Hypercubed, But why? Posted Saturday, April 02, 2005 4/02/2005 03:14:00 PM

Ok, so yesterday I answered the question of what it is to be Hypercubed now. I will answer the question of "why". I guess the answer is that I've been fascinated with the concept of 4-dimensional space for a long time. My fascination began when I read The Planiverse by A. K. Dewdney. This book is a fictional account of contact with a creature living in a 2D world. By understanding the relation between 2D and 3D space we can begin to understand four dimensional space. That is to say the idea of space containing four physical dimensions measured in length. This should not to be confused with the twilight zone type parallel universes (creatures from the 13th dimension, etc) or 4 dimensional space-time. But rather the idea that there could be space that is composed of 4 dimensions of extent. Right now we have up/down, left/right, forward/back... three dimensions each measured using a ruler (not a clock). What if there was a fourth direction that can be measured by length... ana/kata. What would geometric figures with 4 dimensions look like? Because it is impossible for us to imagine 4 dimensional objects (at least I have never met anyone that claims they can) we have to draw on analogies. The only way to begin to understand 4d space is to examine the relationship between 2D and 3D and extend these relationship to 4D. That is why a hypercube is so interesting. We can take two objects we are very familiar with, the square and the cube, and extend it to 4+ dimensions. If you are interested in this type of subject I suggest you read The Planiverse ... it is just plane fascinating (ok that was a bad pun).

Related Lnks:

• Flat Land - by Edwin A. Abbott