I know photon is an electromagnetic wave and are generally massless and therefore cannot exert a gravitational force, however I know energy can wrap the space around it so I'm confused. I think I'm mistaken somewhere so please help, thanks.
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According to General Relativity, a gravitational force is created by energy (including, but not limited to mass). Therefore the answer is yes, photons gravitationally attract each other in General Relativity. The energy of the photons would bend the spacetime in such a way that the photons would get closer to each other. The fact that light deflects in a curved spacetime has been observed. However, the energy of photons is way too small to curve the spacetime in a measurable way. Therefore the fact that photons attract each other remains a theoretical conclusion of General Relativity and has not been observed in experiment.
safesphere
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Fundamental massless particles (including photons) do not interact through gravity with each other but they do interact with the gravitational field of the environment through gravitational lensing. So the answer is "No". Just because they have energy, it means that that energy can be borrowed for a small period of time, according to Heisenberg's uncertainty principle, an hence converted to mass in the form of creation of fundamental massive particles which only then they can interact. So long as this creation has not happened, photons themselves won't feel each other gravitationally; they only feel each other electromagnetically.
Rebel
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