Editing Light cone (section)

==Details==
If one imagines the light confined to a two-dimensional plane, the light from the flash spreads out in a circle after the event E occurs, and if we graph the growing circle with the vertical axis of the graph representing time, the result is a [[Cone (geometry)|cone]], known as the future light cone. The past light cone behaves like the future light cone in reverse, a circle which contracts in radius at the speed of light until it converges to a point at the exact position and time of the event E. In reality, there are three space [[Dimension (vector space)|dimensions]], so the light would actually form an expanding or contracting sphere in three-dimensional (3D) space rather than a circle in 2D, and the light cone would actually be a [[Hypercone|four-dimensional version of a cone]] whose cross-sections form 3D spheres (analogous to a normal three-dimensional cone whose cross-sections form 2D circles), but the concept is easier to visualize with the number of spatial dimensions reduced from three to two.

This view of special relativity was first proposed by [[Albert Einstein]]'s former professor [[Hermann Minkowski]] and is known as [[Minkowski space]]. The purpose was to create an [[invariant (physics)|invariant]] spacetime for all observers. To uphold [[Causality (physics)|causality]], Minkowski restricted spacetime to [[non-Euclidean]] [[hyperbolic geometry]].<ref>{{Cite book |last=Cox |first=Brian |title=Why does E=mc2: and why should we care? |last2=Forshaw |first2=J. R. |date=2009 |publisher=Da Capo Press |isbn=978-0-306-81758-8 |location=Cambridge, MA |oclc=246894061}}</ref>{{Page needed|date=February 2017}}

Because signals and other causal influences cannot travel faster than light (see [[special relativity]]), the light cone plays an essential role in defining the concept of [[Causality (physics)|causality]]: for a given event E, the set of events that lie on or inside the past light cone of E would also be the set of all events that could send a signal that would have time to reach E and influence it in some way. For example, at a time ten years before E, if we consider the set of all events in the past light cone of E which occur at that time, the result would be a sphere (2D: disk) with a radius of ten light-years centered on the position where E will occur. So, any point on or inside the sphere could send a signal moving at the speed of light or slower that would have time to influence the event E, while points outside the sphere at that moment would not be able to have any causal influence on E. Likewise, the set of events that lie on or inside the ''future'' light cone of E would also be the set of events that could receive a signal sent out from the position and time of E, so the future light cone contains all the events that could potentially be causally influenced by E. Events which lie neither in the past or future light cone of E cannot influence or be influenced by E in relativity.<ref>{{cite web |last1=Curiel |first1=Erik |title=Singularities and Black Holes > Light Cones and Causal Structure (Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy) |url=https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/spacetime-singularities/lightcone.html |website=plato.stanford.edu |publisher=[[Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy]] |access-date=3 March 2020 |date=2019}}</ref>