4 ms·
Not sure why an honest question is getting downvotes. 1) We do not yet have any reason to believe there are more than 3 dimensions plus time [1] 2) It depends
by coryfklein 9y ago
Not sure why an honest question is getting downvotes.
1) We do not yet have any reason to believe there are more than 3 dimensions plus time [1]
2) It depends on what you mean by "visible". Take a look at this picture full screen: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter#/media/File:Gravitationell-lins-4.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter#/media/File:Gravit...
That is an image of dark matter bending the light from distant galaxies - take note of the circularly shaped bent galaxies radiating around the middle. This effect is called "gravitational lensing", and it is why we know that there actually is some matter in this picture. We also know that it is invisible because otherwise the "dark matter" would be blocking view of the galaxies you're looking at.
3) I highly recommend reading the summary on the Wikipedia article on dark matter [2]. The whole article is really long, but the summary paragraphs at the top give a great high-level explanation of "what we know" about dark matter.
[1] https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/4079/experimental-evidence-of-a-fourth-spatial-dimension https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/4079/experimenta...
[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dark_matter
- chrisfinne 9y agoHumans have a long history of misunderstanding the geometry of our world. I don't know jack about astrophysics, but the explanations for dark matter and dark energy seem so complicated that my bullshit meter goes off. Reminds me of the people trying to model the walk of the planets in an Earth-centric universe. I'd put money on another Newton or Einstein (or singularity AI) giving us a much more elegant solution in the next 50-100 years.
- kiliantics 9y agoI feel similarly dissatisfied with the explanations but, given the current framework, they're actually the simplest possible models that could work. The rest of physics and the many observations that need to be consistent with it are just that elaborate.