yego.me
💡 Stop wasting time. Read Youtube instead of watch. Download Chrome Extension

Mirrors And The Fourth Dimension


less than 1m read
·Nov 10, 2024

Mirrors do not show us a fourth dimension, but they do show us what a fourth dimension could do to us. First, notice that some things are the same as their mirror image, but some things are not. These two shapes are similar, but they cannot be rotated to look identical, to be superimposable on each other. This is called being chiral.

A chiral shape and its mirror image are called anatomorphs. These two shapes are anatomorphs in two dimensions. No amount of two-dimensional rotations will ever make them superimposable. To do that, I'll need to smash one of them inside out, turn it into its own mirror image, or rotate it in a third, higher dimension.

If I place a sticker here and face that side away from me, notice that the mirror inverts the object, just like a rotation through a higher dimension. The side of the real object that's furthest from me becomes the side of the virtual object that's closest to me. So, what would I look like if I was rotated around a plane in a fourth spatial dimension and then brought back? I would look like that.

More Articles

View All
Executive orders | US government and civics | Khan Academy
What we’re going to discuss in this video is executive orders, and these are directives being issued by the President of the United States that can have the force of law. I know what you’re thinking: isn’t Congress our legislative body, the body that actu…
The Side Effects of Vaccines - How High is the Risk?
Vaccines are celebrated for their part in fighting disease. But, a growing group of people seem to believe that they endanger our health, instead of protecting it. The Internet is full of stories about allergic reactions, the onset of disabilities, and ev…
Rising Ocean Temperatures are "Cooking" Coral Reefs | National Geographic
Foreign. We’ve now had three major bleaching events on the Great Barrier Reef: in ‘98, 2002, and again just recently in 2016. We zigzagged along the whole length in a helicopter and fixed-wing plane. We put about 100 people underwater. The extent and sev…
Can You Answer the 2016 Geography Bee's Winning Question? | National Geographic
[Applause] We started with 2.6 million students across the country. 54 made it to Washington DC, and now just 12-year-old Rishi Nir and 14-year-old Saketh Janna Lagata remain. Is it a trophy or a medal? Is it a trophy or metal? Uh, judges? A medal. It’s …
Neuromarketing: You're Being Manipulated
This video is sponsored by The Daily Upside, a free business and finance newsletter delivered every single weekday. Nowadays, it seems to be a common theme amongst almost everyone to go out and shop our way to happiness. You know, just to take care of our…
Emphatic pronouns | The parts of speech | Grammar | Khan Academy
All right, grammarian, so we know that there’s one way to use this thing we call reflexive pronouns, and that’s to say you’re doing something to yourself, as in the sentence, “I made myself breakfast.” Right? I’m making myself breakfast, or in the sentenc…