Maxwell's Bright Idea
Bit more of a technical one today, assuming some background in multivariable calculus. Our starting point is going to be Maxwell's equations for a magnetic field B and an electric field E in the absence of any charges: We've got these constants mu_0 and epsilon_0 baked into the equations and these are known as vacuum permeability and vacuum permittivity respectively. I'm not entirely sure what that means but the important point is that these are features of the universe and everyone can agree on their value. (Oh look, a gun hanging on the wall).