Seeing In Four Dimensions

by TE Mark – Writer (Mark Thomas)

19/02/2025

SPACE, TIME AND EINSTEIN

That building in the distance is separated from me in 3-dimensional space – but also (according to Einstein) time. Accepting space and time are interwoven (Hermann Minkowski called it spacetime in 1908) and accepting it’s spacetime separating us from objects in our visual field, if I move to one (that building perhaps) am I moving into ‘my’ past or into ‘my’ future?

It must be one or the other. I’d be traversing both time and space. Which would it be? Does time have a universal direction in the spacetime of our visible universe?

OBJECTS AS DIRECT OR REFLECTED LIGHT

We never really see objects across expanses in 3 or 4-dimensions (that building, the lamp post between me and the building, or the laptop in front of me); or at all, in a way. We see the light given off by or reflected from them - which enters our eyes and is then processed by our brains into images.

Like that star we look up at on a clear night, the one astronomers tell us could have exploded when Julius Caesar was contemplating his political destiny on his way to the senate, we’re actually seeing the light that left it over 2000 years ago.

It must be the same then with the reflected light from that building I’m looking at, (almost an unmeasurable fraction of a second) from the lamp post between me and the building, (an even smaller fraction) and from my laptop an even smaller one.

THREE, FOUR OR ONE DIMENSION

This brings us to a disturbingly profound question. Do we see in three dimensions, four dimensions, or just one? (Take a moment to consider that, if we had evolved to ‘see’ in four or even three dimensions, not just interpret the light that falls upon and enters our eyes, wouldn’t we see in the dark?)

Here’s yet another unsettling concept. Is that building we’ve accepted to be in my past also in yours? What if you’ve just walked in through the front door? Or, what if your house is on the other side and you’re looking back at it at the same time I’m looking at it from my house? Can it be in both of our pasts? Especially if we’re looking at it from opposite directions?

KIND OF SOUNDS LIKE RELATIVITY, DOESN’T IT

Throughout, I’ve been using ‘my’ future and ‘my’ past - for a specific reason. Thinking locally, avoiding the concept of a universal directionality in spacetime, (ie Big Bang in the past – moving out from there the future) I would assert we are all in our own ‘spacetime reference frame.’ Each of us is in a way at the centre of ‘our’ universe. Or, more accurately, our reference frame within a universe that has no centre.

The girl waiting for a bus in front of that building, like the building, is reflecting light to my eyes – or I wouldn’t see her. And that reflected light is taking time to reach me – thus, from my perspective, she, like the building, is in my past.

But from her perspective (also reference frame) if she turns and looks at me, it’s me who is in ‘her’ past – unless she starts walking towards me. Then I become in ‘her’ future. And to me she becomes… less and less in my past? Closing in? (Even I need to think on this one)

MY PAST OR YOURS?

While standing still, looking out my window at that building, without considering something akin to universal directionality of time in space, I would posit it’s in ‘my’ past as the light reflected from it heading for my eyes left it a while ago. (like the light from that star)

As for you, looking back at that same building from the other side – yep, it’s also in your past – relative to ‘your’ spacetime reference frame.

WHAT ABOUT MOVEMENT TOWARDS SOMETHING IN ‘MY’ PAST?

What if I begin moving towards the building? Does it not then become an object/destination in ‘my’ future? I’m heading there – assuming I’ll reach it – closing the spacetime gap. Is lessening the spacetime distance between me and something we’ve decided was in ‘my’ past the same as moving into ‘my’ future?

How about the lamp post between me and that building? If we consider the building in ‘my’ past, then is it further into ‘my’ past than the lamp post? That seems reasonable. If we reverse it and consider the building in ‘my’ future as I’ve started walking towards it, is it then further into ‘my’ future than that lamp post? Again, a rational assessment as I’ll presumably reach the post first.

Thus, is that building in both ‘my’ past and ‘my’ future? Depending upon whether I’m stationary looking at it or moving towards it - closing the spacetime gap?

ONE MORE (KIND OF THOUGHT EXPERIMENT)

I’m now standing on the street in front of my house looking at that building – and we’ve fully accepted I’m only, actually seeing the reflected light that left it a while ago rendering it in my past. At the moment I start for it, it reverses – and becomes an object in my future. If I stop at the street, to avoid getting squished by that girl’s bus, the building reverts to being in my past again.

There’s one final question with this: Is it the actual moving towards it that changes it from being in ‘my’ past to ‘my’ future? Or simply deciding to move to it.

THE THOUGHTFUL SPECULATION PART

In my last post, I explored our biases and Quantum Physics and tried to relate them. I touched on Roger Penrose’s theory of Quantum Consciousness. And dropped terms like Quantum Wave Function, and Collapse of a Quantum State.

If Penrose is right, and our consciousness is a quantum mechanical function – the collapse of a quantum state; would a thought – a decision to move to that building be enough to not only reverse our positions both in time and space (making that building no longer in ‘my’ past but in ‘my’ future) but also collapse the wave function of the universe? Thus, splitting it – adding to the Everettian version of the multi-verse?

Hugh Everett, Erwin Schrodinger, the Universe As a Wave Function and the Multiverse deserve a much deeper exploration – one for which I’m planning. Thus, I’ll leave this one alone – for now.

SUMARY AND A BIT MORE SPECULATION

When I started this piece, I was hoping to explore and make a persuasive argument for our seeing in 4-dimensional spacetime rather than 3-dimensional space. I thought it would be neat to prove that we see ahead or back in time whenever we open our eyes.

What I did though, which is true beauty in a scientific or philosophical experiment, was arrive at a somewhat alarming, disarming revelation. I believe we see in one dimension. Not three – not four. Electromagnetism and our quirky biological evolution have granted us the ability to perceive and navigate our 4-dimensional landscape.

Our eyes are the lenses of a binocular camera sending incident light falling upon them to a sophisticated processor (our brains) for interpretation and conversion into dynamic images in our minds rather than to light-sensitive photosites – ultimately landing on a memory card.

And since it’s only the information entering our eyes that our brains process into our visual reality – let’s roll the dice, toss a dart or take a guess at what may lie ahead as we continue to explore various forms of technological augmentation.

Our brains process a fraction of the electromagnetic spectrum entering through our eyes. A narrow band (~380 nm to ~750 nm) we call visible light. What if we could process all of it? Imagine interpreting the radio and microwaves, infrared, ultraviolet and thought waves pouring into our brains through our eyes.

How about information from energy fields, known or hypothesised that aren’t even electromagnetic? Gravitational waves? Alpha rays - Beta rays – cosmic rays? Dark Energy?

Any ideas you’d like to share? I would love to open a debate on this. Leave a comment below.

Mark Thomas (TE Mark – Writer)

[email protected]

19/02/2025

If you’ve enjoyed today’s post, you may like my newly published (Jan 2025) book INTERFACE.

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