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Asked by wizzyg12 to Claire, Kate, Matt, Rob, Sam on 21 Jun 2013.
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Claire Lee answered on 21 Jun 2013:
Colour – nope! Colour is just a particular wavelength of light, and light is massless so it has no weight.
Farts – I guess so, cause farts are molecules in the air that give it that wonderful smell. And molecules do have mass (though small)
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Comments
william102000 commented on :
if light is massless how can it exist
Claire commented on :
Well, light is energy.
From Einstein’s equation E = mc^2 we know that energy (E) and mass (m) are really the same sort of thing, scaled by a constant (the speed of light, c, squared).
What that tells us is that energy and mass are not really two separate things, but one thing, a kind of mass-energy, and that mass is a measure of the amount of energy you have. Most particles have a basic (rest) mass, which gives them a corresponding amount of energy.
But E=mc^2 also says that for some particles, they can have no matter at all – in other words, all of their mass-energy is concentrated in the form of energy (like a wave) – as long as they move at the speed of light.
So what is a wave that travels at the speed of light? Light! 🙂
The energy-mass equivalence is also cool because it explains why light can be bent by gravity.
wizzyg12 commented on :
Thanks 🙂 Its very interesting.