Posted on 11/04/2007 10:07:35 PM PST by SunkenCiv
Someday spacecraft will be powerful enough perhaps to journey at extraordinary speeds, spanning the vast interstellar voids. Our technology might develop until we become a vast, powerful intergalactic society, capable of resolving the deepest quandaries ever known. Only then could we definitely answer what is perhaps the ultimate question: "Is the universe shaped like a doughnut?" This last question pertains to an idea attributed to Homer and mentioned by guest star Stephen Hawking in an episode of The Simpsons. In the episode, Lisa Simpson joins Springfield's chapter of the brainy organisation Mensa, which assumes mayoral duties and vows to remake Springfield into a perfect society. The prospect of experiencing a blossoming utopia attracts the attention of the British cosmologist Hawking, who - in his first animated appearance on the show - decides to visit and see it for himself.
(Excerpt) Read more at cosmosmagazine.com ...
LOL, I hope so. Boy, I’d LOVE to eat at that restaurant!
Space might not be three-dimensional. How many dimensions it might have is really up to us. For the convenience of our mathematical analogies AKA theories it is taken to have from four to 26 dimensions. The sphere is a topological entity of which a convenient mental image might be earth, but that is only two-dimensional so we would have to extend our imagination to add a third and a fourth or more dimension. Four dimensions and eight dimensions have particularly rich algebras so most theoretical work is done in those numbers. In spite of popular ideas of relativity, time is not one of the dimensions and is a very different animal.
If earth was a cube and you wanted measure the volume, wouldn't you need three variables instead of two? a x b x c = volume? Why only two variables (dimensions) to determine the volume of earth? Or were you using the word, dimensional in another sense?
If you were in the Navy you would have measured your position on earth with Latitude and Longitude, which is two dimensions. That’s all you would need. The sphere is taken as the surface only. Volume of a sphere adds a dimension, but then you aren’t dealing with the sphere itself.
Oh sure thing, that's what you think... Until you ride a river of space [WARNING: PDF file] over a waterfall that's plunging at the speed of light into a black hole and notice that time itself has been reoriented radially in the direction of your motion and become one with the other dimensions of space!
LOL, just kidding. As you may be able to tell, I did not fully understand this article. But I LOVED it and offer it up here for your enjoyment as well. :-)
If the universe is a doughnut, would you still be able to fritter and waste the hours in an offhand way?
Understood. But now am curious to know why you don’t consider time as one of the three prime aspects of the material universe?
As in Space, Matter, Time. Take away any one of the three and the universe ceases to exist in any identifiable way.
As an aside, does this have anything to do with the underground testing in Nevada back in the 50's and 60's? I've read some really strange stuff and other-wordly events supposedly happening because of a 'rip'.
Maybe the application of time shrinks the toroidial issue.
"And that, My Liege, is how we know the universe to be doughnut-shaped!"
‘’Cosmologists have built a house of cards and it stands,’’ said Dr. James Peebles, a cosmologist at Princeton.
-From the NYTimes version of this story, March 11, 2003
http://query.nytimes.com/gst/fullpage.html?res=9403E3D6163EF932A25750C0A9659C8B63
I doughn’t know how to respond. I knead more time to think so I can at yeast rise to the occasion.
What I would like to know is:
How much do these guys make for sitting around contemplation the time/space continuum?
I b’n sittin’ around contemplating my navel all these years, jus’ like da Burgie Man, and ain’t made a nickel.
I’m so confused right now, I could be a scientist.
Is Georgia in protospace? I know West Virginia was in protospace. But yet, we still had wifi. And somehow we were able to drive across the boundary.
Hey hey,
night fights day,
there’s food for the thinkers and the innocents can all live slowly
all live slowly.
My my,
the sky will cry
jewels for the thirsty and the guilty ones can all die slowly
all die slowly.
And all the world is biscuit shaped
its just for me to feed my face and i can see hear smell touch taste and
i’ve got one two three four five senses working overtime
trying to take this all in
i’ve got one two three four five senses working overtime
tryin to taste the difference between the lemons and limes,
pain and pleasure and the church bells softly chime
Actually, it's a container of cinnamon swirls we call galaxies...
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