[FormerLurker]

To get less esoteric, let me relate this. That which we perceive as space might just be Something that we can't see or feel. Just as a fish in water might not perceive the fact that it is in a medium that we call water, it is nonetheless in water. As fish in water, we might not perceive that which is something more than nothing, but we attach the word "space" to that medium.

[TigersEye]

re #64. OK, I'll let you off the esoteric hook. ; )
Space may indeed have properties yet to be discovered and those properties might be subject to manipulation. Reality exists whether humans contemplate its qualities or not. But what that reality is is far different than our perceptions lead us to believe. New concepts derived outside our popular perception of things are the 'leaps' in understanding that occur now and then.

Working within the system is good legally and politically in constitutional republics (wish we still had one) but it's a slow and plodding thing in science that rarely leaps ahead.