Interesting that because of the work of Bell and others, some ideas that were dumped because of general/special relativity are coming back in a certain vogue, even though no scientist would ever publicly admit it.
The quantum flux, the ZPE could be considered to be "ether".
There does indeed seem to be some kind of absolute space/time, ie a true, positive, though possibly not preferred, inertial system.
Whatever the next revelation in physics, it's almost to the point where it will be called a "philosophy", not a "hard science".
Bell?