# How accurate is this description of higher dimensions **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 30, 2016, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096 "2016-05-30T16:43:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 10\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Wesley\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/wesley_clark/32/20581_2.png) [@Wesley\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wesley_Clark)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/1 "2016-05-30T16:43:04Z")
> **[Understanding A 10 Dimensional Universe](https://futurism.com/understanding-10-dimensional-universe)** > > The reality of dimensions and how they play a role in the ordering of our universe is really quite different from the popular characterization of "parallel universes." Fifth & sixth dimensions - multiple parallel universes and time travel to various pasts and futures become possible Beyond that, you just have more and more initial conditions that change going deeper. Sixth dimension - all realities under the same initial big bang conditions. Seventh - different initial big bang conditions. > [@](#): > > In the seventh dimension, you have access to the possible worlds that start with different initial conditions. Whereas in the fifth and sixth, the initial conditions were the same and subsequent actions were different, here, everything is different from the very beginning of time. The eighth dimension again gives us a plane of such possible universe histories, each of which begins with different initial conditions and branches out infinitely (hence why they are called infinities). I get the impression that until the 8th dimension, you are still operating under the same laws of physics but by the 9th that opens up all potential laws of physics (most of which are desolate because we live in a [universe](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fine-tuned_Universe)with very ideal physics conditions). Tenth dimension - all possible realities exist. Is this accurate? ---
**Author:** ![The\_Niply\_Elder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8e8cbc/32.png) [@The\_Niply\_Elder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Niply_Elder)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 5:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/2 "2016-05-30T17:07:39Z")
The explanations given in that article are quite different from what I’ve read (mainly Brian Greene’s Elegant Universe). First of all, there’s competing hypothesis that place the number of dimensions at either 11 or 26, depending on the mathematical equations you’re using it makes the calculations neatly fall into place. Second, the physicist notion of “parallel universes” has been so butchered by countless Hollywood movies, that conceptually they are totally different things. It seems to me the explanations of the higher dimension is spurious, it’s not like the universe could have any other number than the 11 (or 26) it has, as the math simply wouldn’t work. ---
**Author:** ![74westy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/74westy/32/3950_2.png) [@74westy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/74westy)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 5:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/3 "2016-05-30T17:34:33Z")
The title of the article is important. It’s about **a** 10 dimensional universe, not **the** 10 dimensional universe. What it describes is mostly 10 dimensional in a metaphorical sense, not a linear algebraic sense. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 9:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/4 "2016-05-30T21:24:39Z")
It’s total nonsense. For starters, there’s no way (save for purely arbitrary conventions) to say which dimension is which number. In actual practice, time is usually considered the zeroth dimension, while the familiar three macroscopic spatial dimensions are numbered 1-3 (though in what order is again arbitrary), but one might just as well say that depth is the fifth dimension, time is the 17th dimension, width is the 2nd dimension, and height is the 11th dimension. That website might have a numbered list of things, but most of the things on their list bear no particular relationship to each other. It’s like saying that the ten colors are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, happy, hard, banana, elephant, and love. ---
**Author:** ![Exapno\_Mapcase](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/exapno_mapcase/32/1051_2.png) [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)\ **Post date:** [May 30, 2016, 10:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/5 "2016-05-30T22:47:43Z")
> [@](#): > > How accurate is this description of higher dimensions On a scale of 0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0,0 to 100x,100y,100z,100a,100b,100c,100d,100e,100f,100g: 0. ---
**Author:** ![Asympotically\_fat](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e47c2d/32.png) [@Asympotically\_fat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Asympotically_fat)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 5:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/6 "2016-05-31T17:51:13Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > It’s total nonsense. For starters, there’s no way (save for purely arbitrary conventions) to say which dimension is which number. In actual practice, time is usually considered the zeroth dimension, while the familiar three macroscopic spatial dimensions are numbered 1-3 (though in what order is again arbitrary), but one might just as well say that depth is the fifth dimension, time is the 17th dimension, width is the 2nd dimension, and height is the 11th dimension. > > That website might have a numbered list of things, but most of the things on their list bear no particular relationship to each other. It’s like saying that the ten colors are red, orange, yellow, green, blue, happy, hard, banana, elephant, and love. Yep, broadly-speaking I’d say file under “n” for “nonsense”. ---
**Author:** ![Saffer](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saffer/32/6440_2.png) [@Saffer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saffer)\ **Post date:** [May 31, 2016, 6:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/7 "2016-05-31T18:27:29Z")
> [@Asympotically\_fat](#): > > Yep, broadly-speaking I’d say file under “n” for “nonsense”. Of course, sensible-ness is only the first dimension in crackpot space. Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk ---
**Author:** ![Senegoid](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/senegoid/32/6606_2.png) [@Senegoid](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Senegoid)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2016, 6:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/8 "2016-06-01T06:02:43Z")
> [@Saffer](#): > > Of course, sensible-ness is only the first dimension in crackpot space. > Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk Sensible-ness, more likely, isn’t any of the dimensions in most crackpot spaces. Sent from my iReality using Huntenpeckenclickenclacken ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2016, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/9 "2016-06-01T06:46:26Z")
Well, it sounds like it might be a description of a universe with more than one ‘time-like’ dimension, so you can sort go up/down/left/right/east/west/widdershins in time in addition to the traditional forward and back direction (with ‘back’ currently being difficult or impossible within our own context). I don’t see why an increase in the number of time-like dimensions automatically leads to the conclusion that travel within those dimensions means travel across a different magnitude of universal change though. I don’t think the universe cares to sort out events of human history into a different layer from events in the formation of stars and planets. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [June 1, 2016, 1:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/how-accurate-is-this-description-of-higher-dimensions/756096/10 "2016-06-01T13:05:17Z")
For what it’s worth, in all of the models which posit extra dimensions, all of the extra dimensions are spacelike, not timelike. As soon as you try to introduce more than one timelike dimension, the models all go ludicrous.