The universe might have a “refresh rate.” If it does, that could explain why there’s a speed limit for how fast anything can move.

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Interpretation

The toy model

Think about a phone screen showing a video.

• The screen updates many times per second.
• A higher refresh rate usually uses more battery.

Now imagine (as a toy model) that the universe works a little like that:

• reality “updates” in tiny steps,
• and faster updates cost more energy.

Why that would create a speed limit

If an object is going to look like one coherent thing moving smoothly, it can’t “teleport” across huge gaps between updates. It has to move a little bit per update.

So if there is:

• a maximum update rate (because infinite updates would take infinite energy),

and

• a smallest meaningful “pixel” of distance,

then there would automatically be a maximum speed:

• the fastest anything can move is “about one pixel per update.”

What this is (and isn’t)

This is not a proof.