where does light from a torch go?

Discussion in 'Physics & Math' started by emanresU, Apr 13, 2014.

  1. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    Indeed, and we know the universe is a very smart place, or at least weird.
     
  2. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  3. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    "The energy does not leave the black hole and the battery depletes."

    Where does the energy go then? What absorbs it? it's facing outwards.
     
  4. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  5. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,152
    OMG WE HAVE AN ENERGY LEAK.

    Now everybody gets to guess what happens at inifinity.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

     
  6. Google AdSense Guest Advertisement



    to hide all adverts.
  7. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    Me neither. Perhaps it is already connected in some way prior to releasing energy. Could that be possible? Spooky action at a distance and all that.
     
  8. exchemist Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    12,538
    But this is as pointless an argument as that of Bishop Berkeley. If the photon behaves as if it exists whenever it is measured, then to speculate as to whether it may cease to do so in between is utterly moot.

    To put it another way, if, to borrow a legal phrase, it exists at all material times, then that's what we mean when say it exists.

    This can be seen as the Occam's Razor principle, yet again. Since all observations can be explained by postulating continuity of its existence, addition of a further postulate, that perhaps it ceases to exist when not observed, adds nothing. It is against science to add unnecessary postulates.
     
  9. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,152
    That takes spooky to the level of superstition.
     
  10. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    To understand the universe means we may have to delve into the undelvable.
     
  11. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    "But this is as pointless an argument as that of Bishop Berkeley."

    ...and almost as pointless as the Universe.
     
  12. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,051
    Sonar. I think both technologies exist...
     
  13. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,051
    The black hole absorbs it. That's what they do!
     
  14. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    "The energy does not leave the black hole and the battery depletes."

    Where does the energy go then? What absorbs it? it's facing outwards.
     
  15. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    But it's at the edge facing outwards, perpendicular.
     
  16. exchemist Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    12,538
    The universe is not trying to argue anything, so it doesn't need to have a "point".
     
  17. exchemist Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    12,538
    So?

    The whole point about a black hole is that light can't get out, even if it is pointing directly outwards.
     
  18. dav57 Extraordinary Thinker Thingy Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    621
    But I want to know where the light goes to. Where does it get absorbed once it's left the flashlight in order to satisfy conservation? It can't escape the black hole and it doesn't get bent along a parabolic path or anything like that because it is perpendicular to the centre. So if the battery depletes, where does the light energy end up?
     
  19. AlexG Like nailing Jello to a tree Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,304
    It starts out pointed away from the center, but the extreme gravity warps the geodesic the light follows, and it just goes round and round.

    It doesn't have to get absorbed by anything to conserve energy, it just keeps traveling round and round.
     
  20. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    6,152
    Kind of like this thread.

    And all the while the local path is a straight line. There have been sci fi dramatizations of this in which a person exits Door #2 of a room to find he just entered Door #1 of the same room.
     
  21. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,051
    It curves around and goes back toward the center.
     
  22. Russ_Watters Not a Trump supporter... Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    5,051
    What does a parabola with zero width look like?
     
  23. AlexG Like nailing Jello to a tree Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    4,304
    In the photons zipping round and round.
     

Share This Page