?? The "structural" difference is that one of the balls is in motion, and one is not. I don't understand what else you mean.

Additionally, this fully depends upon what reference frame you are observing the collision from.

Relativity aside, you could observe which balls were in motion by looking at the air pressure immediately around the balls; the moving balls would have a slightly higher density of air in the direction they were moving to than the direction they were moving from. Also, the doppler effect would cause the colour of the moving balls to differ from the stationary ones.



From a relativistic view if you were stationary with respect to the stationary balls then the length of the moving balls (measured along their direction of motion) would be (very slightly) shorter than the stationary balls.

seanWrote:

zeno's paradox has no real world value and is just a strawman argument. We now know (or at least think we know) that time is not a infitite serries of instants but a finite serries of instants lasting for as long as it takes a photon too travel on plank length. Because no decernable difference between states of an oject seperated by a time frame less than one plank length is observable time frames less than one plank are irrelivant. Zeno asked how a infinite number of events can be completed in a finite amount of time. I aked how motion can be passed from one instant too the other when only one instant of time can exist at any one time. I believe that there must be a structual attribute of matter that determines the motion of matter (other than effects caused by the objects motion). This attribute may be realitive too those who observe the ojects in motion.

Here's my take on it--Not only does the planck time exist as the smallest possible amount of time, the plank length is the smallest amount of space. Every PT (plank time), the matter is frozen in whatever spot it is in, but it still posesses energy. When time makes the jump from one instant to the next, matter makes the jump--in a quantum-mechanical-ish way-- from one PL to the next. Motion is, in my opinion (and it'd take a hundred pages to list all the times I've been wrong, so I very well might be [even though it'd take a million pages to say how many times I've been right, lol] ), a compilation of quantum jumps in both space and time.

BTW, is it "plank" or "planck" ?

Getting back to the original point, There can not be a difference between the two structures. Remember that Relativity requires two objects moving at constant velocity, I.E. non acelerated frames to have perfectly equal validity.



If there were a structural difference before impact then what you would notice is that the frames could be seperated and determined. This would violate the rules of relativity. There is however a structural difference UPON impact.



That information you are refering to is Inertia, or more precisely it is the momentum of an object. Inertia and momentum are both only valid in terms of frame DIFFERENCES, not in terms of absolute frames. When the two balls come into contact they are transitioning from seperate frames to having a conjoined frame. The momentum is passed from one to another by the Electroweak force. More particularly it is passed in a collision between the electrons in the outer valence of the molecules of both balls.



The method of this transfer is acomplished through what is called Electron squeze theory I believe. A number of texts that address phyisical chemistry detail the exact mechanism of this process, But to cut a long story short the electron orbits. are compressed against each other causing the electric field to store a capacitive energy between the electrons in the valence shell and the nucleus. this energy must be restored and is pushed back out causing the objects to transfer their momentum. The time this takes and the method of the information storage is a fucntiong of Schrodingers Wave Equation for electrons. You just have to add a forcing function term to squeeze the electrons together.



As to how the inertial information is stored when the balls are in motion, Dave already addressed this better than I could in another post. the long and skinny is that there isn't specific agreement on all of the methods but the current best guess as to where the inertial information is stored is that it is a function of the Higgs field.



Obviously the more relevant momentum information isn't stored in the structure its stored in the velocity differential between the two frames.

"The planck length is indicative of where gravity should kick in at a microscopic level. The planck isn't anything hugely significant, it's just the time taken for a photon to traverse the planck length."



But, then, that must be the smallest amount of time--since nothing else can happen during then--the fastest thing crossing the smallest distance.

Is that or is it not the point where quantum fluctuations become so violent that all notion of space breaks down? It is essentially the smallest amount of space.

"Space-time is continuous in physics."



We've obviously been reading different things. At least four books in the library all said that the PL is the smallest unit of measurement.

Kyle MarinoWrote:

"Space-time is continuous in physics."





We've obviously been reading different things. At least four books in the library all said that the PL is the smallest unit of measurement.

Emphasis on UNIT OF MEASUREMENT



You've been reading the same things. . ..



You just didn't understand what you were reading.



Space is continuous. . . HOWEVER,



Several modern physical theories discard the idea of a point like particle, under these theories the smallest possible particle size becomes that of the planck length. These planck length particles still exist in continous space but their size becomes a discrete step function.



More importantly if they are no longer point like particle the minimum level of definable movement must be greater than the quantum random function for a particle of that size. Which means that Size, Time of motion, and Step length of Motion, all three become discrete functions.



In practical everyday terms this means matter will act as a discrete functionized object.. . Not that it doesn't already what with atoms and all. But even the smallest constitutents like electrons will act in this manner.



Adiditionaly the Zero mass particles under these theories will have sizes on the length of the planck scale with a minimum energy and time value. That means photons and Gravitons will also move in discrete step functions through continous space.



More particularly the smallest step a photon can make is a function of what is called the spin zero time.



None of these theories are really proven yet but a brief list of theories that rely on the idea of discrete spatial steps for all constitutent objects are:



Gage-Lattice Theory

Twistor theory

String Theory

Brane or M theory.



It is important to note that these theories in general still imagine space as continuous, that means that the discrete steps things can take are functions of their starting postions and directional velocities. Image a checkerboard where every time you move a piece a "step" the grid is remeshed in different directions to match the new possible "steps"



the remesh is the function of the new minimum steps the object can make and it can be remeshed in any position and any direction because the underlying spatial field is continous.