ELI5, is it theoretically possible to have a particle is big enough to behave like a planet? I’m using planet as a device to act as the counter to the particle behavior because I don’t know them correct term.
Is there a mass or property that is the teetering point between acting like a planet vs a particle? If we find a particle with a massive mass, would it be possible that it might act like a planet.
I’m guessing I’m missing a key piece of understanding….
In: Physics
“Particle” doesn’t have a set size or anything, and you can treat basically anything you want as a particle.
In fact, if you were to model a galaxy you would basically just treat all of the stars as particles.
A particle is just something, *anything*, that can be described as having some physical properties that you want to model. I know that’s really vague, but that’s because it’s supposed to be.
So the answer to your question is basically “yes” because we can (and do) treat planets like particles.
Latest Answers