Scientists Predict How To Detect A Fourth Dimension Of Space

Science Daily ^ | May 25, 2006 | Unattributed (Duke University)

[Ben Mugged]

Boggles the mind.....

[Huck]

No matter how they try, no one can explain 4 dimensions in a way that I can understand. The loaf of bread metaphor doesn't cut it (har har).

[Paradox]

Lisa Randall, the Randall half of the Randal-Sundrum theory.

[RightWhale]

It won't work out because time is already an illusion in reality and a convenience in the mechanics formulas.

[Sgt_Schultze]

I'm guessing "thetan levels" aren't going to be discussed.

[avacado]

--- No matter how they try, no one can explain 4 dimensions in a way that I can understand. The loaf of bread metaphor doesn't cut it (har har).---

Which 4 dimensions? 4 dimensions of space, or 4 dimensions of: 3 dimensions of space plus 1 dimension of time.

[RightWhale]

Having finally heard her talk, she is very bright and sure enough of what she knows that it would take a very rare physics mind to out-argue her. She is also current enough in philosophy to be able to stand her ground in C/E debates.

[Frank_Discussion]

In terms of upsetting the apple cart, this would really be shattering in some ways. It would be like the explosion of insight achieved when Relativity showed it explained things Newtonian physics couldn't touch.

[Ramius]

because time is already an illusion

And lunch time doubly so.

[Red Badger]

All they have to do is watch AlGore for a few days...............

[calljack]

Where is that "Time Kitty" when you need one??

[geopyg]

Four dimensions is easy. Meet me on the 5th floor at Main Street and Second Avenue at 3 pm today and I'll tell you all about it.

Five dimensions (of which the ARTICLE speaks) is beyond me! I seem to recall a high-school report where I had a duplicated a drawing that somehow represented the numerous (27??) dimensions that Einstein somehow figured there are???!!

[Huck]

I meant four dimensions of space.

[MHGinTN]

Wow! Just wow. BTW, the 'fourth of space' is an artifact of a temporal reality, as in 'we sense only the messages sent from present arriving at our senses as past temporal. The unsensed present sending messages to our present state is what creates the artifact we interpret as present spacetime ... we don't sense present spacetime directly because we aren't equipped to sense in present only in past orientation. [Wow, would I ever love to discuss this with Lisa ... she's prettier than StephenH don'tchaknow.]

[DoughtyOne]

Try this Huck. The tree dimensions are up, down and depth.

Think of it as a cube. As you leave the cube the length, bredth and depth are frozen to you. In actuality that cube remains active, you just aren't aware of it.

Now move to a different cube that will be unfrozen to you when you arrive.

The first cube was the present. The second cube could be any time other than the present. The movement between cubes would be via the forth dimension.

Perhaps you and others will disagree that this describes the the four dimensions in an understandable way. It does for me.

[OB1kNOb]

The fourth dimension is the one next to the bottom. Next question....

[RightWhale]

There are an infinite number of possible solutions to Einstein's equations, and an infinite number of them are also physically possible in our universe as we know it. A five-dimensional solution was one of the first proposed to Einstein, and it is a solution, but Einstein rejected it because it did not pass the reality test.

[Mazda3Fan]

Fascinating. I wish I had the math background to understand this better.

[avacado]

You described 3 dimensions of space with 1 dimension of time. The idea is to describe 4 dimensions of space without using time, or even saying the word time.

[tumblindice]

Me too. My first thought: `Uh oh, smart people'. (Smart *and* pretty.)
"A philosophical shift in our understanding of the natural world."
What does that mean?