>>I'm working on some... um... fringe research, I guess you could say.
>
>Do you ever do anything other than fringe? < bg >

Hey, I like to keep things interesting.

>Interesting read, and I could understand it.

What about accepting it? Is there anything specifically that you understand, but not accept as true, or have articulated doubts about?

>As I was reading the time and motion analogies, I was reminded of an engineering course I took in college. The professor demonstrated that regardless of speed, there is always one part of the tire or wheel that is motionless for just an instant [giving rise to friction]. It is that part that is directly in contact with the path (e.g., the road). If, in that instant, that part was not motionless, the tire would only spin and you would go nowhere.
>
>To prove this to yourself, all you need are a bunch of evenly spaced spokes around a hub. You could do this with popsicle sticks in a styrofoam ball. Now "roll" the sticks across a counter top. The tip of the stick in contact with the counter is the one that is motionless for an instant while the rest move. The "contact spoke" does not really move until the spoke ahead of it contacts the counter. Using the model you wrote about, I guess you could say change and the advancement of time does not occur until the next "point of contact" hits the counter, or "when the rubber hits the road". < bg >

:-) Not even needing the model, the current theory of light and matter is "quantum electrodynamics", which basically says the "point of contact" is a single electron changing energy levels in a sea of electrons orbiting molecular and atomic nuclei.

So, at the point of contact the notion that some electrons belong to the wheel and some belong to the ground doesn't really work at a quantum level.