The universe began as one dimension?

Interesting lay article (hey, even I can read it!):

http://earthsky.org/space/primordial-one-dimensional-weirdness

Originally posted by Badwater
Interesting lay article (hey, even I can read it!):

http://earthsky.org/space/primordial-one-dimensional-weirdness

I'll bet it goes on to say the lower the energy the more dimensions pop up, like the 4th came on around 5 billion years ago or something. Problem is, how could we tell the 4th has arrived?

Originally posted by sonhouse
I'll bet it goes on to say the lower the energy the more dimensions pop up, like the 4th came on around 5 billion years ago or something. Problem is, how could we tell the 4th has arrived?

Isn't the point that it already has?

I mean the 4th dimension is timeless right?

Originally posted by Thequ1ck
Isn't the point that it already has?

I mean the 4th dimension is timeless right?

Well if it arrived 5 billion years ago it would seem to be connected to time somehow. But how would we detect this 4th dimension, that is the 64 trillion dollar question.

If we are now suffused with the 4th, we don't seem to notice it.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Well if it arrived 5 billion years ago it would seem to be connected to time somehow. But how would we detect this 4th dimension, that is the 64 trillion dollar question.

If we are now suffused with the 4th, we don't seem to notice it.

If the 4th is timeless, then there would be no distinction between cause and effect.
Things would pop into existence as mechanisms for cosmic harmonics. It could explain a lot.

i have trouble undestanding somthing two dimentional. even a peice of paper is three dimentional. if the plane has no depth what so ever how can it actually exist, exept in theory. i think im way to used to a three dimentional universe.

Originally posted by daisychainsaw
i have trouble undestanding somthing two dimentional. even a peice of paper is three dimentional. if the plane has no depth what so ever how can it actually exist, exept in theory. i think im way to used to a three dimentional universe.

If this theory is right, I would bet it would be two dimensional in the same way a paper is 2D, just the 3rd dimension is very small compared to the other two but still there. That is how the theorists are thinking about the extra dimensions in string theory, they are there but curled up to such tiny dimensions as to be invisible and nearly impossible to even detect.

Actually I believe the current theory is that there is 11 dimensions and maybe even more.

Originally posted by tomtom232
Actually I believe the current theory is that there is 11 dimensions and maybe even more.

The most widely agreed aspect of the current theory is that it is not likely to be accurate.

Originally posted by tomtom232
Actually I believe the current theory is that there is 11 dimensions and maybe even more.

is there any evidence for this theory?

Originally posted by daisychainsaw
is there any evidence for this theory?

The evidence I believe being looked for is a change in the inverse square law of gravity at very close distances. The idea is if there are hidden extra dimensions, the inverse square law which works splendidly at all distances so far, would show differences in that curve at very small distances, like measuring the gravity force at 1 micron or something. I believe the closest distance they have reliable measurements are around 100 microns with no change from inverse square law. I think the experimentalists are trying to get below 50 microns but have heard of nothing at that range yet.

Here is a link to work that has gotten as low as 60 microns with no change in inverse square law:

http://www.npl.washington.edu/eotwash/experiments/shortRange/sr.html

I just read The Hidden Reality, a book by Brian Greene published in 2011 which explores the concept of the multiverse and the possibility of parallel universes. It is very readable and is the first that has made me appreciate what is going on here. He offers a range of parallel universes, not just one, each as persuasive as the others, all capable of existing together. Left me wondering if the thing that is really hard to accept is the idea that there is only one universe and we are in it.

Originally posted by daisychainsaw
is there any evidence for this theory?

None I have seen. It is a prerequisite (or perhaps necessary consequence, it might work either way) of string theory. String theory itself, however, is still commonly held to be in the "great set of ideas, shame there isn't any real evidence" category.

Richard

Originally posted by finnegan
I just read The Hidden Reality, a book by Brian Greene published in 2011 which explores the concept of the multiverse and the possibility of parallel universes. It is very readable and is the first that has made me appreciate what is going on here. He offers a range of parallel universes, not just one, each as persuasive as the others, all capable of existi ...[text shortened]... hing that is really hard to accept is the idea that there is only one universe and we are in it.

There is more than one valid way of using Occam’s razor in this case. You can either say the assumption that “all possible universes exists” is the least assumptive hypothesis (because it does not assume that there are 'possible' universes that don't exist and we already know at least ONE 'possible' universe exists; our own ) and we are in just one possible universe out of a vast (possibly infinite) number.
Or you can say “there is only one universe, the one we know” is the least assumptive hypothesis (because it doesn't assume the existence of universes that we have yet to observe).
Purely on the bases of this Occam’s razor logic, I would say there is no more reason to believe the only-one universe theory than the multi-universe theory.

However, having said that, if we eventually discover that, despite the universe being so big with many Earth-like planets in the inhabitable zone, the probability of life emerging and existing ANYWHERE in the universe is extremely small, then that could be seen as good evidence for the multi-universe theory. This is because there being a vast number of universes so great in number that it is, mathematically, virtually inevitable or inevitable that life will emerge in some of them, despite a tiny probability of it doing so in each one universe, would mathematically explain why there is life and why we exist -whichever universe we came to exist in, we could say “isn't it an astonishing coincidence that we exists in THIS universe! “ 😛 -of course, it would be no big coincidence because their would be nothing 'special' about this universe other than it would be one of the one-in-a-zillion universes that life just happened to emerged in.
Else, if there is only one universe and if the probability of life emerging ANYWHERE in the universe is extremely small then it would be a strange coincidence that life formed in the only universe to exist despite a tiny probability of that happening anywhere within it!

Originally posted by sonhouse
If this theory is right, I would bet it would be two dimensional in the same way a paper is 2D, just the 3rd dimension is very small compared to the other two but still there. That is how the theorists are thinking about the extra dimensions in string theory, they are there but curled up to such tiny dimensions as to be invisible and nearly impossible to even detect.

Wouldn't a very small 3rd dimension be no different in a large on in that is
has some dimension?
Kelly