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ZENO’S PARADOX SOLVED?


Draggingtree

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Draggingtree
7/3/2016

Filed under: General — Patterico @ 11:59 pm

I am bored by politics. How about some abstract philosophical/theoretical physics musing, from a complete and total amateur. If nothing else, it’s a chance for you to teach me something.

 

You have probably heard of Zeno’s paradoxes, one of which is that to get anywhere, you first must travel half the distance, and then half the remaining distance, and then half the remaining distance, and so on. According to this theory, you never get there.

 

I have seen various solutions to this, but I am not sure anyone has proposed mine. Perhaps they have, but here it is anyway:

 

My proposed solution is that there is a minimum distance in the universe, which cannot be subdivided into smaller distances.

 

Imagine a debate between Smarty Pants #1 and Smarty Pants #2. They are debating whether there is a smallest distance in the universe.

 

Smarty Pants #1 says there is no such thing as a smallest distance. He says: imagine the distance equal to .001 of an inch. I can add a zero and make it .0001 of an inch. If you imagine the distance equal to .00000000001 (ten zeroes) of an inch, he says, Scissors-32x32.png

http://patterico.com/2016/07/03/zenos-paradox-solved/

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