The 4th dimension is BS

Kaithar

Active member
Joined
May 17, 2021
Messages
11
Points
43
The video is trying to show a hypercube, which is an interesting idea. So...

A 3D cube's surface is six 2D squares. Each square is a plane in 3D space where one of the 3 co-ords is constant, each pair of faces has a different one of the 3 constant. If you drew only the X,Y and ignored the Z completely you'd draw 4 lines for the sides and two squares for the top and bottom, all overlaid. Knowing what a cube and square look like, is that understandable?

A 4D hypercube's surface is eight 3D cubes. You construct it from pairs of cubes in exactly the same way, each has either W,X,Y, or Z constant. So if you tried to draw that using only X,Y,Z you get two overlaid cubes and 6 square planes, each representing one of the faces of the hypercube.
With that in mind, does weird cube-in-cube make more sense?

As for reality? We have 3 spatial dimensions. Gases fill and expand in a 3d volume, gravity and EM propagate as the surface of a sphere giving inverse-distance-squared, the number of spatial dimensions is baked into physics.
 

Ploptian

Active member
Joined
Aug 2, 2020
Messages
5
Points
43
THERE IS NO PROOF TIME EXISTS.
That clock over there? Proof of a rate of change, but not the existence of time.
FIGHT ME.
Time may not exist as a continuous dimension, we can't check after all, but that "rate of change" is things moving through space, and to move through space you also move through time. Space and time are not separate, rate of change is literally all the proof you need of time.
 

Gryphon

The One who has the Eyes
Joined
Dec 10, 2021
Messages
736
Points
133
4D is time though. Being 4D means you can time travel and shit. Being 5th dimensional means you can see all realities and outcomes and forms of you and become a mulitversal singularity across these timelines or something.
Again thats not 4D. 4D is when a 4th dimension to spacial properties. You know how our world works on a XYZ axis where you can move horizontally, vertically, and up and down. Basically the 4th Dimension is when you add another dimension to how stuff like that works. Pretty much having something like a WXYZ axis.
 

AnonUnlimited

????????? (???/???)
Joined
Apr 18, 2022
Messages
4,570
Points
183
You know what? After sleeping on it I’m just going to agree with the topic that the 4th dimension is total BS.

All the theories an are just that… theory. People say it’s time, it’s a different angle, or it’s gravity since it has effects that go beyond 3 dimensions, it rips the fabric of space

blah blah blah.

Gravity doesn’t have to be 4th dimensional but simply a force that pulls objects together, we may know how it works and observe it working but we don’t exactly know what causes it.

I may agree that a 4th dimensional being can see a 3 dimensional being the same way we see two dimensional pictures, but again it’s all theory.

Its BS to somehow think we can imagine a 4D object, even the cube within a cube in the opening post is 2D, not 3D and it’s just a bunch of pixels doing a visual illusion of motion.

The möbius strip is still a 3D object with a definite volume. The flask of which I can’t remember the name also has a definite volume.

Anything that has volume is 3D and the only reason we may consider an object 4D is because we are deceiving ourselves from accepting the fact that all objects are made up of three dimensional particles.

To be 4D would not require 4D angles, or 4D whatever but actual particles that are 4D which 3D can’t touch, hence there is string theory that talks about particles and dimensions we cannot interact with.

1D and 2D were simply concepts about angles and shape, and most of us can tell that 3D is nearly infinitely more complex than 2D, hell 2D isn’t even made up of particles but is only a concept that we have in our heads that say it’s 2 dimensional, but 2 dimensional doesn’t actually exist in our universe as anything but a connection of points in our heads.

Im just saying, I think we are looking at 4D completely wrong.
 

Gryphon

The One who has the Eyes
Joined
Dec 10, 2021
Messages
736
Points
133
Time may not exist as a continuous dimension, we can't check after all, but that "rate of change" is things moving through space, and to move through space you also move through time. Space and time are not separate, rate of change is literally all the proof you need of time.
In the video I provided it goes into some basics about time as a spacial dimension. To quote from the video, the act of flipping through a notepad and a 2d sketch being animated with each turn of the note is a simple example of time acting as a spacial dimension. The thing is though is that the 2D image didn't become 3D because of time's influence. It portrayed a 3D object in a 2D space, but it didn't start coming up from the page like a pop up book.

