Photons cannot accelerate
Acceleration and Velocity are vectors. Changes in a velocity vector are an acceleration. Therefore when photons change direction technically it’s a form of acceleration.
Ok but photons don’t change direction either. Treating photon scattering as an individual particle accelerating due to an applied force, well that’s just not a correct description of how perturbative QED models photon interactions.
They do at 0m/s^2.
What about diffraction?
Since photons are indistinguishable, it's hard to say too much concretely, but it some sense a diffracted photon is different photon. In order for a photon to interact with say, a diffraction grating, the interaction is done with "virtual photons".
So for a photon to change course, aka accelerate, it does it by absorbing a virtual photon and emitting another. Whether that is the "same photon" after the interaction is kinda more philosophy than physics, at least to me.
Feynman diagrams are surprisingly accessible for how much information they contain. It's one way to think about photon (and other particle) reactions.
Not with that attitude.
PHOTONS HAVE MASS
ANYONE WHO DOES NOT BELIEVE THEY HAVE MASS IS A COWARD
But every time i put it on a scale, it just flys away. GIVE ME PROOF. I have a kitchen scale to offer.
MEASURE FASTER
IT MOVES REAL QUICK
Photons can have little a mass, as a treat.
Who is the dude on the right?
A scientist at CERN.
Ah, I get the joke now. Classic
Without mass how could you do anything else?
Wave!
I see you there
