Split Second (Split Second, #1)

by Douglas E. Richards

My favorite of these paradoxes is called Achilles and the Tortoise. Imagine a tortoise is given a large head start in a race. Well, before Achilles can catch the slow critter, he has to travel half the distance they are separated. But while he’s traveling half, the tortoise is also moving ahead. So now he again must travel half the remaining distance before he can catch the reptile. But again, in the time this takes, the tortoise will have moved forward a small amount. By the time he travels half the remaining distance again, which continues to shorten, the tortoise moves forward again. And so on, forever. In this way, thousands of years ago, Zeno presented a logical argument that Achilles should never be able to catch up to the tortoise, in a way that was quite difficult to disprove for some time (even though we all know Achilles will, in fact, catch and pass the tortoise).