moses wrote:When one considers that experiencing, or consciousness, can be practically thought of as being in a different dimension, then a multi-dimensional universe could exist.
Our actual world could be physically multi-dimensional, it is just that we ascribe points in other dimensions to points in 3D. There are anomalies in physics which suggest more dimensions. A creature that puts all information into a 2D universe, recieves points of light from the 3D or higher universe and converts this light into nerve electrical impulses, from which the creature generates experiencing that represents that light. Now if anyone is following this they would see that this has become very tricky.
Indeed, how do we generate the experiencing of what is around us. We had better leave this to some other time and place.
But 3D is only an approximation to reality. And in the other dimensions lies life with all it's mysteries.
Cheers,
Mo
Hey moses. Thanks for your reply.
When it comes to "consciousness," I make no claims, and suspect (and would bet) that there is a great deal more than physical reality. I am actually a new age kind of guy. But calling whatever is beyond physical reality "dimensions" only confuses the issue when talking about science.
If the physicists want to "play the game of science," where they always claim that whatever they say is "more real" than what anyone else says (even when they have zero physical evidence), then they have to stick to their own rules. All I am saying is that there is no hard, physical, "scientific" evidence for even one physical "dimension" existing
all by itself (whatever that means). And until that can be "observed" SCIENTIFICALLY, not simply speculated about, all talk of extra (physical) dimensions is just speculation without any empirical support. My point is that the physical space that we live in is just ONE THING. It is not made up of three separate things to produce the "space" that we all know and love. There is no evidence at all that the space that we inhabit can only be produced if someone or some thing goes down to the corner store, buys three things called "dimensions," and puts them together in some way that produces what we call "space." I am saying that when you go down to the corner store, what you buy is ONE thing called "space." If you or anyone else wants to throw some SCIENTIFIC evidence against this claim, hey, I am ready to look at that evidence. My complaint is that the whole discussion of extra physical dimensions is without any physical, scientific evidence.
You claim that our world "could be" physically multi-dimensional. Well, that is absolutely correct. It might be. But "could be" does not qualify as any sort of scientific evidence. Our world "could be" entirely made up unicorn feces. Who knows? Since no one knows what unicorn feces are, there is now way to disprove the idea. But will that idea really help us understand our world? Anything is possible if we don't have the ability to prove (or disprove) what we are talking about.
You mention that a creature "that puts all information into a 2D universe." Well, no one has ever seen a 2D universe. This is one of the complaints in my first post. A sheet of paper does NOT represent a 2D universe: a sheet of paper is a THREE dimensional object. As far as I'm concerned, the very idea of a 2D OBJECT is physically impossible, much less a 2D
universe. If you want to argue this point, I will simply reply, SHOW me a 2D object (or universe, if you wish to be bold). If you can't do that, then does it really deserve a place in scientific discussions? This is not like atoms in the 19th century, where there were many compelling reasons to think that some unobservable thing like atoms might exist. There is no compelling reason to think that unitary dimensions exist. The only thing we know is a "three dimensional" universe and 3D objects. Nothing else has any empirical support whatsoever. Until there is some empirical support for such a thing, it is an idea and nothing more, just like a unicorn. It could be correct, but it is not science. If you want to point to a physical 2D universe (or simply a 2D object), something that we can actually see or touch or "observe" through a microscope or some other instrument, I'm all with you. Until then, my claim is that talk of physical dimensions as separate things in themselves will not further our understanding of the world we live in, in the same way that no amount of talk about unicorns, no matter how "scientif
ic" that talk appears to be, will ever further our knowledge of the real world.
Something that few people seem to think about is, how would you even perceive a 2D object (or universe)? By definition (and remember, this is a mathematical DEFINITION), anything 2D has zero thickness. Zero thickness basically means, in our "3D" world, that it DOES NOT EXIST. If you want to argue this claim, then show me something with ZERO thickness. How would you see such a thing? This is part of what I am saying: by definition, all talk of anything "2D" is NOT perceivable by us in our 3D universe, so is it even possible, by definition, for us to ever verify the existence of such things? I would be interested in serious ideas of how we could actually perceive one-dimensional or two-dimensional objects from our three dimensional perspective in a three dimensional world.
I want to emphasize that I am only talking of the dimensions that physicists (and mathematicians) talk about. I do not deny the possibility of many what I prefer to call "realms" (to avoid confusing with physicists use of the word "dimension") that are somehow "beyond" the physical world that we live in.