Eli5: if Energy and mass are equal and transformable to one another, and if the sun is constantly projecting energy on the earth, why isn’t the earth getting heavier and constantly changing its orbit?
In: 16
One thing people seem to miss is that although energy and mass can be converted, it’s not even, a LOT of energy equals a TINY amount of mass.
That’s why atomic weapons are so potent, a tiny amount of matter is, due to E=mC^2, converted to a massive amount of energy.
In reverse, anything less than an *extraordinary* amount of energy won’t create any significant mass.
Also, just because energy *can* be converted to mass, doesn’t mean it *will* be. Energy, really, is simply momentum, or the ability to *change* momentum, so the energy from the sun increases the momentum (and therefore, energy) of the particles of the Earth that it strikes, as heat.
This *does* result in a mass increase, but it’s so slight it’s negligible, as momentum only really affects mass significantly at speeds close to the speed of light. (This is how photons have energy despite having no mass, they get their energy from momentum)
It doesn’t literally turn into matter (although this can happen with things like particle accelerators and cosmic rays), it’s just a transfer of momentum.
And as other commenters have pointed out, the Earth is losing *FAR* more mass to natural processes than it would ever gain from the sun’s light.
Latest Answers