Best literature & fiction books according to Reddit
Reddit mentions of Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Dover Thrift Editions)
Sentiment score: 20
Reddit mentions: 42
We found 42 Reddit mentions of Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions (Dover Thrift Editions). Here are the top ones.
- Dover Publications
Features:
Specs:
Color | Yellow |
Height | 5 Inches |
Length | 7.8 Inches |
Number of items | 6 |
Release date | September 1992 |
Weight | 0.21164377152 Pounds |
Width | 0.3 Inches |
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#20 of 28,164
The body is already familiar with it, so it gets metabolized extremely quickly. Thus, the trips only last 5-10 minutes and you are left feeling like you just woke from a dream; memories of the trip fading quickly unless you dwell on them, also much like a dream. It's ironic that the strongest hallucinogen known to man is also the safest.
I truly believe it shows you higher mathematical dimensions similar to what the circle experienced in the book Flatland.
It's available free online, but I've def got a hard cover copy on my bookshelf. I can't really deal with digital versions of things, I need physical books.
Sagan didn't create Flatland, it was a book written in 1884 by Edwin A. Abbott.
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Have you read Flatland?
It's a novella, so it's less than half the length of a novel. It's about a 2D world and its reaction to the introduction of a three-dimensional object. Lots of math and philosophical stuff.
I've never read it, since I'm not into those topics, but I've heard plenty of people say that it's good. It's in the public domain, so you should be able to find it free online.
Flatland describes this situation in a more "romantic" fashion.
Read Flatland. It's the book Sagan was referencing in his demonstration. On top of the 2D world of the protagonist it also visits a line world and a 1D world. It even gives them primitive social hierarchies.
It's really short, you can read through it in a few hours.
$2.00 on Amazon.
just in case some readers aren't aware... there is a really cool (and short) book called Flatland about 2D creatures that can only conceive of the world in 2D. One of them starts understanding 3 dimensions and things get interesting. Here is a link (normal) for the book I mean:
http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
most of those books looked like they were $2-$4. Go get a copy if you haven't read it yet.
I'm not sure about an article per se, but maybe some excerpts from Flatland (or the whole thing, since it's less than 100 pages) might fit the bill.
It's a pity they don't know any calculus; my old professor Carolyn Gordon's article "You Can't Hear the Shape of a Drum" is a fantastic read, and a wonderfully intuitive introduction to the ideas of spectral geometry.
My suggestion, if you need a true article, is to paw around online for a while for something on basic graph theory. Little tidbits like the Seven Bridges of Konigsberg are fun; or maybe an article about the four-color theorem. Graph theory is great for people with no formal math training, since it's easily visualized.
I've been exploring this recently. I'm not an expert, but I'll do my best to explain it.
The shape or object represented in the gif you posted is called a tesseract or a hypercube. You can search for these terms for more information.
To explain this, some basics about 2D and 3D must first be established to understand how to continue the explanation to 4D.
A super-brief explanation of the gif above as the four dimension object (spatially) is that it is a representation or projection of viewing a 4D object/shape in a 2D view. (That gif as displayed on our computer screens is 2D because our screens are 2D and it's not encoded as 3D to be viewed with 3D glasses) and a 4-D object or shape actually appears to us to be 3D objects inside of 3D objects, just as if we look at a 2D object - say a square drawn on a piece of paper - we are able to see inside of the 2D object and see additional objects drawn inside of it and just as we are only able to draw a 3D object on a piece of paper if it is drawn as a transparent outline, this gif shows the 4D object drawn as a transparent outline in which we only see the many sides folding in and outside of itself. A being that is capable of seeing four spatial dimensions would be able to look at you and see inside of you. The following demonstrates this concept pretty well:
Fourth Spatial Dimension 101 (video, 6:27)
To better understand the concept of the fourth dimension, read on. I also included more videos below, including an excellent one by Carl Sagan.
