I'm excited to say I've made a book stay tuned until the end of the video for more about that what is time in this channel we've talked a lot about time as black holes warp space around them we've learned that time slows down we've discovered the time influencing effects of gravity and even how the James Webb Telescope can peer through time to the distant past by taking advantage of the fixed speed of light all this makes sense so far but what actually is time you can't taste it touch it or feel it yet time has
an Unstoppable influence on us and is pushing us forward whether we like it or not doesn't something that impacts everything we do deserve some additional understanding I'm Alex mccolgan and you're watching astrum and while this is an area that scientists have many theories about I'd like to share with you today one model that might help you understand this mysterious concept that is ticking all around us by the end of this video we are going to have a possible explanation of why time slows down as velocity increases and why shapes warp when undergoing velocities close to
the speed of light this video is a collaboration with my brother based on recognized scientific theory where we have taken scientific Concepts and combined them into something you may not have seen before but before we get to that we have to begin with one foundational idea time is actually another dimension now before you double check that you haven't logged into some Sci-fi channel by mistake let's discuss what I mean by dimensions while in popular culture different dimensions are often described as parallel worlds that are very similar to ours yet subtly different in this context when
we talk of different dimensions we are referring to the dimensions of space as in three-dimensional space or 3D space which may be far more familiar to you this is by no means trivial though 3D space is all around you it is the around you and is very relevant to our topic let's begin by making sure we understand the 3DS and the relationships between them before we add the fourth d broadly speaking 3D or three-dimensional space simply refers to space that can be measured in three different perpendicular directions the perpendicular nature of these Dimensions is important
but we'll get to that later three-dimensional space is usually described as having height width and depth and they all have 90 degree angles between them simply put objects like us that exist in 3D space can move left and right up and down and forwards and backwards we are comfortable with this kind of space using this as our basis it becomes much easier to imagine what we mean by 2D space and even 1D space to move from one space to another all we need to do is remove or add an extra dimension of measurement or movement
that must be a 90 degree angle from all previously existing angles so 2D objects move in a plane that's bounded by the X and Y directions or the x and z directions or the Y and Z directions but not all three at once 1D objects can only move either along X or Y or Z imagine a person who lived in such a 1D world the whole existence would be found either moving one way or the other all of reality would exist either to the left or to the right of them and would appear as a
singular dot they could not move or see in any of the other directions and probably could not even comprehend such directions as even existing photons Wishing by them would only be visible if they entered the singular line that was a 1D person's whole area of existence now adding extra directions of movement is what's needed to move things up from 1D to 2D to 3D so in theory we can predict what we need to do if we were to jump to 40. however here we hit a snag while it's easy to draw a line that's perfectly
perpendicular to a single other line or to draw another line on top of those lines that is perpendicular to the two previous lines how would we draw a fourth line that's perpendicular to all three surely such a thing is impossible well within 3D space such a thing is impossible the best we can do is draw approximations for instance it's possible to draw an approximation of a 3D shape on 2D paper by doing something like this these lines are all two-dimensional but we look at this and our brain recognizes that this is a picture of a
3D shape so in the same way we could probably do something similar to what a 4D object might look like using just 3D lines mathematicians have attempted to do this although their results tend to be a little confusing although this is mathematically sound as a basis for a 4D object I personally don't find my understanding of 4D Space deepened by looking at it so I won't focus on it in this video there is some evidence however that the fourth Direction exists and we are moving along it right now that fourth direction or Dimension is time
Einstein predicted this connection when he linked space and time into one unified space-time in his theories of relativity according to him time and space are two parts of the same thing to me this connects with 4D space very nicely just as there is no real difference between the Zed and the x or y directions so two would then not be any difference between time and space if time is just another Direction albeit one that we can't see and time is important without time our 3D space wouldn't move it would perpetually be in one state because
it's time that allows us to move about in it but why can't we see it why can't we look in the direction of time to explain this let's look at the difference between the different dimensional spaces we best noticed this when we consider what 2D objects might look like if they were to move around in 3D space this is where we start to delve into the model let's begin by visualizing a standard 3D space but because we want to eventually see all of space and time in one model let's cheat a little let's compress all
of 3D reality as we know it into a flat two-dimensional place in this plane let's make that our X Y plane which we will label space which frees up the Z dimension for time in this model all 3D people are now just 2D a 2d person could exist and live their lives in the place marked space at the bottom of our chart however by moving them up on the chart at a constant rate they are also moving through time let's put ease and convenience say that the top of our diagram is the future while the
bottom is the past so the higher up our 2D person goes in this diagram the older they get as we don't seem to have a whole lot of control over our ability to travel through time let's imagine for a second that our 2D person travels upwards at a constant rate as if there is some consistent force or wind at play pushing them upwards towards the future sadly we cannot slow down time for ourselves simply through willpower no matter how much we might want to do so however it is misleading to say that we can't change
it at all the faster we travel in Space the slower we travel in time this is one of the guiding principles of Einstein's relativity this model can express this idea through the power of vectors as our 2D person tries to move to their left or to their right their Vector of travel changes while traveling at a fixed rate like a sail on a ship catching a breeze we can only go as fast as the wind takes us so the vector coming out from their front must always remain the same to travel the fastest through time