That also kind of makes me wonder. Time can't move in a 2D space without outside force from the 3D world to make it move. So theoretically, lets say a 4D world does exist. Does that mean that the only reason we're moving is because someone from the 4D world is making us move? I'mma shut my brain off for now cause I just woke up and I don't want to have another crisis since I went to sleep.
 

Prince_Azmiran_Myrian

🐉Religious zealot exhorting Dragons for Jesus🐉
Joined
Aug 23, 2022
Messages
2,827
Points
153
THERE IS NO PROOF TIME EXISTS.
That clock over there? Proof of a rate of change, but not the existence of time.
FIGHT ME.
I don't need to fight you, time will do that for me. BECAUSE YOU ARE RUNNING OUT OF TIME. Hurry, the end comes sooner than you might want.
 

melchi

What is a custom title?
Joined
May 2, 2021
Messages
2,874
Points
153
In the video I provided it goes into some basics about time as a spacial dimension. To quote from the video, the act of flipping through a notepad and a 2d sketch being animated with each turn of the note is a simple example of time acting as a spacial dimension. The thing is though is that the 2D image didn't become 3D because of time's influence. It portrayed a 3D object in a 2D space, but it didn't start coming up from the page like a pop up book.

That also kind of makes me wonder. Time can't move in a 2D space without outside force from the 3D world to make it move. So theoretically, lets say a 4D world does exist. Does that mean that the only reason we're moving is because someone from the 4D world is making us move? I'mma shut my brain off for now cause I just woke up and I don't want to have another crisis since I went to sleep.
Is it really so confusing? Those geometry drawing are just ways of trying to visual things.

1.) 1D square is a straight line
2.) 2D square is 4 of the same line.
3.) 3D square is 4 of the same square or a cube
4.) 4D is the same pattern but we call it a hyper cube.

However, a flat surface is 2D so it is not the real thing.

Unless someone is a time traveler time is a partial dimention. Something may be at spot (X,Y,Z) at time (t) then not be there anymore at some other time.
"Crap, I locked myself out... let me just move backward in the [t] direction to where the door isn't locked. My X,Y,Z spot is good so those can stay the same though."

Computers deal with more than 3 variables all the time. The only reason it is so mind blowing is because big brains make the extra dimension something esoteric like different realities, or diverging possibilities (Like stein's gate). Math with lots of variables is nothing new and well understood.
 

LilRora

Mostly formless
Joined
Mar 27, 2022
Messages
1,349
Points
153
To be 4D would not require 4D angles, or 4D whatever but actual particles that are 4D which 3D can’t touch, hence there is string theory that talks about particles and dimensions we cannot interact with.
That is why great majority of books and other things that talk about 4th dimension are not entirely correct. The z dimension in those stories is not the same as the base three; it is a complimentary dimension that relies on the three existing.

Have you heard about Noether's symmetries? To explain in very simply, it says that for each symmetry of the universe, there is one preserved quantity - so for example because space is symmetric over rotation, we have conservation of angular momentum. The reason why I'm bringing this up is that in most stories that involve the 4th dimension, it is not entirely symmetric under rotation and the reality is restricted to a single, fixed plane.

That is why it is not true 4-dimensional world - things don't suddenly start rotating in the 4th dimension and disappear from our plane, because they simply can't. The 4th dimension is only symmetric under translation and can be imagined as an infinite stack of 3-dimensional realities. What that does to the world, very simply, is that it forbids the existence of true 4d objects and permits the existence of 3d objects.

You can compare it to a stack of papers - assuming for the sake of experiment that a single sheet is a 2d object - with a small human shaped doodle on paper inserted in the middle. In such case you can move the doodle on the layer it's on, but it can't go up or down. You can pull it out and insert it in another layer - let's assume that's what advanced teleportation magic does. But how can you rotate the doodle in the third dimension? It is simply impossible; it would need to go through many papers, and you could only see a line where it would be crossing the sheet of paper - needless to say, not happening. A real situation with 3d objects in layered 3d reality is obviously more complicated than that, but the core of the issue remains the same.

