Druidus
Keeper of the Grove
Just a fun thing to think about:
Supposing there are higher dimensions (beyond time), which is currently supported by a number of theories in physics, then could not organisms have evolved to live "there"?
Second dimensional beings, Flatlanders as they've been called, would move around in their 2D matrix of existence, entirely unaware that they were looping and twisting in the 3rd dimension. Their ability to interact with higher dimensions would be necessarily extremely limited. And 3D objects that passed through their senses would be strange to them. A ball moving past a Flatlander would look like a small dot at first, expanding to a circle, eventually reaching a circle with the ball's diameter, and then shrinking back to a dot before disappearing. What would the Flatlander think of, for example, a human interacting with it, or its world?
3D objects, including us, affect the 2nd dimension. What if in the fourth dimension, there exists a plethora of "animals" (I prefer "constructs") that navigate and live within time itself. They wouldn't be limited to our experience of time, and we could never understand their perceptions. Or even constructs in the fourth spatial dimension (5D) and beyond.
If these construct organisms exist, we'd have no real way of knowing, because, like the Flatlanders, we simply couldn't perceive their full structure or nature at once. We would experience infinitesimal fragments of them, as they moved through their world (interacting with ours like we would Flatlanders - barely aware of the fact that the lower dimensions exist).
Now for the fun... What if all (or some of) the Gods that people have worshiped for tens of thousands of years are merely our limited perception of higher dimensional constructs that took a passing interest in us, and interacted with us? What if we have been acting like a Flatlander that worshiped the humans it dimly perceived?
I can see no reason why such constructs could not exist, living and evolving with their own rules of selection, perhaps becoming sentient (in a way different to our own sentience). Of course, there's no proof, and I can't think of a way to get any, but it's just a thought experiment.
One more thing: According to some theories, following the Big Bang, the lower dimensions (1-4) expanded rapidly, whereas the higher dimensions sort of curled up and shrank "within" the lower ones. Of course, the language I use is not appropriate, but it shall have to suffice.
If this is the case, then perhaps subatomic particles are types of constructs. All possibilities exist at once, time is only experienced because of evolutionary need in our form of life. These constructs would "experience" this world much differently than we do. These particles could be akin to the dot that the Flatlander sees. It may be why we cannot understand quantum mechanics perfectly - it's governed by higher dimensional logic/order. If we could think in higher dimensional terms, we could glimpse the whole nature of these particles.
Anyway, just thought I'd share my musings.
Supposing there are higher dimensions (beyond time), which is currently supported by a number of theories in physics, then could not organisms have evolved to live "there"?
Second dimensional beings, Flatlanders as they've been called, would move around in their 2D matrix of existence, entirely unaware that they were looping and twisting in the 3rd dimension. Their ability to interact with higher dimensions would be necessarily extremely limited. And 3D objects that passed through their senses would be strange to them. A ball moving past a Flatlander would look like a small dot at first, expanding to a circle, eventually reaching a circle with the ball's diameter, and then shrinking back to a dot before disappearing. What would the Flatlander think of, for example, a human interacting with it, or its world?
3D objects, including us, affect the 2nd dimension. What if in the fourth dimension, there exists a plethora of "animals" (I prefer "constructs") that navigate and live within time itself. They wouldn't be limited to our experience of time, and we could never understand their perceptions. Or even constructs in the fourth spatial dimension (5D) and beyond.
If these construct organisms exist, we'd have no real way of knowing, because, like the Flatlanders, we simply couldn't perceive their full structure or nature at once. We would experience infinitesimal fragments of them, as they moved through their world (interacting with ours like we would Flatlanders - barely aware of the fact that the lower dimensions exist).
Now for the fun... What if all (or some of) the Gods that people have worshiped for tens of thousands of years are merely our limited perception of higher dimensional constructs that took a passing interest in us, and interacted with us? What if we have been acting like a Flatlander that worshiped the humans it dimly perceived?
I can see no reason why such constructs could not exist, living and evolving with their own rules of selection, perhaps becoming sentient (in a way different to our own sentience). Of course, there's no proof, and I can't think of a way to get any, but it's just a thought experiment.
One more thing: According to some theories, following the Big Bang, the lower dimensions (1-4) expanded rapidly, whereas the higher dimensions sort of curled up and shrank "within" the lower ones. Of course, the language I use is not appropriate, but it shall have to suffice.
If this is the case, then perhaps subatomic particles are types of constructs. All possibilities exist at once, time is only experienced because of evolutionary need in our form of life. These constructs would "experience" this world much differently than we do. These particles could be akin to the dot that the Flatlander sees. It may be why we cannot understand quantum mechanics perfectly - it's governed by higher dimensional logic/order. If we could think in higher dimensional terms, we could glimpse the whole nature of these particles.
Anyway, just thought I'd share my musings.
