# Quantum Space ??? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 17, 2002, 9:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204 "2002-11-17T21:02:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 19\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Ring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Ring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ring)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2002, 7:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/21 "2002-11-19T19:45:15Z")
And by the way, jeffocal, what do call this stuff? It certyainly isn’t physics. ---
**Author:** ![Ring](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Ring](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ring)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2002, 7:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/22 "2002-11-19T19:49:29Z")
Groan. That should, of course, be certainly not certyainly. ---
**Author:** ![JS\_Princeton](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/57b2e6/32.png) [@JS\_Princeton](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JS_Princeton)\ **Post date:** [November 19, 2002, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/23 "2002-11-19T19:55:23Z")
Please don’t feed the crackpots. ---
**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:** [November 19, 2002, 7:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/24 "2002-11-19T19:55:47Z")
[Curly]Soy-ten-ly![/Curly] ---
**Author:** ![jeffocal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9a140/32.png) [@jeffocal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jeffocal)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 4:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/25 "2002-11-20T04:36:36Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Exapno Mapcase \* > \*\*No, Jeff. Wrong. This is simply not true. > > You postulate four spatial dimensions. Oops. In four spatial dimensions the number of gravitational field lines per unit area at a distance of r would go as 1/r^3 instead of the 1/r^2 we see in our three dimensional space. > > But 1/r^3 orbits are unstable. > > \*\* Doesn’t that depend on how the axis of the fourth spatial dimension is oriented with respect to the axes of three-dimensional space ?? Jeff ---
**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:** [November 20, 2002, 4:50am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/26 "2002-11-20T04:50:45Z")
Your notions of math are fascinating, Jeff. Tell me more. How is your fourth spatial dimension oriented? ---
**Author:** ![jeffocal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9a140/32.png) [@jeffocal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jeffocal)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 10:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/27 "2002-11-20T10:53:43Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by Exapno Mapcase \* > \*\*Your notions of math are fascinating, Jeff. Tell me more. How is your fourth spatial dimension oriented? \*\* As demonstrated in Chapter Ten of Shadows the orientation of the “W” axis of the fourth spatial dimension is simultaneously parallel and co-terminal to each of the axis of the third spatial dimension. Jeff ---
**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:** [November 20, 2002, 7:19pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/28 "2002-11-20T19:19:12Z")
Ah, I love a big, bold thinker. For thousands of years every mathematician on earth has assumed that when extrapolating into higher dimensions all axes would be oriented at 90 degree angles to one another. But not our Jeff. He needs to invent a totally brand new mathematics with which to encompass his theories. A courageous move, this. For as Jeff surely understands, when a basic alteration to the foundations of mathematics is made, one cannot use **any** current equations or procedures without rederiving them from scratch. For his new mathematics he would have to redo from first principles all of algebra, geometry, trigonometry, topology…, heck, every single branch of math ever invented. And more. He has already said he repudiates the laws of orbits, gravity, and motion as established by Kepler and Newton, so he has to start from scratch and recapitulate all of mathematical physics from square one. More than that: he has to recreate Newton’s whole Principia Mathematica, because I’m positive that the calculus as proposed by Newton and Leibnitz would not function with his mathematics. And of course that means throwing out all of his Shadows work, because his favorite equation is E=MC[sup]2[/sup]. But that is derivable from f=ma, Newton’s basic force equation and he has already rejected Newton’s laws. (Not to mention that Einstein leaned heavily on tensor calculus to make SR work, but as we’ve already seen, calculus has been kicked to the wayside.) Not being able to use any of today’s math or physics would constitute a heavy handicap for most people. But I’m sure that Jeff is, heck, maybe even as I type these words, dreaming in his high school math class about the new topologies he can create. Who can tell what the answer to the equivalent of the four-color map problem in higher spaces would be when the “fourth spatial dimension is simultaneously parallel and co-terminal to each of the axis of the third spatial dimension”? You have my admiration, Jeff. You’ve given yourself quite a load of homework. Let’s see, recreating the sum total of what every mathematician on earth has done in the entire history of math all by yourself, say, a million years. Check back with us when you’re done, Jeff. I’m sure the results will be fascinating. ---
**Author:** ![Taran](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/edb3f5/32.png) [@Taran](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Taran)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 7:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/29 "2002-11-20T19:43:35Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jeffocal \* > \*\*As demonstrated in Chapter Ten of Shadows the orientation of the “W” axis of the fourth spatial dimension is simultaneously parallel and co-terminal to each of the axis of the third spatial dimension. > > Jeff \*\* Woah woah woah, how the hell does that work? If this “W” axis is parallel to each of the traditional three axes, then it would have to be parallel to two skew lines in 3-dimensional space. I’m not intimately familiar with higher-dimensional spatial mathematics, but I don’t know of any way to make this possible. ---
**Author:** ![Achernar](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/e274bd/32.png) [@Achernar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Achernar)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 8:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/30 "2002-11-20T20:08:48Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by jeffocal \* > the “W” axis of the fourth spatial dimension is simultaneously parallel and co-terminal to each of the axis of the third spatial dimension. You meant perpendicular, right? Not parallel. ---
**Author:** ![SPOOFE](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/c5a1d2/32.png) [@SPOOFE](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SPOOFE)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 9:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/31 "2002-11-20T21:55:24Z")
Hey, Jeffo, ever find a crack in a black hole’s event horizon? ---
