by thigle » Wed Mar 15, 2006 2:22 pm
moonlord, your 'density' is different from 'apparent density'. 'apparent density' means 'density-perceived' or 'density-as-perceived', 'density-as-it-appears'.
the 'density' of the perceived surely stays the same, but that's why the apparentDensity can change with zooming.
what i meant with apparentDensity is (and we don't need to go underPlanck this time) that any matterial is actually full of holes on certain scale. one can think a sugarcube to be solid, but with good-enough microscope, one would see the molecular lattice full of empty space running through it - a porous structure.
so a piece of metal would look much more porous(=apparently less dense) than it feels when one hits one's finger with a hammer.
as for the essence of points question, that's a whole another topic. i think what we take for info/energy/matter is just twisting of teeming microstructure of emptyspace itself, as someone once said "undulations of the fabric of space". it's geometry is believed by some to be spin-like, taking advantage of possibility of spherical-rotation (or spin) that is possible in 3-space. then there lies those quantum-gravity theories that claim to potentially unify the 4 forces into a symmetry, like quantum-foam and spin-networks approaches of Smolin, Baez, etc. also Penrose is taking the fundamental point to be some twistor-like structure, (from sequence scalar, vector, tensor, spinor, twistor), not a sphere(point) as such.
until we create underPlanck technology (which is unnecessary and wastefull, for we have natural underPlanck technology integrated in our Being, only we usually don't know where is the interface-panel, nor do we know how to use it when we occasionally come across it), we cannot decide in aristotelian logic frame whether the space is continuous or discontinuous. so until we come to our full senses, we have to accept that it can be BOTH (continuous AND discontinuous) AND ( NEITHER of these 2 ).
meanwhile, we can agree upon different consensus for different contexts/domains though, while keeping in mind that it's nothing more or less than that.