Spatial Dimensions

Space, Time & Everything 1

When we talk of spatial dimensions, we often talk of them as if they are separate concepts in their own right. Draw a line. Yep, that’s one dimension. Now draw a square. Yeah, that’s two dimensions. Build a cube from the paper. Wow, that’s three dimensions.

Then people start talking about the possibility of a fourth dimension, perhaps even more.

Yet, by looking at them as separate concepts, I believe we are looking at them the wrong way.

Consider one dimension. It doesn’t matter which one—length, width or height. Yes, we can draw a line to represent the one dimension. But it isn’t one dimensional. It will have length, width, and possibly even a smidgen of height. And it doesn’t exist without the paper or whatever it’s drawn on. What about the edge of a solid object? Again, it may have some width, and it certainly doesn’t exist without the object it’s part of.

So, a single dimension simply doesn’t exist by itself. Perhaps we can consider it as part of two-dimensional space.

Then what about two-dimensional shapes, combining any two of the three dimensions? The face of a piece of paper can represent two dimensions. But that face doesn’t exist except as part of the piece of paper which has thickness and is three dimensional. The same applies to the two-dimensional surface of any object. It doesn’t matter what surface you are talking about; it doesn’t exist except as part of the three-dimensional world.

Thus, none of the three dimensions exist by themselves. Nor do they exist as any of the three possible combinations to form two-dimensional space. They only exist as aspects of three-dimensional space.

So, the concept of dimension is only a generalisation used in geometry and then applied to the general world when we’re describing or measuring something. Yet like many of those concepts that we humans form, it refuses to go away. Not only do we continue to refer to one dimension and two dimensions as if they exist by themselves, the idea of a fourth dimension, or even more, continues to persist.

Why?

There is no logical progression here. A one-dimensional line can be part of a two-

dimensional drawing. The two-dimensional surface is part of some three-dimensional object. But our three-dimensional world doesn’t form part of a four-dimensional world because basically three dimensions means all of space.

Instead, advocates argue that the fourth dimension is somehow part of space, and somehow passing through all three other dimensions at right angles.

I believe research has demonstrated that space is flat. I don’t like that term because it sounds two-dimensional, but it means there is no evidence of any curvature of space, and surely that also means there are no warps and mythical tunnels. Just three-dimensional space.

Now those three dimensions are everywhere even if we only see them in solid objects. If a fourth dimension was present, wouldn’t it also exist everywhere? Wouldn’t it be in the stars, the planets, the comets, the mountains and the seas? Wouldn’t it even be part of living shapes? Wouldn’t the tides, currents, waves and wind be passing through it, and wouldn’t we be passing through it every time we moved?

I don’t think so.

I have seen drawings that supposedly illustrate how a fourth dimension might exist or distort our vision. All I can say to that is the drawings were made in a three-dimensional world and contain illusions to the human eye. Illusions created in two or three dimensions are created in our three-dimensional world and certainly aren’t evidence of a fourth dimension.

So, I simply don’t believe in more than the three spatial dimensions. The fourth dimension is very imaginative, but as I discussed in The Thinking Process, just because someone can imagine something doesn’t make it right.

Why do we let the concept cause such confusion? Are we simply trying to avoid the implications of three-dimensional space?

Consider choosing any spot in space. In how many directions could we move away from that spot? My initial reaction was that it would be huge number but still finite. Okay, but what if each direction moves away into infinity. Then surely the number of directions you can move away from that spot also becomes infinite.

Surely that idea is mind-boggling enough. Who needs another dimension? Perhaps we need to focus more on the idea that three-dimensional space is everything.

Unless it’s infinite, in which case the term ‘everything’ doesn’t really apply.

Yep, just my thoughts. Nope, not much research.