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4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
91–100 of 148 posts
Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#92This looks fantastic. If I had a VR device I would get this immediately. I've always had a fascination with trying to grok higher dimensions. I think it's just about impossible to have an intuitive understanding of it - 3D spacial reasoning is in our wiring through both nature and experience. You know the theory of how language shapes your thinking? For example, in societies where there is no separate word for orange…
Often when I see something about 4d it uses this same analogy: a 2d being seeing a crosssection of a 3d world, in 2d. However, the video is in 2d, and it's able to show 3d in a much better/more clear way, clearly, cause when it's showing that example it's got a cutout of the "3d" view (which is still 2d!). Why can't we do the same thing with 4d? Why does the object just disappear when it bounces into the 4th dimensio…
But I'd still like to see the difference.
Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#93Odd. I just bought this on my wife's iPad. It opens, drops some shapes and then repeats. If you touch the screen it instantly crashes
Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#94Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#95Earlier quoted context omitted.
Often when I see something about 4d it uses this same analogy: a 2d being seeing a crosssection of a 3d world, in 2d. However, the video is in 2d, and it's able to show 3d in a much better/more clear way, clearly, cause when it's showing that example it's got a cutout of the "3d" view (which is still 2d!). Why can't we do the same thing with 4d? Why does the object just disappear when it bounces into the 4th dimensio…
Maybe they could do something like a fog? That is, if the object was farther away in the 4th dimension, it would appear less distinct or more fuzzy/blurry, like being in the fog.
Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#96Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#97Earlier quoted context omitted.
I am not sure you are correct. We have 2 eyes so that our brain can work out the depth of the image.
We see in 2D, with a tiny bit of depth metadata. True 3D vision would allow you to look at someone, and see the entire volume of all their internal organs simultaneously.
Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#98Earlier quoted context omitted.
Often when I see something about 4d it uses this same analogy: a 2d being seeing a crosssection of a 3d world, in 2d. However, the video is in 2d, and it's able to show 3d in a much better/more clear way, clearly, cause when it's showing that example it's got a cutout of the "3d" view (which is still 2d!). Why can't we do the same thing with 4d? Why does the object just disappear when it bounces into the 4th dimensio…
I remember playing a flash or java game years ago that did exactly this. It was a 4d maze, rendered in stereoscopic 3d. It displayed the images side by side and you crossed your eyes to get the 3d effect. It was really disorienting (the 4d, but also the eye-crossing), and like the post author says, just bundles of lines rather than solid shapes. Still very cool. Ooh, I found it! http://www.urticator.net/maze/
Re: 4D Toys: a box of four-dimensional toys
#99Earlier quoted context omitted.
See also Flatland ( http://amzn.to/2qKFrOh , aff. link) which is a short novel in part about 2D shapes discovering the third dimension. Edit: Didn't notice it was mentioned at the end of the comments, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14472395 , there's a free version linked from archive.org.
A favorite novel of mine actually! Hard to believe that it was written in the 1800s, yet still Abbott understood the 4th dimension better than most people today.
Aside from all the misogyny and the style of writing, you mean?