The analogy lyx2no gives is very apt Buz. As expected you just don't get it.
Lets say you construct a fence and use a very, very, very good level that is about 20 feet long. You check each 20 foot length and determine that is is dead level within the error bars that you can measure (hell, let's make that error zero for this example). You keep doing this for miles and miles and miles. At all points the fence is absolutely dead level but at some point it will be at right angles to where you started.
The way we define level is something like "at right angles to the local gravity field". But the "down directions" defined by this are not parallel.
We define straight within the space around us in an analogous way. Something is perfectly straight but if the space isn't "flat" then our intuition doesn't count.
An absolute straight unbended bar 10,000 miles long resting on one point of the surface of the earth would have two opposite ends extending out into the atmosphere.
This just shows how far away from having any clue at all you are. lyx2no was using
level on the surface of the earth in his example as an
analogy for straight in spacetime. You switched level with straight which totally wrecks the analogy. The reason you did this is because you don't understand it at all. And you never, ever will.
Buz, you are simply wrong on this. I think you'd look less silly if you just realized that and got real quiet on the subject.
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