Oooh it’s a bull’s-eye! I was getting all sentimental with the twinkle in the eye and how even cows appreciate beauty… It’s a freaking pun 😂
I totally missed that. Honestly, it’s a solid comic without the pun, but that kicks it up another level! Love it
I’m glad you said something! What a great conclusion to his comic.
Its not light years, but approximately 8 light minutes.
The light is not from our sun, but another star. Its nighttime for the cow.
OK, youre right. Misinterpreted the comic.
For the particle itsself it’s even instantaneous!
C’mon you of all people should appreciate this.
The Two-headed Calf
By Laura Gilpin
Tomorrow when the farm boys find this freak of nature, they will wrap his body in newspaper and carry him to the museum.
But tonight he is alive and in the north field with his mother. It is a perfect summer evening: the moon rising over the orchard, the wind in the grass.
And as he stares into the sky, there are twice as many stars as usual.
This, and the image accompanied by it, were one of the things that broke me when I was younger.
I legit cried because it was so beautifully put together.
That’s what’s so weird about us humans.
We can write beautiful poetry about cows, then eat them.That is beautiful. Thank you.
This is just the law of really big numbers.
Something literally astronomical relative to something subatomic is necessarily going to happen.
A Star is really really big but more importantly it produces a more than a lot of photon’s
Fun fact: according to our models the photon doesn’t exactly travel in a straight line and hit the eye of the cow. It’s a probability wave that spreads out across an astronomical range. It might as well “hit” Mars instead of the Earth. What actually happens is that the huge wave randomly interacts with the eye of the cow. At that time the probability collapses into a certainty (the photon), making it impossible for the wave to interact with anything elsewhere in the universe.
Edit: or if you subscribe to the many-worlds interpretation, the wave interacts with both Mars and the Earth. When the wave reaches the eye of the cow, a new series of waves ripple out. They contain the effects of a photon interaction, but the original (standing) wave before the interaction also remains. We can make a slice of the multiverse in which the cow’s brain perceives the photon, and another slice in which there was no interaction and the cow didn’t see it. Because of how consciousness is tied to a single chain of events, the cow as a matter of experience doesn’t both see and not see the photon. Rather it’s as if there are two separate experiences that exist independent of each other.
Wow, none of what you’re saying is really new information to me but it’s put together in a way that is really interesting to think about. Thank you
… do some of us go on the journey with the cow who sees the light and others on the journey with the cow how doesn’t?
Or are we already on the path with the cow and our other is on the path with their cow?
Bulls on farms rarely stick around for 20 years. Also, how did it account for 20yrs of movement of an unpredictable life form?
It’s 20 years for us, but for the photon, no time passes from being ejected from the photosphere to hitting the cow’s retina.
Relatively speaking.
Reminds me of a relatively funny joke:
Why do photons have insomnia? Because they have no rest frame.
I am so glad others have this thought. I look at stars and realize that particular particle hit my eye from that far away.
Iv always loved the idea of animals enjoying beauty.
Your comment is a great example of an animal enjoying beauty.
There’s absolutely no reason to believe otherwise.
Studies have shown bears will stop and enjoy the scenery from time to time.
It seems very sure that it’s a light particle… I like those vibes.
Even better: traveling at light speed means that from their point of view it takes zero time to get there.
The math is wrong but the intent is beautiful
Edit: I misread oops but I do think the comic is very beautiful still
It’s not our Sun but a different star 20 light years away.
Technically it could be our Sun, and they’re an alien species of cow-like beings on their own planet far away from Earth.
As is evidenced by the fact it’s night time
Oopsie I read it as the other photon said just a single light year away, my b
We don’t know what star they’re on.
Oopsie I read it as the other photon said just a single light year away, my b
