Since photons move at $c$, do they experience time or distance? If they don't, doesn't this explain action at a distance? From the point of view of the photons, there is no time, so the action at a distance must happen instantly. It only seems weird from our point of view.
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$\begingroup$ Photons don't move, at all. They are units of energy exchange between quantum fields. What "moves" are the fields and they move at the speed of light for the massless case. That these things don't happen instantly is a tested fact. That radiation doesn't form an observer system has little to do with that, though. $\endgroup$– CuriousOneCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 2:00
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$\begingroup$ @CuriousOne I agree these things don't happen instantly but why does it make more sense to take a single photon oscillating 600 trillion times per second and changing it into 600 trillion waves passing by for second? Isn't that much more complicated and harder to explain? $\endgroup$– Bill AlseptCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 2:23
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1$\begingroup$ @BillAlsept: A photon doesn't oscillate. the field does. A photon is just a small amount of energy and angular momentum. When electromagnetic fields interact, they can only do it by means of one of these small units. A rapidly oscillating field exchanges more energetic photons than a slowly oscillating field does. There is nothing complicated about this, people are just not reading the instructions that come with quantum field theory. $\endgroup$– CuriousOneCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 2:31
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$\begingroup$ You're just passing one solution off for another one that's far more complicated. A photon coming from a distant star makes far more sense than trillions and trillions and trillions of waves coming from that star just to make One photon when it gets here. There needs to be something traveling from that start to here. As you would say can you write your name on that field ? I've never seen one. I still don't see why you need to introduce the wave to explain it. $\endgroup$– Bill AlseptCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 3:05
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$\begingroup$ Based on the duplicate listing, it seems there are two opinions. $\endgroup$– devhlCommented Jul 27, 2016 at 0:16
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There is no "point of view of the photons", you can't attach a frame of reference to them. Best if you imagine the photons as waves, and as these waves are propagating with $c$.
The classical time dilatation, length contraction formulas (you know, everywhere the $\frac{1}{\sqrt(1-\frac{v^2}{c^2})}$ in them) are defined only for macro-sized objects going below $c$.
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$\begingroup$ As an object moves closer to c, time slows down; so why is it that at c the time dilation suddenly stops? It seems like the formula was only written for matter with mass. Perhaps matter without mass has different formulas. $\endgroup$– devhlCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 1:37
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$\begingroup$ @devhl Yes as you near $c$, the time dilation nears to $0$. But the same formulas would also show that the mass of the photon is $\frac{0}{0}$. Btw, photons are microscopic things and their formulas aren't so easy and beautiful. Quantumelectrodynamics plays with them. In it, the photons are described as the "waves" of a quantum field, and these waves are propagating with c. $\endgroup$– peterhCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 1:49
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$\begingroup$ It is not so bad, the problem is that there are no such easy formulas in the QFT as in the SR. But understanding them on a basic level is not so hard if you know derivation of many-dimensional functions, and complex numbers, and matrices. $\endgroup$– peterhCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 1:58
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$\begingroup$ Since photons have no mass, isn't it a moot point that the mass dilation is undefined? I still feel like there should be time dilation involved to the most extreme. $\endgroup$– devhlCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 2:06
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$\begingroup$ @devhl I think you feel it well, but every theory is only an approximation and has its limits. On my opinion, your thoughts reached the limits of the Special Relativity and hit the barrier to the QFT (quantum field theory). :-) $\endgroup$– peterhCommented Jul 25, 2016 at 2:16