Eli5: How does gravity affect time, dumb it down for me as much as possible
In: 286
Here’s how I understand it–and it could be totally wrong so someone please correct me if I am.
It’s not so much that gravity “affects” time, it’s that time is part of how gravity works. For example, if I jump up into the air I am leaving earth at a velocity that slows down time (however minuscule). Even though it slows down time I am not going at enough of a velocity to surpass the warp in spacetime around the planet. This is because the warp in spacetime causes time to move slower closer to the ground and faster as you move away from the ground. So even though I’ve jumped into the air, I haven’t jumped fast enough or far enough into the air for time to increase enough so that my trajectory increases exponentially in speed because of the difference in time. I get “pushed” back down because time is moving slow and low enough that spacetime sets a limit on my speed upwards relative to the force I’ve exerted upwards.
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