system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Does time dilation at the speed of light also mean that distance collapses to zero?

So the nearest star outside our solar system is roughly 4 light years away. 

A photon generated by that star, from our reference point, would take 4 years to reach earth. 

From the point of reference of the photon which is obviously travelling at the speed of light, time dilation has caused time to completely stop, so the "*4 light year*" trip occurs instantaneously.

Because the photon can not violate relativity and surpass the speed of light, it appears that the only other way the photon could have instantly traveled 4 light years (or **any** distance), is if the distance was **also** zero.

My (very limited) understanding is that length contraction, in this example, only occurs for observers of the photon, but not the photon itself. So from our reference point on earth, the length of the photon in the direction of travel, contracts to zero (or near zero), but this does not occur at all to the photon, from the photon's point of reference, and does not affect the distance traveled by the photon.

What am I missing that explains how the photon can travel 4 light years distance in zero time ?

I've created my Reddit account just to ask this question, so many thanks to anyone taking the time to respond to this.
gpt
Photons don't have a reference frame. One of the laws of relativity states that from every perspective, light always travels at c. If you're a photon, then you will observe yourself staying still, rather than travelling at c, which violates this rule of relativity and outlaws photon reference frames.