What I just described is actually much more similar to how time works (like Gryphon's example with the notepad above), although that's also more complicated in reality since we continuously move though time... or at least we think we do? What is similar is that we can't "rotate" through time - we can only get an impression of doing so thanks to Einstein's relativity and limited speed of light.

Generally, I would not say we are looking at 4d wrong, but rather that what many people think is 4-dimensional reality is actually not one - at least not a true 4d reality with each of the four physical dimensions indistinguishable from the other.
 
Last edited:

AnonUnlimited

????????? (???/???)
Joined
Apr 18, 2022
Messages
4,570
Points
183
@LilRora Thanks for what you wrote, but I don’t have the energy to continue a discussion on this.

I don’t see 4D is important, it’s only interesting for me until it gets complicated, and you my dear have made it very complicated lol.

still thanks for your insight, I don’t really have anything of substance to add.
 

owotrucked

Chronic lecher masquerading as a writer
Joined
Feb 18, 2021
Messages
1,465
Points
153
Reminder that
-everything has different time coordinate and moves through time differently
-time is unique from space because it imposes a direction for causality
-gravity isn't a real force
-when a body is in freefall, its trajectory through spacetime is a geodesic (generalization of straight line)
-when you fall on earth, it's litteraly the ground ramming upward the spacetime
-time slows closer to mass. Maybe you could say that in isolated space, your spacetime trajectory is straight in time dimension without component in space dimension. But close to curved space time, your spacetime trajectory gets a spatial component, which lowers your time component
-in black hole, space becomes time and time becomes space

-iirc string theory was just an excuse for quantum gravity to be weaker than its macroscopic generalization (as if gravity was spread through smol pockets instead of only affecting in 3 dimensions)

Extra dimensions always gud for making up shit because you can't affect the extra D but the extra D could affect you. So you can't disprove that there's an eldritch god fucking up with you only when nobody's looking around
 

greyblob

"Staff Memeber" pleasr
Joined
Feb 6, 2021
Messages
2,743
Points
153
1D length is absolute
2D area is absolute, length is subjective
3D volume is absolute, area and length are subjective
4D something is absolute, volume area length are subjective.

in theory a 4D being could transverse through 3D space, teleport anywhere and blink out of existence.

 

Cipiteca396

Monarch of Despair 🐉🌺🪽🌊🪶🌑🐦‍🔥🌈
Joined
Jun 6, 2021
Messages
2,700
Points
153
1D length is absolute
2D area is absolute, length is subjective
3D volume is absolute, area and length are subjective
4D something is absolute, volume area length are subjective.

in theory a 4D being could transverse through 3D space, teleport anywhere and blink out of existence.

That game looks really... Interesting.

What it makes me realize, is that we would be horrifying creatures to a 4d being.
In the video I provided it goes into some basics about time as a spacial dimension. To quote from the video, the act of flipping through a notepad and a 2d sketch being animated with each turn of the note is a simple example of time acting as a spacial dimension. The thing is though is that the 2D image didn't become 3D because of time's influence. It portrayed a 3D object in a 2D space, but it didn't start coming up from the page like a pop up book.
That interpretation of time as a spatial dimension just doesn't make sense. Even if it did come up from the page like a pop up book, that wouldn't be time; it would be depth. He tried to turn time(t) into depth/height(z).

A better example of how time works is the video itself... By sliding the red bar at the bottom of the video, you can simulate motion across t. As you move the bar to an 'older' or 'newer' point, the video changes. At any point in t, the video has a specific image. That image is 2D, and transition from one image to another is the third 'dimension'.

The keyframes of an animation program might be an even better example, especially if you were working with a 3D animation.

That said, it really is different from a spatial dimension. If you change the x coordinate, it doesn't change t, y or z. So it's weird that changing t changes the rest.
 

Gryphon

The One who has the Eyes
Joined
Dec 10, 2021
Messages
736
Points
133
That interpretation of time as a spatial dimension just doesn't make sense. Even if it did come up from the page like a pop up book, that wouldn't be time; it would be depth. He tried to turn time(t) into depth/height(z).

