how does a photon reach my eye-?

Question

when its got trillions of atoms in it pathway before it reaches me?

Answer 1

A photon may react with an atom, exciting the electrons in it to move to a higher shell, but when the electrons settle down again, a photon is emitted. The reason you see colors is because photons have reacted with whatever they're striking and have been re-emitted in whatever particular wavelength corresponds to the color you see. As far as having to go through trillions of atoms, this is easy. No surprise there. A neutrino will go through a light year of solid lead without hitting anything or slowing down. At night you are bombarded with trillions of neutrinos from the sun, passing through the earth and then through you before they go on their merry way into intergalactic space. And although we have not determined a mass for a neutrino, it is theorized that a neutrino does have some mass, just too small to detect, whereas a photon is mass-less.

Answer 2

There are many atoms in the way but within even an atom, i believe 99% of the area is emptiness, both electrons, neutrons and protons are much smaller than an atom. Photons are also a wave and can travel through matter depending on the photon's energy and the matter's density and transparency.

Answer 3

Photons reach your eye directly from the source or through reflection. Absent of mass (from the smallest, like dust, to the largest, like galaxies) between a source or reflection photons are relatively unimpeded by anything. Although empty space is not really empty, what it contains is so rare that most of the photons pass through easily. Atmosphere is denser than outer space, but it still is rare enough that a lot of the light gets through.

Answer 4

Mostly, the space between atoms and molecules is much bigger than the atoms themselves. And even then, the photons just "slip around" the atoms without being diverted much by them. The nitrogen and oxygen that make up air are practically transparent, meaning they don't interact with visible light very much at all.

Wavelength of light = about 470 nm
Size of N2 molecule = about 3 nm
... (or maybe 0.2 nm? depends on how you define "size")

Answer 5

There are trillions of photons too. Sure, the odds of one particular photon reaching your eye are small, but the odds of any photon reaching your eye are high.

Answer 6

Photons don't actually exist; they are a conceptual construct that was developed to explain the odd ways that light behaves. If you think of light as waves, it's much easier to manage, with a few notable exceptions.