Lesson #9: The TENTH Dimension

WOW that just blew my mind, and at the same time comfirmed some thoughts I have had.

You have thoughts?!?!?! :)

Posted with little to no proofing. :D

OK, these are cute, and there are scientists that could baffle me with irrefutable proofs. But I stand by my guns. All this 1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc... dimension stuff is bunk. It's simply a theoretical framework designed to give us something to hang other theories on to give us something to ponder and feel stable about. It's because, like numbers, it starts with an imaginary theory: a point. "Points" don't exist and I simply refuse to accept the validity of theories based on something that can't be proven in itself, and needs to just be accepted. Show me an actual real point and I'll show you something that disproves itself. It's like talk about gods. You can see the effects and you can theorize about the origins based on outcomes, but you can't prove the first exists.

After the first dimension, it gets somewhat aceptable to me for a while. I can generally accept the second and third dimensions are good theories (ignoring, of course for the time being that they are based upon a bunch of connectors between a multitude of theoretical, non-existant points.) But time? Nuh-uh. Our theory of "time" is a measuring stick held up to a piece of fruit. How far is it from new seed to moldy husk? It isn't. It's different states of being, growth and decay. Time is our word for change, but it isn't a bunch of slices along string or tube. It's just our marking of an item in it's current state, plus our memory of what it was and that it might become.

Until they prove the first dimension, the rest are all house of cards. And don't even get me started on the whole theory of numbers, "Distance from zero, my ass."

When we were kids, we used to say things like "you're stupid!" and the correct response was "well, you're stupid times infinity!" I used to think the only amount bigger than that was infinite infinities. It never helped my case trying to argue that, not only were they even stupider than me, but that there wasn't room in our discussion for a greater amount of stupidness. Infinite infinities covered it all. I wonder if maybe one of my teachers may have introduced us to this tenth dimension theory back then. I certainly recall early introductions to the mobius strip and other crazy brain stretchers. The 70's was definitely a good time to be getting educated. Nothing like the 80's or now. Yuck. Sucks to be in elementary school now. "And so kids, the mouse clicks here and good grammar is an archaic theory used by our forefathers to help stabilize their fledgling country."

Actually I was going to post something very similar to what Seth posted. The only 'dimensionality' we can prove is a good analogy for our universe is the 3D model (with a few tweaks to include what we know about time). We don't know enough about time to really say that it is a 'dimension' in the sense that the video presented it. There are some nice theories about time travel, but the only one proved so far (to the best of my knowledge) is time dilation (the relative velocities of objects changes the rate at which an object experiences time, they were able to measure this with atomic clocks on orbiting space craft).

There are a lot of similarities in the thinking presented in string theory (and in the video) to religious thinking. Essentially the premise is that we can't observe something because of our limited human (3d thinking in this case) brains. So here is a grand world view that we can't prove or disprove, HEY LOOK A BEAR, sub atomic particles are generated by God errrr.... I mean vibrations in 10 dimensional space. The video as a whole would have been better if they didn't try to link it to string theory. String theory has a long way to go before it becomes science.

When watching that video keep in mind that it doesn't describe a view of our World (in the broadest possible sense) that can be verified. We can't really pin down Time, let alone multiple time lines, multiple multiple universes, or even as Seth points out lower dimensional space. The video is very careful to use the proper language (mentioning that 0 through 2d space is impossible and anything higher than 4d space is highly improbable). It is up to the viewer to keep in mind that the video is presenting one way of [i]visualizing[/i] dimensions higher than 3. In math you can deal with N dimensions no problem, however, as a human you can't visualize more than 3 dimensions meaningfully.

So what's my point? The video gives a neat mental trick that will keep intro calculus and linear algebra students from going mad. It does not introduce a compelling model for reality.

[quote="Charlie"]You have thoughts?!?!?! :)[/quote]
What is that suppose to mean??

[quote="copperdusk"][quote="Charlie"]You have thoughts?!?!?! :)[/quote]
What is that suppose to mean??[/quote]

I think it means [b]you got owned times infinity! [/b]

Man, Seth, it must have been a while since you took calculus. :)

See, the way out of the "your stupid infinity infinity" thing is easy...you just compose an equation that rises faster than the opponent.
Some functions grow faster than others even if both eventually reach infinity.

As for you guys denying dimensions...uh...not sure what to tell you other than mathemeticians and physicists much more experienced than you guys have probably already said those very things...and then got laughed at by their colleagues. :)

I don't think it was supposed to be a model for reality, I think its exactly what Eric said. Its a trick to help us understand what the dimensions 'look' like. In fact, if you look around the website, you'll notice it says that little video pretty much sums up the first chapter of the book it advertises.

Sure, we have problems proving lots of things. Some things you have to take for granted simply because we've seen soemthing happen over and over.
For example, no one has actually 'proven' gravity exists. We really have some problems trying to figure out how it works. We have some ideas, but NOTHING we can do can predict what will happen when you slip on that peel. We just know after thousands of years of EXPERIENCE that that damn peel is gonna inadvertently send us to the ground.

So since gravity has not been proven, do you think its bunk?

How about evolution? The religious nuts always say, "ITS JUST A THEORY! It has not been proven!"
Does that make it incorrect?

*applause*

We accept that we'll fall. It's really faith-based :P

But, you're right, and if you start seriously questioning all we take for granted, the act of inhaling and exhaling becomes a real chore.

::Nods sagely::