Higher spacial dimensions

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Do you know what "is" is?

Is that empirically testable?

Theoretically speaking, how would one empirically test for something that exists in a dimension outside our own?

We notice distortion of time due to speed and gravity but that's about the only empirical evidence we can generate. Beyond that, we don't seem to have much of a grasp on time or gravity other than its direct effects on our own part of existence.

Gravity is evident empirically. The other cannot be tested so it is mere speculation. The only question is is it mathematically possible. Answer: yes.

ruveyn

No one knows what causes gravitation, but there is an excellent theory (Einstein's General Theory of Relativity) that can describe how it works. Ditto for electromagnetism. Quantum electrodynamics makes correct predictions good to 12 decimal places. One does not have to know what anything is. It suffices to know how it works.

ruveyn

It never suffices to simply know how it works. For someone who is big on his own intelligence, you certainly would pass by a lot of tools through the course of history if you only worry about how it works on the surface. If you didn't know what Uranium was, all you'd have is a poison rock. Knowing the source of something's effects, (in essence) knowing what it "is" makes all the difference.

the underlying causes of the electromagnetic field are not (yet) known, but you are making use of transistors and other electronic technology based purely on the HOW of quantum electrodynamic effects and not on the WHAT.

Knowing how suffices.

ruveyn

And what technology and tools would be unlocked with knowing the underlying causes? It's always sufficient because it's all we know at the moment. It's never sufficient in that we should never acquiesce and simply be happy with that.

Maybe I'm just looking at it from a different semantic, though.

According to David Hume we never know causes for sure. All we know is that an event of Type A is immediately followed or accompanied by an event of Type B. Cause is necessary connection between event types and we never really observe the connection. We assume the connection by the working of our minds. Causes exist in our heads. Events exist in the world.

Can you prove the world exists outside your head?

Can you prove the world exists outside your head?

All we know of the world exists in our heads. If there were nothing out there for us to make suppositions about we could invent anything and it would function properly to our concept. But something corrects us, tells us that this is right and that doesn't work. It seems to indicate there is something out there.

This is the trouble that arises when we use plain english.

When physicists or mathematicians refer to an n-dimensional space, it is a space in which a point can only be uniquely identified by using n distinct elements.

So, for example, in two dimensional space (a flat plane), we can identify a point in two simple ways: how far that point is from two arbitrary lines that intersect with each other (they need not be at right angles, btw, but that's the convention), or it's distance from a fixed point, and the angle that the resulting line segment makes with a predetermined line.

When we expand to three dimensions, there is an entire line of points that satisfies those two dimensional reference systems, so we need to find a way to identify a specific point on that line in some fashion.

When we expand our definition of a point in space-time to higher dimensions, we are simply ascribing new characteristics to it--time has often been identified as a dimensional characteristic.

Now, when we create a higher dimensional mathematical model, we don't always know what those higher dimensions represent. We test the model, and we find that it provides reliable results in conventional space-time, so that gives us some confidence that the model is a sound one, even if we don't know the mechanics that lead to that.

Consider mathematics. When we look at polynomial equations, we know that some equations have no real solutions, but, when we expand into complex numbers, we suddenly find that every polynominal of degree n has n complex solutions--a very elegant results. We can't identify what a number like i√2 means in the real world, but we know that it is a solution to the equation x^4 - 4 = 0.

Mathematics is, fundamentally, the study of patterns. If we can create an artificial system that completely describes that pattern, then we can predict how that pattern behaves. We don't have to know how the mechanics of gravitation work to know that we have a cogent model of how it functions. Now, obviously, we would love to know how gravitation actually works, but in the meantime we can work with the model that we have to try and better understand it.

So in this example, using time we can shuffle from one cube being visible to the next, yet in reality (that's obscured by the dimension we perceive this in) they are in fact all cubes?

Thanks for the long reply. But as I see it the mathematicians refer to these higher dimensions as being "spatial". So I assume they are taking about space. Do you mean that they could be taking about something other than space? Or in fact do not know what they are talking about?

No wonder I have been getting nowhere with all this superstring theory.

Oh, I get it, now. Like the way train tracks seem to terminate on the horizon at a point?

So, would perspective be the 4th dimension here?