Sometimes all I have is my opinion. Especially when I have no clue. I am just muddling through life. I still cant get past 3 dimensions plus time.
What is the fifth dimension? I mean really...I hear about things like 27 dimensions..but just make me visualize the fifth one.
Most people do have definite opinions about most subjects. I tend towards a different approach. I prefer to use phrases such as "I tend to think", "I suspect", "My gut reaction is", or in the tradition of Arthur C Clarke, "If I had to bet". Having an opinion means making up one's mind. When it comes to subjects where we have no basis for an informed opinion, I really don't understand why anyone would have an opinion. It is illogical. As many wise men have said, there is nothing wrong with "I don't know" as an answer. I often find it to be a relief to just admit I don't know. I don't have to form an opinion when I have no basis for doing so. I don't have to make any leaps of faith and violate logic that way.
Let's see if this thought experiment helps. Imagine that you are just a one dimensional object that can only move in a single direction. You can go backwards or forwards but always only in this single dimension. Now imagine that you can spin around horizontally 360 degrees within your one dimension. Doing that adds a second dimension within the one dimension that you are still confined within. Now add the ability to roll 360 degrees and to tumble 360 degrees. That adds 3 dimensions all within a single dimension. A one dimensional object travelling entirely within one dimension but still able to spin, roll and tumble within that dimension. Now add the ability to move up and down to the single back and forward dimension. Include the additional 3 spin, roll and tumble dimensions into the up and down dimension. This means that the one dimensional object can now move both up and forward while rolling, tumbling and spinning. How many dimensions is it interacting with simultaneously?
While that is a nice way to think of it, it is somewhat misleading. What you are really describing is degrees of freedom. If you take any point on a body and consider it's position in space, rolling, tumbling, and spinning can be described entirely using 3 dimensions. In thermodynamics, we have to consider precisely what you describe. All molecules have three degrees of freedom for linear motion in the three dimensions of space. But we have to consider things like rotation to predict the behavior of molecules; and in particular their ability to store energy. And we call those additional forms of motion, degrees of freedom. I prefer to use the dimension of time as an example. We are all moving through time. That is the 4th dimension. So we are familiar with more then three dimensions already. But that fails because additional dimensions are thought to be spatial dimensions. There is really no way for our minds to conceive of additional dimensions. For us mere mortals, we are limited to only mathematical models to describe them. This is the best example of the 5th dimension I have ever found.
LOL! I appreciate that it was a simplistic explanation but sometimes it is easier to visualize complexity by taking things down to the basics and removing anything extraneous as you attempt to reach an understanding of the more complex concept. At least it works for me.
Probably the most popular way to understand additional dimensions in space, is to imagine Flatland - a two dimensional world. And consider how three dimensional objects would appear in a two-dimensional world. If Flatland is a sheet of paper and I poke my finger into the paper, the Flatlanders would see a circle. They couldn't conceive of the length of my finger.
An ant was crawling in the lawn....his feet got dirty so he decided to go onto a glade of grass. he got up toward the top and looked down, suddenly he realized there was more than the dirt he walked on. He crawled down to tell his queen, she lived in the colony. He walked until he found the hole and began to seek her out. As he walked he suddenly realized he was going down and understood the dirt path kept going. He walked back and forth looking for the queen but she was not there. The ant went outside to find her, spending many days until he thought about how long it had been since he ate. Our little ant just realized his small world was much bigger than he first thought having explored and found new "Dimensions", What other interesting things will he find?
Look...I may well be a dumbass but in my mind there is no such thing as a flatland....unless you are on LSD....So I look at it this way. The world is long, wide, and thick. Space can be warped with gravity but you cant be in one place in space and be somewhere else at the same time. Extra dimensions are a construct of the imagination. Just like having one dimension without the other two.
Flatland is way to understand the limitations of three dimensions. We can imagine two dimensions but not 4 spatial dimensions. Extra dimension are not a construct of the imagination. They are mathematical. We follow the math where it leads us. It has led us to many truths we never could have imagined - not the least of which being time dilation. And Quantum Mechanics is entirely counter-intuitive. But it has successfully predicted more correct results than all other theories combined. It is why your computer works. So if you don't believe it, you must be having an imaginary conversation. I forget exactly what but I believe it was a graph of the known particles based on energy. When plotted on a graph, the known particles mapped as half of a hyperbola. Hyperbolas have two parts. We could only fill the right side of the graph with known particles. Mathematicians objected because hyperbolas are made of two mirror images. But the physicists said, well, these are all the particles that exist. That is how they map. Then one day we discovered the anti-particles. And those mapped on the other side of the hyperbola. So all along the math was telling us that something else was there. We just hadn't discovered them yet. Never underestimate the power of math and physics. They are the purest form of truth we have ever discovered. And the universe is not only stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine. But it requires humility. It requires accepting that reality is beyond out ability to imagine it. We have to discover it. Math and physics are our tools for learning greater truths than our imaginations can manage. The Greeks thought we should be able to rationalize all of reality. And science has proven them wrong time and time again. So your thinking is 2000 years behind the reality of what we know. As I said, it requires humility. Math and physics are superior to our imaginations. To be honest, your mindset is not dumb. It is arrogant.
I just see what I see. I aint smart enough.to be arrogant. I have been measuring things all my life and just cant imagine another dimension....or something like a worm hole. A black hole I can get....but I have a problem with matter collapsing on itself.
not too long ago I read something about quantum computers that would allow something to be in two places at the same time...not that I know enough to understand about physics how that could work...