**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:** [November 20, 2002, 10:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/32 "2002-11-20T22:34:30Z")
It’s even worse than you think, **Achenar**. From Shadows Chapter 10: > [@](#): > > In a similar manner, the “W” axis of the fourth spatial dimension “shines” on the entire “surface” of the length width and height of three-dimensional space resulting in it “appearing” to be “parallel” and “perpendicular” simultaneously to the three dimensions of length width and height. Therefore, three-dimensional beings would perceive the effects of the orientation of the “W” axis of the fourth spatial dimension to be simultaneously “parallel” and “perpendicular” to length width and height of three-dimensional space. ---
**Author:** ![William\_Ashbless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a87d85/32.png) [@William\_Ashbless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/William_Ashbless)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/33 "2002-11-20T22:58:21Z")
How on earth can you mathematically define something that is both parallel and perpendicular? In what conceivable way could beings ‘perceive’ any such thing? And what kind of meaning is ascribed to ‘shines’? The Shadows document has some wonderfully poetic moments. I’d just like to be able to see how to take Shadows and use it to predict the outcome of an experiment I could actually perform. Jeffocal, do you claim that Shadows could do this? If so, could you suggest a simple experiment? ---
**Author:** ![DocCathode](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/doccathode/32/18773_2.png) [@DocCathode](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DocCathode)\ **Post date:** [November 20, 2002, 11:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/34 "2002-11-20T23:16:56Z")
how do phi and the golden mean figure into all this? ---
**Author:** ![jeffocal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9a140/32.png) [@jeffocal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jeffocal)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2002, 5:01am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/35 "2002-11-21T05:01:41Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by William\_Ashbless \* > \*\*How on earth can you mathematically define something that is both parallel and perpendicular? > > \*\* Multi-linear algebra ??? Jeff ---
**Author:** ![William\_Ashbless](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/a87d85/32.png) [@William\_Ashbless](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/William_Ashbless)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2002, 5:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/36 "2002-11-21T17:25:17Z")
Fair enough, off I go to study multilinear algebra for a while. ---
**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:** [November 21, 2002, 6:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/37 "2002-11-21T18:17:19Z")
Enough. Stop slinging terms around, Jeff. (Especially one that is found nowhere in your Shadows document.) If you’re going to use real math, show it to us. Show us what it means. Show us how this supersedes Newton, let alone 20th century physics. I’ll give you the same advice I give all beginning writers: show, not tell. ---
**Author:** ![don\_willard](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/a88e57/32.png) [@don\_willard](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_willard)\ **Post date:** [November 21, 2002, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/38 "2002-11-21T21:27:26Z")
Shouldn’t we be calculating in the factor of the expansion of the universe too? I still don’t seem clear on whether every bit of space including that between protons and electrons and even between one quark and another is expanding or whether just the space between galactic groups is expanding. Or is the microexpansion very teensy, the expansion among the stars also teensy, the expansion among one galaxy and the others a little bigger, the expansion between galactic groups a little bigger still? ---
**Author:** ![jeffocal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e9a140/32.png) [@jeffocal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/jeffocal)\ **Post date:** [November 23, 2002, 1:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204/39 "2002-11-23T01:06:02Z")
> [@](#): > > \*Originally posted by William\_Ashbless \* > \*\*Fair enough, off I go to study multilinear algebra for a while. \*\* William Thank you your efforts will be greatly appreciated however we would like you to be aware the reason we put a series of question marks after Multi-linear Algebra ??? is because we are not sure if it can be used mathematically define something that is both parallel and perpendicular. Juan, a member of the Shadows research team is presently attempting to developed a mathematical model based on the geometry defined in Chapter ten which will define how the axis of the fourth spatial dimension can be both perpendicular and parallel simultaneously to all axis of three dimensional space. He is also working on developing a mathematical model which will answer the orbital question that Exapno Mapcase asked earlier regarding the instability of the planetary orbits in four spatial dimensions “But 1/r^3 orbits are unstable.” Part of the answer to this orbital question lines in the fact that according to the geometry defined in chapter ten [http://home.attbi.com/~jeffocal/chapter10.htm](http://home.attbi.com/~jeffocal/chapter10.htm) the lines of gravitational force mentioned in Exapno Mapcase article are not radiated throught the four spatial dimension but only along the axis of the fourth spatial dimension axis that is parallel to the three axis of three dimensional space. Therefore his assertion that “In four spatial dimensions the number of gravitational field lines per unit area at a distance of r would go as 1/r^3 instead of the 1/r^2 we see in our three dimensional space.” is not a valid interpretation of the dimensional model defined in chapter ten. If you or anyone else would like help and become part of the shadows research team please post or email Jeff at [jeffocal@attbi.com](mailto:jeffocal@attbi.com) Hope to be hearing from you soon. Jeff [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/quantum-space/137204.md?page=1)