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To flatlanders - 2D organisms with no concept of the Z axis (up and down) - Earth is flat. Their land exists continuously on a straight plane in whichever direction they turn (of course, they can't look up or down).
But, their land is actually curved. They aren't large enough to notice their land is curved. If an ant is placed on an endless plane, up and down would never occur to them. Think about those words; never occur to them.
The 3rd dimension doesn't SEEM to exist to the ant because it never occurs to it. The only way the ant could ever realize that there is a third dimension is if it can travel along the 3rd dimensional plane. Up and down.
So, the ant somehow lifts up into the air, and as it does so it notices the land it once thought was flat is actually curved.
In this sense, the ant has gone from being a flatlander to a third-dimensional being. Does that suggest that everything exists on all dimensions, but they can't necessarily travel along each dimensional plane? In which case we humans are actually 4-dimensional beings yet we cannot travel along the 4th-dimensional plane?
We exist in the 4-dimensional plane. Without the 4th dimension, nothing happens. Objects do not move in any dimensional plane, because the core dimension - time - does not exist.
There is only height, width and length; everything is somewhere but because time does not exist the objects never move. So, because things are happening over a mysterious unknown dimensional plane we think we cannot see (but we actually can), we must surely exist and so must the dimension of time.
Think about creating an existence. Things need values to exist.
A rectangle needs a length, so you assign the value 45 to it in centimeters. Now it needs a width; so you give it the value 30 cm. Then you give the rectangle a height; 25 cm.
The length made the object initially exist. In this sense, everything must need at least one dimensional plane to exist, provided the dimensional plane is of spacial value.
The reason behind this is that if you gave an entity in existence the ability to travel along the dimensional plane of time, it can travel through time - but not space!
Back to our rectangle's creation.
So you give the object a width, it is now a 2-dimensional object. It can move along two axes.
Perhaps all objects in existence can travel along any dimensional plane, but it depends on whether they are built from each dimension.
Think about building the rectangle again; you need to implement each dimensional plane to be able to assign a value.
What do you draw before plotting points on a graph?
The axes. They must come first before you plot anything.
The rectangle is now built up with the three dimensions, but the dimensional plane of time has not yet been added. Without this 4th dimensional plane the rectangle would exist outside of time and thus would never exist to entities that exist within the 4th dimensional plane.
So we have our rectangle and we add the 4th dimension to our existence so it can travel through time. What should the value be?
Is the value spacial in the sense that the rectangle only ever exists within a certain area in its entire period of existence?
Or is the value of time separate from a spacial sense and is simply the periods at which it exists for all other entities that exist within the 4th dimensional plane?
To help you visualize this, let's create an event in time.
The event will be called Point A.
A second rectangle exists 4 seconds after Point A and stops existing 20 seconds after Point A.
Our rectangle we have created still needs a time value, so it will exist 5 seconds after Point A and will stop existing 25 seconds after Point A.
There are TWO VALUES required for time.
The beginning and its end.
Of course, you could say it only needs one value: how long it exists for.
But then ask yourself "at what point does the rectangle's life actually begin?"
You can in fact set an objects existence on the 4th dimensional plane of time using at least two of the following values;
-when the entity first exists (A)
-how long it lasts for (B)
-when the entity stops existing (C)
Using when it first exists and how long it lasts for tells me when it will stop existing. Using when the entity first exists and when it stops existing tells me how long it lasts for.
A = C-B, B = A-C, C = A+B.
This can be applied to the X, Y and Z axes as in height, length and width.
Back to our two rectangles.
We shall say that Point A is 0s into existence.
To our rectangle, the second rectangle already exists because it started existing one second before it. Then, 20 seconds after Point A, the second rectangle suddenly disappears.
This is simpler than you think. The only reason anyone can ever see you is because you have at least one spacial dimension.
If you were to suddenly lose your 2nd dimensional plane, you would only have length and height.
So to anyone from the side, you would be near-enough invisible.
If we take away time; you will become invisible.
If you were to suddenly lose your 3rd dimensional plane, you would have a length and width but no height. Immediately, your body would be flattened to the ground.
You will then argue that your entire body mass would suggest nothing happens to your body because each layer of your body would stack up on top of each other like a stack of flatlanders.
This is correct, because technically any entity can travel along another dimensional plane. The only problem is, you are no longer you. All that exists where you once stood is simply flatland segments of each part of your body stacked upon one another.
In a sense, you become a living statue. Sure, you look the same, but your whole anatomy is segregated into objects without height.
But here's the problem; you have no height. You do not exist on the 3rd dimensional plane. So all the stacks of segments have no height and thus appear as a 2D 'painting' of what your body once was.
Our only problem is visualizing the 5th dimension.
In what way is each dimension different from the other?
But what the hell?
One-dimensional objects make 2D objects when combined.
2D objects make 3D objects when combined.
Therefore; 3D objects should make 4D objects.
You need three or more 1D objects (dots to make lines) to make 2D objects.
You need three or more 2D objects (lines to make shapes) to make 3D objects.
You need three or more 3D objects to make 4D objects, surely?
[Edited on 12.01.2012 3:15 PM PST]