General Question

elbanditoroso's avatar

Do invisible people make shadows?

Asked by elbanditoroso (33578points) August 25th, 2015

In other words, do they have mass and a physical substance that would cause a shadow to be created?

Or does invisibility mean that they literally have no physicality at all?

Observing members: 0 Composing members: 0

10 Answers

kritiper's avatar

Sort of. The heat of the body and breath deflects light rays so there would be something if not a complete shadow.

zenvelo's avatar

If they are truly invisible, then light passes through them to illuminate what is on the other side of them, so no shadow.

If they are camouflaged so that they cannot be discerned from the background, light does not pass through them, so shadow.

Pachy's avatar

Objects become visible when they interact with light, for example by scattering it. If an object didn’t interact with light, you couldn’t see it, and light would travel straight through it. So, as you suspect, no shadow would be formed.

ragingloli's avatar

Depends on which wavelengths of the EM-spectrum they are invisible to.
If they are just invisible to light that is perceivable by humans, then they will cast shadows in gamma rays, x-rays, ultraviolet, infrared, microwaves, and radio waves.

JLeslie's avatar

Bert on Soap probably did cast a shadow. I’m going to say yes.

kritiper's avatar

Next time you get gas in your car, and the light is shining just right, look on the ground, or where ever the shadow of the nozzle is, and observe the shadows the gas fumes cast.

stanleybmanly's avatar

Wait a minute. Questions like this drive me crazy. When people ask “can a faster than light spaceship….?” or “why does kryptonite….?” as if these are everyday realities like noodles or sales taxes, they are distorting both reality and worse the language utilized in describing it. There’s nothing wrong with speculation, and truly wondrous things have resulted from it, but a speculative question regarding imaginary or hypothetical topics is entitled to an “if” or a “would” in front of it, never an “is” or “does”.

wsxwh111's avatar

Agree with @zenvelo
We can see something either because it’s shining or because it’s reflecting light that is illuminating on its surface. The reason about invisibility is the invisible thing somehow find a way to let all the reflecting light from the object behind it bypass it and still travel in the same direction instead of being blocked by it, thus letting people see the object behind them(the light illuminating on the surface of things behind it enter our eyes).
And the reason of shadow is the sunlight can’t pass the object, so no sunlight at the spot that the object is blocking, thus a dark area(there’s less reflecting sunlight from surface of the area of shadow so less light of that area enters our eyes).
So obviously, sunlight will also bypass the invisible object and shine one the surface of the ground. So no shadows.

wsxwh111's avatar

*on the surface of the ground(last paragraph)

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