6 ms·
Why though?
by itsthecourier 2y ago
Why though?
- UltraSane 2y agoBecause humans can't visualize more than 3 dimensions.
- Asraelite 2y agoIt's possible, it just takes a lot (years) of practice.
- patrickthebold 2y agoIt's actually quite easy: first, you imagine n-dimensional space, and _then_ you set n = 4.
- amelius 2y agoThat's not imagining; that's reasoning.
- ToValueFunfetti 2y agoTry setting imagining = reasoning and I think it will work out
- Asraelite 2y agoI'm getting downvoted now :/ I think I'll write a blog post at some point explaining my process for visualizing 4D. Hopefully it should make it clearer what I mean. I think most existing resources on the topic go about it in a way that makes it hard to build up a proper intuition. They start by assuming that humans can visualize 3D and then try to extend that one dimension higher. But humans can't actually visualize 3D, only 2D. We combine multiple different 2D perspectives together to "fake" an understanding of 3D. Our vision is also only stereoscopic 2D, not true 3D. If you take a similar approach with 4D, trying to project directly from 4D to 2D instead of going through 3D as an intermediate step, it's harder to visualize at first but better in the long run for really understanding it.
- _yb2s 2y agoAlthough I (and I assume Patrick above) were joking, I will back you up here- having studied and worked with physicists. Some people can visualize, through practice and psychological “tricks” higher dimensional spaces- and different people can do this to different levels. Some people can instantly intuit approximate geometric solutions to high dimensional problems without working out the math- so I know they are either visualizing it, or doing something similar. I can generally visualize 4D with some “tricks” that compress the problem. For example if you can imagine varying configurations of the same 3D space, that itself is essentially at least a non continuous 4th dimension. If you can imagine that evolving into new configurations, you are starting to visualize or at least imagine 5 dimensions. Some people appear to be able to so this for ~8 dimensions.
- NBJack 2y agoDepth is the third dimension for our brains. You can argue it is faked as we don't gather the depth directly, but it is still something you intuitively understand and can visualize clearly. You can rotate an object mentally, fill in the gaps, etc. We may tend to store that data in 2D, but spatial reasoning is very much achievable in 3D. We do it all the time. While I don't dispute your method works for your purposes, would you say it allows you to visualize more than a single 4D shape side by side? What about interlocking shapes? Can you place this shape in an arbitrary 4D space among others and describe its relative position?
- _yb2s 2y agoI use a similar technique to swim- one merely flies, while setting their location = underwater.
- deleted 2y ago[deleted]
- ks2048 2y agoI’d say it’s not possible, but that depends on your definition of “visualize” (I guess maybe 4d as 3d+time would also count)
- Asraelite 2y agoThe first step is being open minded about it, otherwise you're right, it's not possible.
- JadeNB 2y ago> Because humans can't visualize more than 3 dimensions. It's awfully hard to prove that real-world things are impossible, especially if there's no objective measurement of whether they've been achieved. (For example, if I tell you that I can visualize more than 3 dimensions, then how could you verify or disprove that?)
- epidemian 2y ago> For example, if I tell you that I can visualize more than 3 dimensions, then how could you verify or disprove that? I don't really know. The first thing that came to my mind would be to ask to draw/model different cross-sections of a 4D object ("cross-volumes"?). We can visualize 3D objects, and therefore can draw 2D cross-sections of 3D objects relatively well, and relatively easily. Like, sections of a human body, or a house. So, maybe someone who can visualize 4D objects in their head could also model 3D "cross-sections" of that object at arbitrary "cuts". And we could check if those 3D radiographies are accurate, because we can model those 4D objects on a computer, and draw their 3D cuts. Just a simple idea. I'm sure there could be other ways of probing this.
- JadeNB 2y ago> We can visualize 3D objects, and therefore can draw 2D cross-sections of 3D objects relatively well, and relatively easily. Many people can draw cross-sections reasonably well, but I can't. Nonetheless, I believe that I can visualize 3D objects.
- paulpauper 2y agoIsn't the 4th dimension time? So it's like objects moving in time and interesting each other.