mars and the Earth. When the wave reaches the eye of the cow, a new series of waves ripple out. They contain the effects of a photon interaction, but the original (standing) wave before the interaction also remains. We can make a slice of the multiverse in which the cow's brain perceives the photon, and another slice in which there was no interaction and the cow didn't see it. Because of how consciousness is tied to a single chain of events, the cow as a matter of experience doesn't both see and not see the photon. Rather it's as if there are two separate experiences that exist independent of each other.

[–] YarHarSuperstar 9 points 1 week ago

Wow, none of what you're saying is really new information to me but it's put together in a way that is really interesting to think about. Thank you

[–] [email protected] 1 points 1 week ago (1 children)

… do some of us go on the journey with the cow who sees the light and others on the journey with the cow how doesn’t?

Or are we already on the path with the cow and our other is on the path with their cow?

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

It's more like we are on both paths at the same time.

[–] stupidcasey 6 points 1 week ago

This is just the law of really big numbers.

Something literally astronomical relative to something subatomic is necessarily going to happen.

A Star is really really big but more importantly it produces a more than a lot of photon's

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

Even better: traveling at light speed means that from their point of view it takes zero time to get there.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

I am so glad others have this thought. I look at stars and realize that particular particle hit my eye from that far away.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

It seems very sure that it's a light particle... I like those vibes.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago (1 children)

Bulls on farms rarely stick around for 20 years. Also, how did it account for 20yrs of movement of an unpredictable life form?

[–] NoSpotOfGround 2 points 1 week ago

You have a point, buuut: photons don't experience time or distance. Leaving the star and hitting the bull's eye happen in the same instant for them, no matter how many billions of light years apart they are. From the point of view of the photon, the bull's eye is touching that star in that other galaxy. For just that single instant in time.

[–] [email protected] -1 points 1 week ago (3 children)

Its not light years, but approximately 8 light minutes.

[–] [email protected] 27 points 1 week ago (1 children)

The light is not from our sun, but another star. Its nighttime for the cow.

[–] [email protected] 8 points 1 week ago

OK, youre right. Misinterpreted the comic.

[–] YarHarSuperstar 4 points 1 week ago

C'mon you of all people should appreciate this.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 week ago

For the particle itsself it's even instantaneous!

[–] [email protected] -2 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago) (2 children)

The math is wrong but the intent is beautiful

Edit: I misread oops but I do think the comic is very beautiful still

[–] officermike 24 points 1 week ago (3 children)

It's not our Sun but a different star 20 light years away.

[–] FooBarrington 21 points 1 week ago

As is evidenced by the fact it's night time

[–] DarkCloud 16 points 1 week ago* (last edited 1 week ago)

Technically it could be our Sun, and they're an alien species of cow-like beings on their own planet far away from Earth.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 week ago

Oopsie I read it as the other photon said just a single light year away, my b

[–] [email protected] 9 points 1 week ago (1 children)

We don't know what star they're on.

[–] [email protected] 4 points 1 week ago

Oopsie I read it as the other photon said just a single light year away, my b