our 2D person must Orient his Vector completely in the future direction or upwards however if they are to travel any amount in either direction to their sides they can only do so by pointing their Vector away from their direction of travel they have Motion in the X Direction now but they have done so by reducing their Motion in the Z Direction they are moving through space But at the cost of moving a little slower Through Time taking this to its furthest extreme our individual has completely flipped on their side and now only has Motion in
the direction of X and none in the direction of Zed they have velocity in space but not time so I suppose this implies our Vector is the speed of causality or the speed of light if this is the speed we're talking about then moving at low speeds through space would not have any noticeable difference in our speed through time we'd have to go really fast before we started to notice anything the vector still mostly points upwards an interesting result of this model is that from the 2D man's perspective nothing has really changed he has his
own view of what reality is for him the vector coming out of his chest is still time the dimensions of the plane he's lying flat on is his space to him it's the rest of the universe that's gone a little weird but he himself is perfectly normal however once he reorients himself it is clear that the rest of the universe has moved on without him this is clearer if we add a second 2D person initially both of our individuals do not move in space all of their Vector is pointing in the direction of time nothing
that strange seems to happen so far however if our stick man on the right turns and vectors at near the speed of light for a bit then reorients himself while the second 2D man on the left just stays where he is it becomes clear that our 2D men have not moved at the same rate Through Time assuming that our two stick men can somehow still see each other let's imagine that they somehow project an image of themselves onto the other person's space plane they immediately noticed that there is a difference in age the one who
traveled at the speed of light did not advance so quickly through time as the other who remained stationary and so is younger but why do we find this model so compelling well it is because of what those projections would look like during changes in Direction from the point of view of the first Stickman initially the projection of their friends seems fairly normal however as they start traveling very quickly in space and they're Vector oriented in a direction away from time a 2d shape reveals its inherent flatness and from a face on perspective it goes from
this to this [Music] the speedily traveling Stickman appears to flatten with an effect that's more pronounced the faster they go and the flattening takes place in the direction of their travel the stickman who remains stationary might wonder the strange change that is occurring to their friend never comprehending that it represents a reorientation of a 2d figure in 3D space now what captures my imagination about this is that this same thing happens in real life according to Einstein's theories of Relativity objects traveling at Great speeds in 3D space would appear from an external Observer to flatten
in the direction of their travel this squishing effect happens exactly in line with this model and is to do with time dilation however from the person whose traveling's perspective they do not flatten but it is the rest of the universe that warps I talk about this in Greater depth in another video of mine where we can see the effects of spatial warping in a computer model from their perspective everything would stretch at the edges of their Vision while their destination would seem further away which is again what this model would predict the only difference is
that in this model we're just exploring a 2d object stretching so the stretch is only in One Direction while in real life it's 3D which means it stretches in two directions instead but that is what you might expect as you turn away from our conventional three dimensions and start orienting yourself away from time but if this is correct so what why does it matter if time is truly a direction then it deepens our understanding of the universe it also raises more questions what is the force that pushes us ever forward in time why does it
seem that we can never move against it although in this model there is no reason why a vector could not Point downwards in real life that doesn't seem to ever happen this model also answers the question of if time is a direction what is our shape in time thus part of us protrude into the past or into the future according to this model that does not happen we are flat pancakes in the fourth dimension pennies that look round when you look at us head-on but revealing our thinness when we turn away from you that's a
strange thought but it may just be true this might explain why we are unable to see through time we just don't extend enough in that direction for it to be visible your form might be quite different than you first thought of course this model is just a theory of ours although we have tried to base it on scientific observations and conventional Theory but what do you think does this model help you make sense of time as a fourth dimension please leave your ideas in the comments Below on the nature of time and what they might
actually be instead I hope to explore more strange Concepts like this in a new series called the Unseen World where I want to explore the shape of reality around us while it's normally invisible to us the shape and dimensions of the universe can explain why things are the way they are and I'm excited to explore it with you if you are interested in it let me know I'm very pleased to finally show you something that's been in the works for a while I've been working together with Stuart McPherson and the Don Hanson Foundation to produce
a book it has already been sent to thousands of schools around the world to hopefully help school children develop a love for space and now they are available to you too the focus of this 160 page book is the solar system and contains thousands of facts about the different celestial bodies found there and what I actually love most about the book is the print quality combined with the images somehow these images just look so good when printed out compared to seeing them on a computer screen I spent hours finding the very best images to include
and I'm very proud of the finished product the initial sale is a limited edition of only 175 books so it's really while stocks last and they will include a signed card from me and a Serial showing your unique number I really expect these to go fast so don't delay and check my store link below thanks for watching I hope you learned something new today if you did consider subscribing for more liking and sharing also really help another way to support is to become a patron or member if you'd like to see your name added to
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