This Week’s Science Blog: Taking You to a Higher Dimension


Okay. So this week’s science blog is really, really awesome, but I think if I try to summarize it and put it in my own words here it’ll lose a lot. So I’ll just copy down a few highlights. This is another question answered by the Physicist at AskAMathematician.com: What would life be like in higher dimensions?

Seriously. Really cool answer.

Highlights:

  • In 4 or more dimensions orbits are always unstable, and in 1 dimension the idea of an orbit doesn’t even make sense.
  • f you set off a firecracker in 3, 5, 7, etc. dimensions, then you’ll see and hear the explosion for a moment, and that’s it.  If you set of a firecracker in 4, 6, 8, etc. dimensions, then you’ll see and hear the explosion intensely for a moment, but will continue to see and hear it for a while…it may not even be possible to understand people when they speak.
  • Which elements are stable, and the nature of chemical bonds between them, would be completely rearranged.
  • Every element after helium would adopt weird new properties, and the periodic table would be longer left-right and shorter up-down.

What sayest thou? Speak!