A NOVEL USE OF VERY LONG-BASE-LINE INTERFEROMETRY TO PHOTOGRAPH PAST EVENTS FOR STELLAR AND PLANETARY SCIENCES - IMPLICATIONS FOR BASIC THEORY

Because of the increased distance traveled, diffracted photons detecte d at extreme sidebands will have spent more time inflight and will car ry information from further in the past, as compared to photons detect ed in the central band. Very long baseline interferometry (VLBI) can b e used to detect the older, lav-amplitude photons. Although the tempor al difference is small, it can be useful in stellar and planetary scie nces. Under the role measurement plays in the standard interpretation of quantum mechanics, the theoretical detection of significantly past light from a nearby source is ambiguous and could reflect low-probabil ity events that did not occur in our universe.