Icedog,

Thank you very much for your reply. I like your pictures! I can see you enjoy the virtue of quality tools. Actually the tomato cutting analogy was just a bad attempt to be funny, which is a flaw in my character. But your explanation of it makes sense to me, and the idea of looking at the "peaks" of the edge as spears that concentrate the cutting force in spike points to allow for better penetration is both new and revealing to me. I just finished cutting a tomato in the slowest possible motion, and I could actually see the serrations punching through the tomato skin, before the inclusions follow. The big question is: are similar principles at work when a razor slices hair? At least I can see one flaw in my previous reasoning: I assumed that one hair got trapped in one inclusion between to peaks, and that the sharp bottom of that inclusion did the cutting. How stupid could I be? A hair measures between 30 and 120 microns, while razor striations are about 10 times smaller. Thank you for showing me the light on that. The question of course remains: does "toothiness" really make a difference if applied to a razor's edge? And if so, what would be the ideal size/distribution of the teeth?
I am aware that shapton owners generally do not bother with such ideas, but just put the finest possible edge on a razor and shave while whistling Dixie. As for myself, I'd rather drop dead than slicing tomatoes with a serrated knife, and as far as a razor edge goes, except for the whistling, I have been following the "polish as far as possible" approach. I like to find out IF a "striated" approach to razor's edges makes equal, less or more sense.

Thanks again for chiming in.
I hope you make quick and full recovery,

Bart.