Connecting two other ELI5s. This is something that I've always struggled with.
Space is nothing. There is no actual "fabric" of space. There are things in space, and the "space" in between is.. nothing.
Nothing, as I understand it, is without mass, energy, information, anything. There is no thing to bend.
But! Gravity doesn't bend light because light doesn't have mass. It bends space and we see light bend along it.
How can nothingness be bent?
And why doesn't light just pass through empty nothingness on the same trajectory, if it isn't being acted on by gravity? OR is it that it does do this and it's only our 3D perception that it has changed trajectory?
When we talk about gravity bending space, are we actually talking about the distribution of Stuff within a given area, as it relates to another body, due to the effect of gravity? e.g. the distribution of Stuff around a random planet
I know this is very long and contains multiple questions. My hope is that by including all of this, it will make clear where my misunderstanding is. The real question is, how can nothing be bent?