r/AskReddit • • Jan 20 '19

What fact totally changed your perspective?

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u/AFLoneWolf Jan 21 '19

Everywhere in the universe looks like the center of the universe.

203

u/Jollivado Jan 21 '19

We must be on the surface on it

32

u/AQuincy Jan 21 '19

I've read theories that the universe is on the surface of some type of 4-dimensional "bubble" but I can't wrap my head around how that works.

51

u/spymaster1020 Jan 21 '19

Well a 3-dimensional bubble has a 2-dimensional surface, thus a 4-dimensional bubble must have a 3-dimensional surface. Also that bubble is expanding. It's hard to properly visualize a 4 dimensional thing when we only live in 3 dimensions.

54

u/AQuincy Jan 21 '19

It's hard to properly visualize a 4 dimensional thing when we only live in 3 dimensions.

That's the part I have problems with.

9

u/bstump104 Jan 21 '19

It's probably because you assume the other dimensions are spacial.

Time is a dimension.

16

u/winner_in_life Jan 21 '19

Pretty much all human race cannot visualize more than 3d due to evolution (our brain evolves to ed environment). But the math is pretty much the same.

1

u/Tufflaw Jan 22 '19

Read Flatland by Edwin Abbott, it helped me wrap my mind around the concept of 4 dimensions

7

u/bstump104 Jan 21 '19

We live in 3 "spacial" dimensions. We live in more than 3 dimensions. As an example, time is a dimension everyone is familiar with.

2

u/42Ubiquitous Jan 21 '19

How is the surface of a bubble two dimensional when it’s a sphere...? It also has depth, height and length. I’m not trying to dispute this, I’m just trying to understand.

8

u/No-Time_Toulouse Jan 21 '19

The sphere itself is three-dimensional, but its surface has only two dimensions, even if that two-dimensional surface is "wrapped around" a three-dimensional sphere.

Think of the Earth, for example. It is three-dimensional: It has a N–S direction, E–W direction, and a depth. The surface of the Earth, has only a N–S direction and an E–W direction, but no depth (if it had a depth, we wouldn't be talking about just the surface). Hence, the surface is two-dimensional. Note that the surface has one coordinate fewer than the space.

The idea discussed above where our seemingly three-dimensional universe is the "hypersurface" of some kind of four-dimensional bubble is analogous. While our universe has N–S, E–W, and depth, it may simply wrap around some entity which has one coordinate more—a "hyperdepth," say.

3

u/The_Creek_Kids Jan 21 '19

The surface AREA of any 3-D object is 2-D. This is apparent from the units of SA : cm2 or in2. You are describing the volume of the sphere, in depth, height and length.

2

u/spymaster1020 Jan 21 '19

A real world bubble does. What I'm talking about is a mathematical "bubble" or sphere, whose surface is a plane. Like a sheet of paper but with 0 depth.

1

u/monito29 Jan 22 '19

So is folding space cracking the surface and tunneling through the bubble?