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First, some facts / definitions:
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Conceptualizing the limitations and advantages of dimensional perception:
We are able to perceive objects spatially in 3 dimensions (3D). By spatially, we mean that we're interpreting the environment or world's space, and not considering the fourth dimension as something other than space, such as time. (The gif linked above is of a four-dimensional object of which the fourth dimension is also space.) When we look at a drawing of a square on a piece of paper, we are able to see not only its length and width, but also inside of it because we are viewing it from above - from height. If we look down at it and draw a triangle inside of it, we can see both at the same time. We are able to see inside of 2D objects. A 3D object is comprised of several layers of 2D objects stacked upon one another. So imagine the 2D drawing, and stacking many papers on top of each other until it's several inches or centimeters tall. That's a 3D object now. Then, shape it into a square at each sheet of paper (so cut through all sheets) and you will end up with a cube of paper. Shape it into a triangle and it will be a triangular, pie-like shape. Angle it more narrow on the way up and it will be a pyramid-like shape. With any of these shapes, we cannot see inside of it. But now imagine this: just as we in the 3rd dimension looking at a shape in the 2nd dimension can see inside of it, a being in the 4th dimension looking at a shape in the 3rd dimension can see inside of the 3D object. That is because just like there is only length and width in the 2nd dimension, but no height; in the third dimension we have length width and height, but no __. I'm unaware of whether there is a name for the additional direction that would exist in the fourth dimension.
I also don't know whether a 4th spatial dimension actually exists or is just an abstract concept, nor do I know whether it is possible or known to be possible to detect. As far as I am aware, the fourth spacial dimension is only known of abstractly, meaning that there is no evidence for it actually existing.
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These videos explain how to understand what the 4th dimension would look like:
Dr. Quantum explains the 4th dimension (video, 5:09)
An oversimplified explanation from the movie "What the bleep do we know: down the rabbit hole" in which the character, Dr.Quantum, first explains what an (imagined) 2D world (flatland) would look like to us - who are able to see the 3D world, as a way of understanding (or extrapolating) how a being that could see in the 4D world would be able to see through and inside of 3D objects. (note: I've been warned that this is part of a video that goes on to some cult-like recruiting, so please be forewarned about the video's conclusion and entirety.)
Cosmos - Carl Sagan - 4th Dimension (video, 7:24)
Carl Sagan explains how to imagine what the 4th dimension looks if we were able to see it and how it would allow us to see inside 3D objects. An important part of this video is explaining and showing exactly how and why we can only see a distorted version of 4D objects since we only see in 3D
4th Dimension Explained By A High-School Student (video, 9:05)
An excellent description of the first through fourth dimension and how we can perceive them.
Unwrapping a tesseract (4d cube aka hypercube) (video, 1:39)
Hypercube (video, 3:18)
Watch the above two videos to see how we can conceptualize a 4D object in 3D space.
Videos mentioned elsewhere in this comment:
Fourth Spatial Dimension 101 (video, 6:27)
Flatland (video, 1:39:56)
--------------------------------------
Videos, Books and Links mentioned by other redditors:
Flatland: a romance of many dimensions (Illustrated) by Edwin Abbott Abbott (book, free, ~230kb)
Amazon description & reviews
hat-tip to /u/X3TIT
"Warped Passages: Unraveling the Mysteries of the Universe's Hidden Dimensions" by Lisa Randall (Amazon book page)"
Looks interesting.
hat-tip to /u/karoyamaro
-----------------------------------
(Edited: 1- to add video lengths; 2- added book links, 3 - readability more videos, 4 - a warning about the Dr. Quantum video.)
> fuck it, I'm gonna write a story about polygons. there, you happy?
Too late: http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
It's literally called 'Flatland': https://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X. It had a sequel too, about higher dimensions. It illustrates the way in which one might comprehend things at are not directly observable from your current presepective- obviously using geometry- but it isn't really a math book, it's a story. Carl is paraphrasing the central plot in this video.
Edit: for the lazy: "This masterpiece of science (and mathematical) fiction is a delightfully unique and highly entertaining satire that has charmed readers for more than 100 years. The work of English clergyman, educator and Shakespearean scholar Edwin A. Abbott (1838-1926), it describes the journeys of A. Square, a mathematician and resident of the two-dimensional Flatland, where women-thin, straight lines-are the lowliest of shapes, and where men may have any number of sides, depending on their social status.
Through strange occurrences that bring him into contact with a host of geometric forms, Square has adventures in Spaceland (three dimensions), Lineland (one dimension) and Pointland (no dimensions) and ultimately entertains thoughts of visiting a land of four dimensions—a revolutionary idea for which he is returned to his two-dimensional world. Charmingly illustrated by the author, Flatland is not only fascinating reading, it is still a first-rate fictional introduction to the concept of the multiple dimensions of space. "Instructive, entertaining, and stimulating to the imagination." — Mathematics Teacher."
