2006-07-12 06:34:12 · 22 answers · asked by CHRIS V 1 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Astronomy & Space
Quantum physics, light is matter and energy.
Photons are the matter. They act as a particle and they act as a wave. They do this simultaneously.
2006-07-12 06:46:15 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
a black hole doesnt actaully have gravity, what it does it warp spacetime so that all energy that comes within its field of effect, or crosses the "event horizon" are pulled in. the event horizon is the boundary beyond which it is impossible to provide enough energy to a particle or body to allow it to escape the influence of the black hole.
imagine a trampoline and then drop a bowling ball into the middle. the trampoline is spacetime and the bowling ball is the black hall. now roll a table tennis ball onto the trampoline. it will be attracted towards the black hole. this is in effect, what gravity is. with a big enough bowling ball creating a big enough dent in the tamopline, it doesnt matter how hard you push the table tennis ball along the strecthed fabric, it will always gravitate towards the bowling ball. this is how a black hole works.
now, as far as the universe is concerned, there is no difference between light and matter (or time as well), as both consist of energy that does not posses enough energy(!) to escape the dimple in space caused by the black hole.
this is why light, even though it is not matter in the classic way we describe matter, is affected by a black hole.
2006-07-12 09:55:11 · answer #2 · answered by top_cat_1972 2 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Light is NOT made of electrons - the fundamental unit of light is called a photon. Photons ARE affected by gravity, as are electrons, protons, you name it. One famous test, done during a total eclipse of the sun, proved that the path of starlight is bent when it passes a massive gravitational object, like our sun. Einstein predicted this would happen. Think of a black hole like any other massive object in space. If something gets within its gravitational influence, it will orbit around it just like a moon would around a planet or a planet would around a sun. If the object crosses the event horizon of the black hole (fancy way of saying it gets too close), then it will not be able to escape. In order to escape the Earths' gravity, for example, you need to accelerate your spaceship to escape velocity, about 7.6 miles per second for our planet. The smaller the planet, the less escape velocity you need. If you stood on a small asteroid and threw a baseball, that sucker would never come back, the baseball's speed would exceed the escape velocity of the asteroid. The escape velocity of a black hole from inside the event horizon exceeds the speed of light. Thus, even light can't escape.
2006-07-12 06:59:51 · answer #3 · answered by Anonymous · 1⤊ 0⤋
According to Einstein's General Theory of Relativity, gravity is not a force, but a "dent" in space time made by a large mass. Simply put, anything (including light) will always follow the shortest path through space-time If it passes through a gravitational field, the shortest path will be curved. Any mass can affect light, but usually only large masses (like the Sun, Stars, galaxies, or black holes) have significant amounts to affect light in a significant manner.
A black hole (BH) is so massive that it simply does not "dent" space-time, it "rips" it, so any light headed for the fringe of a black hole actually travels the shortest distance, straight into the BH.
If you really wanna stick to the particle that constitutes light, it is called a photon.
2006-07-12 06:47:38 · answer #4 · answered by dennis_d_wurm 4 · 1⤊ 0⤋
ZetaTalk: Black Holes
Note: written by Jul 15, 1995.
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So dark that light can't escape, so dense that all matter going in gets compressed into imperceptibility. What is a black hole, and does matter go in and never come out? All is relative, and the denseness of black holes only seems so to humans because they have no basis of comparison. Also, as nothing seems to be coming out, humans assume this is a bottomless pit of some sort, and frankly fear black holes. They serve a purpose, however, and are part of God's plan for renewing the Universe. You know about the concept of the big bang, which we have explained as setting the clock back on a part of the Universe, a type of refreshed state. The big bang requires something to bang from, and that state is what the black holes are accumulating.
Do black holes consume all that they catch in their snare, and is there any escape? Black holes are voracious, but proceed slowly. So slowly, in fact, that one can escape without even making haste. In addition, black holes do not capture souls, as developed entities can float out of them, being of a lighter substance. However, black holes do accumulate the substance of which souls are composed, when this has not formed into an entity, and remains loose and undefined. This is packaged into the whole, and spread uniformly during the big bang, and thus the process of worlds forming and evolving begins again, in a small part of the Universe. This is part of God's plan, as far as we know it.
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2006-07-12 14:15:22 · answer #5 · answered by creativedynamic 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Your assumption is wrong. Light is affected by gravity, just not enough, usually, to make a difference.
Because matter and energy are the same (e=m*c^2) and the gravity near a black hole is so huge, the poor light particles have no chance.
2006-07-12 06:50:22 · answer #6 · answered by Don't look too close! 4 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Light is electromagnetic radiation the propogates in packets called photons. Photons have no mass. However, they follow the curavture of the space in which they are traveling (just like a marble follows the curve of a trampoline that has a bowling ball in the middle of it). Something with mass causes the fabric of space to curve. The light simply follows that curve.
Masses also follow the curvature of space. We "observe" this following of the curvature as gravity.
2006-07-12 06:51:25 · answer #7 · answered by Jared Z 3 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Coem on folks, get a clue, einstein got it WRONG. Michelson-Morely did NOT give a null result and Miller definitely did NOT get a null result either, as subsequent investigations of his re-released data has indicated. We're living in an entrained ether. Even Einstein admitted there had to eb a "substance" to the universe not a void of nothing, or else the waves and whatever else makes no sense! And as he said, if Miller's results yield a positive result relativity collapses like a house of cards.
Read up on thunderbolts.info and plasmacosmology.net
Also, see the rather scathing and thoroughly informative article about Dayton Miller's work, and Shankland's botched "investigation."
http://www.orgonelab.org/miller.htm
http://www.orgonelab.org/miller2.htm
Pretty much lays to rest relativity, and reinforces the entrained (fluid; not rigid as Michelson/Morely posited/tested) aether, since there were strong ties to (variations with) the sidereal (cosmic) day rather than the solar day.
2006-07-12 08:15:49 · answer #8 · answered by Michael Gmirkin 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Light exhibits what is known as "wave particle duality" that is to say that although it has zero mass (if it did, it could not travel at the speed of light) it has an "apparent mass" (the m in e-mc2). What this means that we can measure the apparent mass of a light photon by the way is interacts with other bodies. In other words it has no mass, but it behaves as if it does.
Wierd or what!
2006-07-12 08:14:49 · answer #9 · answered by jase 1 · 1⤊ 0⤋
Light is an electro magntic radiation. Light rays are known to bend due to gravity and likewise are sucked in by black holes.
2006-07-12 06:41:44 · answer #10 · answered by openpsychy 6 · 1⤊ 0⤋
It is not only matter that is effected by gravity. Light or rather the space It travels through are also effected by gravity.
2006-07-14 11:24:16 · answer #11 · answered by greebo 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