c'mon DA, didn't my response to jjw's first three points illustrate that I have picked up some physics books? Maybe I could have been clearer, but the stuff answered below the quoted section (not within the quoted section) was supposed to be summed up with the part you didn't quote: "Hope this gives you a laugh (...but pause for a thought too). I've certainly questioned all these precepts too; and still do!" -and I encourage jjw to continue questioning.

...and about questioning precepts: I like what you wrote: "Amazing. We just throw away the rules by which we understand physics. Force. Momentum. Acceleration. Causation." -DA
You've hit upon a very good point; that the rules are how we *understand* physics (but the rules are not reality). Newton came up with a very good approximation of reality. He gave us rules which worked in most cases, here on Earth. Einstein came up with a much better approximation of reality (by questioning precepts) which work in most cases even off of the Earth.
But neither of these "physics" allow us to understand everything. To get an even better approximation, or to get exact, I think we'll need to "think outside the box." I know that "observer effect" thing is not provable, but I don't think it's disprovable either. I've just always thought it was funny; like the old "Life is just natures way of turning light into heat."
Remember we're on the not-so science page here.

I'm surprised you didn't call me on the "anti-DeSitter membrane in 8-space" gobbledygook. I just threw that in as an "outside the box" type of prompt. It's actually a very bad description of some string theory stuff that I read about last year (but I added the stuff about stretching in a black hole to relate things back to expansion).

I'd sure like some help refuting (or proving) my shower-curtain effect (Scientific American, 2001) question. I need good, questioning, critical minds to help me follow through with "studying" this effect. Have you seen that topic on this forum? Maybe it'd have done better on the hard science forum; it's really not a joke.
Thanks,
~Sam

Pyrolysis creates reduced carbon! ...Time for the next step in our evolutionary symbiosis with fire.