What is a dimension? In 3D...and 2D... and 1D

1D - it's the new 3D!

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Minute Physics provides an energetic and entertaining view of old and new problems in physics -- all in a minute!

In this episode we talk about dimensions and how we know that we live in 3D (or do we?).

Music by Nathaniel Schroeder
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[YourXavier]

I wish you'd do more than one minute. These are fascinating. I've long been annoyed at my lack of grounding in physics.

[TheMonkeyWithTheHat]

My house > London > The Moon > My Garage.

Just where is your garage?!

[jorgecalivalle]

@imshanedulong ,Allan Turing had the answer to that question.

[jorgecalivalle]

@MW3xB345T .there are actually eleven dimensions in our bidimensional flat Universe.

[MW3xB345T]

Aren't there people searching for a 4th dimension?

[imshanedulong]

what if you make a robotic ball that reacts with other types of robotic balls in certain ways. program them to react with eachother the same way electrons, protons, neutrons, and other particles do, and give them enough power to last a few hundred billion years. then, move away a few billion galaxies, and put them in its place, enough to make one galaxy. wait till life evolves on this robotic galaxy. will these giant organic robots ever discover theyre really robots?

[mrbarnes85]

@jeirda5 negative 32 is the answer you are looking for

[IIRobertll]

@TheMathShaman The idea of moments is a good one. It's the same idea as taking 2D slices of an object as you move across it.

The attempts at explaining higher dimensions aren't as mathematical or physical as the first 4. Multiple timelines would definitely have to extend into a 5th dimension, but to what extent you can talk about that dimension physically existing, or actually say anything meaningful about it, is unknown. Anything past the main 4 is purely conceptual/theoretical.

[jeirda5]

1+2+4+8+16+...=-1?

[TheMathShaman]

@TheVerandaguy

Points have no dimension. They are 0 dimensional. stack an infinite number of points alongside each other, and you get a line with length but no other size. Stack the line aside itself infinitely and you get a plane with length and width, but no height. Stack the plane on top of itself infinitely and you get a cube, with length, width, and height. But the cube is a "timeless" concept. Take all the 3D "moments" through which the cube exists, and stack them to get a 4D time-line.

[TheMathShaman]

@IIRobertll

As I understand it, each infinitely-small "moment" in 3D space is actually a "point" along a 4D line. Like the frames along a film real. Each "point" in the 4D line is the entire 3D universe at its given moment. If you stack the 4D "Line" along side itself infinitely, you get a 5D probability plane, where curves represent choices over time and points along those curves are the moments in which choices are "made."

The universe may be one static object we exp. one point at a 'time'.

[HitachiHenemaru]

@YourXavier He does do more then one minute, he does almost one and half minutes