Post 5

So what do we have? We have a thing, light, which possesses a property, velocity, that apparently alters depending on the state of motion of the observer, so that each observer will measure the same momentary speed, but such that nothing else about the thing changes, i.e. the total distance traveled remains the same for all observers. To me, my instincts are telling me that this is somehow related, possibly identical, to the quantum mechanical phenomenon of light being either a wave or a particle depending on how you measure it. Perhaps light has an equal probability of being everywhere along its entire path at once, and when an observer measures its speed, the particle or wave sort of “coalesces” at that point along the path, and keeps pace with the observer until the measurement is complete. In other words, just as in the double slit experiment of quantum mechanics, when an observer in a speeding rocket shines his light beam, the light has no exact position or velocity along its path, until the rocket’s observer measures the beam, whereupon it takes on the velocity alongside the observer. Likewise if a stationary observer were to measure the same beam, the light would take on its appropriate velocity in relation to the stationary observer. So light has no momentary velocity until it is actually measured, whereupon each observer will measure the same velocity regardless of his state of motion.