as i was sitting here pondering how a magnet works(staring at the wall for entirely too much time.) it occurred to me that i could use a spring to explain positive and negative attractions. so if a spring is stretched it will want to shrink back to its original shape(negative). if a spring is compressed it will want to expand back to its original shape(positive). if you do nothing to this a spring it is neutral. so, if you have a stretched spring and a compressed spring and you put them together one will spring in and the other will spring out. if you, say, put 2 compressed springs together though, they will push each other away. negative and positive both attract to neutral because both can give or take to find a medium between negative/positive and the neutral. so, inside the nucleus of an atom protons dont repel each other because they are more strongly attracted to the neutrons. this would explain why neutrons have a slightly heavier mass than protons. and yes i know there's quarks and that neutrons have 2 downs and an up and protons have 2 ups and a down. im having a hard time picturing exactly what that's supposed to mean. maybe im looking to far ahead. maybe a dozen or so physics classes and i might be getting close.
if and when you eliminate the impossible, whatever remains, no matter how improbable, must be the truth