What do they mean when they say space time is curved? I keep hearing a lot of talk about Space Time being the 4th dimension, and no matter how many trampoline examples I see, I just don’t get it.
In: Physics
Think of graph paper, it’s flat. You can draw a triangle on it, just draw 3 dots and connect them with three lines. One of the properties of a triangle is all the angles of the corners add up to 180°. This is always true… On flat spacetime.
Curved spacetime would be instead of flat paper, you draw on a balloon. Do the same thing a draw 3 dots and connect them with straight lines. On a balloon you can draw a triangle with three right angles. This is because while the corners look flat and the lines look straight up close, they are actually curved. And since they are curved, math doesn’t always work as you expect, exactly how depends on how it’s curved.
Spacetime might be curved in the same way, but in three directions, triangles might not always have corners that add up to 180 degrees, parallel lines might not stay parallel, and you might actually be able to look in any direction and see yourself from behind.
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