Attn Highly Technical: The Ten dimensions explained

[Tarzanman]

... and with flash, no less

http://www.tenthdimension.com/flash2.php

 

[Qriz]

Very cool. I've always had a bit of trouble with these concepts, but the animation/great narration made it much easier. Well, I had to watch it twice, but still! Thnaks for posting this!

 

[Varun]

It's still hard to get my head around, but an interesting animation that really helps with a difficult concept.

 

[Rockinacoustic]

My face just went through ten dimensions of

Nonethless, it was pretty interesting

 

[dorion]

When I saw this on Digg there was alot of controversy about its accuracy.
Can anyone confirm its accuracy?

 

[pcy]

Hi,


I think it's facile, and probably gibberish.


It does help get the basic idea of multiple dimensions over, and it's a good school text upto the 4th dimesnsion (time); but after that:

1. It failed to recognize that time may be an anomoly in n-space
2. I represented a highly conjectural arguement for the existance of precisely 10 dimensios as if it were fact. I don't think it's even a majority opinion.
3. The entire process of wrapping all the dimesnions we have so far into a point and extending them into a line in some new dimension may be a good way to help visualize n-space if yo are new to it, but I don't think it's accurate in any sense at all.
4. The use of higher dimensions just to map distant locations in lower dimesnional space into eachother is again, possibly a good way to explain what a higher dimension might be like but highly impausible as hard science.




Peter

 

[Qriz]

Well, yeah. We 3rd dimensioners find it extremely difficult to fathom what other dimensions would be like to be in...because we only really know our own. I don't think there are better metaphorical connections you could make besides the one demonstrated in the animation.

There's an extremely limited amount of "hard science" we have on this, because it's pretty much impossible to be able to imagine higher dimensions (4+) in our own. Everything is fully hypothetical, and as far as anyone is concerned, impossible to prove. BUT we can look at the relationships between dimensions 2 and 3 pretty easily, which makes imagining those between the others a bit easier.

 

[Riddlinkidstoner]

Oi my head hurts. The slight possibility of alternate universes and realities based on choice and outcome would totally screw up every single religion out there

 

[Tarzanman]

Ah, i think that time necessarily being the 4th dimension is wrong. If we lived in a 2d world, then you could just as easily say that time was the 3rd dimension (which woudl be wrong)

 

[Qriz]

Someone in a 2nd dimension world (which is impossible for us to really imagine) wouldn't have a concept as time as we know it. You're taking time for granted as always being...time! This explanation is saying that the 4th dimension is what we call time, because the 4th dimension is a "line"- a connection, between two different "points," or presents, or realities, in the 3rd dimension. So right now I'm typing while listening to Weird Al, and later on I'll be eating ice cream from the container. The 4th dimension of my reality is the "line" that can be drawn from me typing to me eating, which we call time. But in the 2nd dimension, which like the 4th is also a "line" (a connection between two 1-dimensional points,) their "time" is a "fold" in their own dimension, which causes their position in their 2nd dimension to seemingly instantly change.

Does that make sense? Of course, I don't take everything in the animation to be automatically accurate, but I like the metaphors he draws. The ant is especially good and another look at it might help you (Tarzanman) understand the supposed relationship between the first few dimensions better than my (attempt at an) explanation.

Now I'm gonna take some ibuprofen. A lot of it.

 

[DrPizza]

Hey, the movie is coming out this fall:

Flatland (the movie)
Check out the trailer for the movie.

 

[pcy]

Hi,


Time is referred to as the 4th dimension becase we happen to percieve a universe with 3 spatial dimensions and 1 temporal dimension.


I can't see any particular reason why there should not be multiple time dimensions actually, though that might screw up the relation between time and entropy.


Or maybve it's really true that "time is an illusion, lunchtime doubly so"; and we actually inhabit a static universe with only three dimensions.


The thing about a dimesion is simply that it's a location parameter that is not capable of being converted into any other dimension. That's all.

Just think of a starburst...



Peter

 

[gamefreakgcb]

Originally posted by: Rockinacoustic
My face just went through ten dimensions of

Nonethless, it was pretty interesting

QFT

 

[Fullmetal Chocobo]

It seems the explanation was limited to a multitude of three ideas: the point, the line, and the fold. Is that because we are 3-dimensionally minded? Would a 2-dimensional entity define the 10 dimensions as repitions of 2 ideas? And the same for a 4-dimensional entity?

Just a thought.

 

[gamefreakgcb]

An interesting thought, I thought the explanation involved those three but didn't link it to us being 3D.

 

[PowerEngineer]

I'm not sure who Rob Bryanton is, but his descriptions of the upper dimensions don't seem to jive with what I got out of string theory discussions. Maybe I'm out to lunch...

 

[preslove]

I enjoyed the visualization and it's explanation of one particular form of string theory, but string theory is actually just a big ass hypothesis that is very, very hard to prove. I hope physicists can come with a way to confirm/disprove it soon. Science is getting too close to theology for my tastes.

 

[SuperFungus]

Thanks for the link, i found it interesting even if i didn't fully understand all of it. I think i have a fairly good grasp of how if we knew there was a dimension 'above' our own that would mean infinate 3d worlds because of how there being at least 1 3d world means infinate 2d worlds and simmilarly, a single 2d worlds means infinate 1d worlds. What i still fail to grasp is how any higher worlds can be predicted at all, how we can possibly know that these dimmensions which we do not know exist could be "bent" and finally how we can limit the number of higher dimensional worlds to 10. Any clarifcation on those points would be appreciated

On a related note i'd like to say that i tend towards a dislike of string theory. Now i certainly don't claim to be an expert, but it seems that rather than attempting find the laws that govern the world as it is, string theory has already found the law and is now in the process of proving that it indeed defines the world. I know that thats not the whole story but that is my current, general gripe with string theory, theres something backwards about it. If thinking about the universe in terms of strings meant the development of models that where proven to work i guess i could live with that, but when string theory largely fails on even this level (to the best of my knowledge) i begin to question what the theory has to offer to science. I would also be interested in any clarification on these points.

And Riddlinkidstoner i don't really see how religion relates to the topic. And while i don't want to bring this thread any more off course i would be interested to know exactly how you think multiple dimmensions threatens Relgion? I happen to be Catholic and do not feel that my religion is threatened by this. That there are multiple dimmensions does not somehow 'disprove' any religious beliefs i've heard of. Further, just because we can prove that there are multiple dimmensions does not give meaning to any of them.