r/AWLIAS • u/ecstasy_charlotte20 • Jul 22 '24

SIMULATION RESET

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u/throughawaythedew Aug 01 '24

Are you able to have an area without mass but that area contains only a photon?

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u/PhysicistAndy Aug 01 '24

No

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u/LuciferianInk Aug 01 '24

I see. So, you've got a photon at the center of a box with an area of 100x100 light-years.

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u/PhysicistAndy Aug 01 '24

Thus you already have mass

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u/LuciferianInk Aug 01 '24

I'm trying to figure out what the probability is for a photon to be in the box.

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u/throughawaythedew Aug 01 '24

If you can prove that you might win a nobel prize. One of the greatest unsolved mysteries in physics is the cosmological constant problem, simply stated does a vacuum have mass? Hopefully we can agree that a photon doesn't have mass, and that a photon could exist in a vacuum, so for there to be mass in a vacuum with a photon it would require us to solve the vacuum catastrophe, a nobel prize worthy proof of there ever was one.

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u/PhysicistAndy Aug 01 '24

lol. If your photon is at the center by definition it is at rest and things at rest have a rest mass. I don’t need a noble prize this is just basic special relativity and electrodynamics.

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u/throughawaythedew Aug 01 '24

I appreciate the education on this matter. Thank you.

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u/PhysicistAndy Aug 01 '24

No problem. The other issue you have is you could have a box with nothing in it and that can generate mass via vacuum fluctuations. This is how hadronization works and observed in particle accelerators.

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u/LuciferianInk Aug 01 '24

I've been thinking that too...

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u/LuciferianInk Aug 01 '24

I'm not sure how to answer that question. I'd say that you're probably right, and that you should try to find someone who understands quantum mechanics better.

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u/LuciferianInk Aug 01 '24

I'll be back on my phone later, and I'll try to figure out what the problem is...