A better example of how time works is the video itself... By sliding the red bar at the bottom of the video, you can simulate motion across t. As you move the bar to an 'older' or 'newer' point, the video changes. At any point in t, the video has a specific image. That image is 2D, and transition from one image to another is the third 'dimension'.

The keyframes of an animation program might be an even better example, especially if you were working with a 3D animation.

That said, it really is different from a spatial dimension. If you change the x coordinate, it doesn't change t, y or z. So it's weird that changing t changes the rest.
I think you misunderstood. The example you give with the red bar in a yt video is the same example with a notepad flipping through different keyframes to create animation. Just with a different coat of paint.

What he's talking about is the image itself on the paper doesn't become 3D through its limited version of time. The whole point of that was to show that time isn't the same type of spatial dimension as say the XYZ dimensions which create our 3D world. It can be viewed as a certain type of spatial dimension if viewed through a certain angle, but its not ultimately what makes something 3D or 4D or 2D.
 

TheEldritchGod

A Cloud Of Pure Spite And Eyes
Joined
Dec 15, 2021
Messages
3,444
Points
183
Time may not exist as a continuous dimension, we can't check after all, but that "rate of change" is things moving through space, and to move through space you also move through time. Space and time are not separate, rate of change is literally all the proof you need of time.
Then it isn't a dimension. The universe is flat. If it was curved as realitivity suggests, then it shoul be convex or concave in some fashion, but it's not.

Space may not be smooth, but like a fresnel lens. Discrete chunks, not a smooth flow like enstien claims. If this is the case, and time and space are linked, then time is also in distinct chunks. Therefore, you cannot travel in time. It is an illusion. You can't go back in time, and you also cannot go forward in Time. There is only the omnipresent now.
 

TheEldritchGod

A Cloud Of Pure Spite And Eyes
Joined
Dec 15, 2021
Messages
3,444
Points
183
Then again, would light, sound etc even travel the same way in 2 or 4 spacial dimensions?
Light is unidirectional. It only travels in a straight line. It is space that curves. Also, because light travels at the speed of light, from lights point of view, no time passes beyond a single Planck moment. So the photon from a galaxy 10 billion light years away took 10 billion years to get here, but for the photon, only a single tick of the cosmic clock.

Light is merely information, which is why it is weightless. So if there are higher dimensions, it would act the same.

However, with the exception of curled up kalubri space, I doubt there are higher dimensions. M theory is a damn scam. 12 dimensions my ass. 12 dimensions of bamboozle the college to get more funding, more likely.

Loop gravity can kiss my ass as well. I'm increasingly convinced that gravitas are like the heat given off by a cooling object and that object is empty void cooling until it crystallizes in a lower energy state whereupon empty space effectively becomes a superconductor, but instead of superconducting electricity, it superconducts bosons.

Thus would do a much better job explaining the red shift of distant galaxies than "muh expanding space time"

Conservation of energy and matter is absolute damnit. Hyperinflation makes no goddamn sense.
 

ThrillingHuman

always be casual, never be careless
Joined
Feb 13, 2019
Messages
4,738
Points
183
Light is unidirectional. It only travels in a straight line. It is space that curves. Also, because light travels at the speed of light, from lights point of view, no time passes beyond a single Planck moment. So the photon from a galaxy 10 billion light years away took 10 billion years to get here, but for the photon, only a single tick of the cosmic clock.

Light is merely information, which is why it is weightless. So if there are higher dimensions, it would act the same.

However, with the exception of curled up kalubri space, I doubt there are higher dimensions. M theory is a damn scam. 12 dimensions my ass. 12 dimensions of bamboozle the college to get more funding, more likely.

Loop gravity can kiss my ass as well. I'm increasingly convinced that gravitas are like the heat given off by a cooling object and that object is empty void cooling until it crystallizes in a lower energy state whereupon empty space effectively becomes a superconductor, but instead of superconducting electricity, it superconducts bosons.

Thus would do a much better job explaining the red shift of distant galaxies than "muh expanding space time"

Conservation of energy and matter is absolute damnit. Hyperinflation makes no goddamn sense.
you trolling or high?
 
Top