X-Message-Number: 25237
From: 
Date: Mon, 6 Dec 2004 14:14:41 EST
Subject: 4th dimension etc.

Scott Badger writes in part:
 

>(Case #1)  Suppose I could see beyond 3 dimensions  and
>into time. So when you walk across a room, you appear
>to me  as a worm, one end starting at the time when you
>entered the room and  the other end when you left the
>room. I would see not only the   you  that entered the
>room, but every instantiation of   you  every
>microsecond as you passed through the  room.

>From my 4th dimensional perspective, there would  be
>millions of versions of  you  in the  room
>simultaneously.
I think this confuses rather than clarifies. First of all, to call time a  
dimension is just a mathematical convention, sometimes useful but not  

necessarily reflective of reality. The Einstein block universe, past and future
"coexisting" in more or less the same sense that objects at different spatial  

locations "coexist," is only an hypothesis or viewpoint, not an established  
fact. 
Time(s) and space(s) both remain mysterious, but time(s) more so if that  is 
possible. And the existence of additional space dimensions, beyond the usual  
three, is also just speculation so far, despite the partial successes of 
various  versions of string theory. 
 
The situation may be vaguely likened to different kinds of numbers. We  

started out with ordinary natural numbers, the positive integers, plus zero,  
then 
gradually added several new kinds of "numbers" beginning with fractions,  then 
negative numbers, going on to continuum numbers, complex numbers and more. 
 
Are negative numbers really numbers? Yes and no. They are often useful, but  
in at least one sense they do not exist. You can display two dollar bills, or  
even (approximately) two and a half, but you can't display a negative two  
dollar bills--although you can use the concept or the symbol for calculations  
involving debt etc. Negative money is just a conceptual tool or mathematical  
convenience, not a "real" thing. 
 
Scott goes on to raise again the question of what happens to "identity" if  a 
brain is broken temporarily into pieces, none of which alone is fully  
functional. Again, my answer is (1) Since you differ in some ways from your  

predecessors and successors, you are never 100% identified with them. (2)  
Usually 

you overlap your predecessors and successors in space and time at least  to some
extent, so this may give at least some validity to identification or  partial 
identification.
 
And finally, again, we need to keep perspective and remain tentative. What  
we don't know dwarfs what we know, and there is near zero chance that we are  

close to adequate understanding of these questions. It's mainly just amusement
at this point. (There are many things more amusing, but most of them are out 
of  my reach at this stage of the game.)
 
Robert Ettinger
 
 
 
 
 
 




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