Anything by Simon Singh is worth reading. In addition to what others have recommended, these books are good:
[The man who loved only numbers](http://www.amazon.com/MAN-WHO-LOVED-ONLY-NUMBERS/dp/0786884061/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1254333710&sr=8-1
)
Flatland
Prisoner's Dilemma
A mathematician reads the newspaper
A mathematician plays the stock market
Innumeracy: mathematical illiteracy and its consequences
Also, while not exactly about Maths:
Surely you are joking, Mr Feynman
What do you care what other people think?
The Art of Computer Programming
Gödel, Escher, Bach is a popular one. If you're looking for fiction, then I highly recommend Flatland.
I could say the same about you. Politics does not consist of a spectrum between two points because that only determines one dimension, whereas there are actually at least four points (liberal, conservative, statist, and libertarian) that form a field of political beliefs rather than a one dimensional spectrum with infinite gradations. To help you understand dimensionality you might pick up a copy of Flatland.
You might benefit from reading Flatland: a Romance of Many Dimensions, if you haven't already.
I recommend the book Flatland by Edwin Abbott. The Kindle edition is only a buck. The dead tree version is less than three bucks.
The main characters of this book are two dimensional creatures that live in a plane. There are some neat visualizations on how we in our 3 spatial dimensions interact with the plane dwellers. Tyson uses some of these. For example a sphere passing through the plane would, from a plane creature's point of view, first be a dot that appears, then a growing circle, then a shrinking circle, then a dot again, then it disappears.
Flatland also takes a look at 4 dimensions.
In Monster's Inc, there are two three dimensional spaces that share a plane (the door). A two dimensional analogy would be two planes intersecting along a line. 2D creatures moving about these planes would still perceive themselves as being in 2 dimensions. So I disagree with Tyson that the movie is a good portrayal of 4 dimensional space.
Do you think they come from flatland ?
Close enough:
http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
I suggest reading Flatland. It really helps to grasp the concept of higher dimensions. It is an easy read and not long at all.
I'm in!
Linking a book because I have too many books!
I am 33 pages into this right now!
I've read 1984, Brave New World, and Fahrenheit 451 within the past year, and so far I'd say this compares very favorably. The tone, for some reason, reminds me a lot of Flatland.
And! I just bought Player Piano, which is mentioned in the article as being a derivative, so my next couple of weeks are looking pretty solid.
I love music, so my favourite one was Last Night A DJ Saved My Life. A history of electronic music which gave me a real in-depth appreciation of the electronic music scene now.
I also really liked A Brief History of Time by Stephen Hawking and Flatland (not exactly non-fiction, but extremely interesting).
"moist"
Oops, First Contest!
And if I win, either this book or this hair thingy would be ideal.
http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
Flatland! I fucking love this book.
https://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
For anyone interested, it's only $2 on Amazon.
http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1367608608&sr=8-1&keywords=flatland
sounds like soemthing out of Flatland but i can't recall if i'm right.
I just wrote a super long response and accidentally the tab and whole textbox. Anyway, it consisted of a few points,
I'm still drunk, probably moreso than before, but I hope at least some of this makes sense. I have no authority in any aspect of physics, but I do enjoy reading and thinking about the nature of our existence. Two books - Flatland and In Search of Schrödinger's Cat have probably had an undue impact on my beliefs and theories. But fuck it, this is a minecraft server subreddit and I can ramble about half-baked cosmological perspectives if I feel like it.
Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions
Amazing fictional novel about imagining dimensions in a funny way. The main character is named "A Square". I want a copy for the purposes of lending to my friends! :)
Is this the book you're talking about: http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X ?
Further down I linked this video which explains some pretty complicated concepts in a manner easy to understand.
The video uses the comparison of 2D and 3D universes as a parallel to 3D and 4D. If a 3D object enters a 2D world then it appears in that world as a 2D object. It is only as the object moves orthogonally (perpendicular but generalised for n dimensions) to the 2D plane that you can see all of the 3D object, but only in 2D "slices" at any time. In the video above the guy uses his finger, and the observers would see 2D slices of the finger.
This is significantly harder to wrap your head around when thinking about 3D and 4D, but the same principles apply.
If you want to read more on the subject then the book Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions is highly regarded. The video uses the same concepts, but this book was written in 1884 which is just mad in my opinion; it was very forward and abstract thinking at the time, and still is today.
Further to this, perhaps the most well-known analogy was neatly illustrated in the book Flatland.
Check it out if you haven’t. The book considers the perspective a two-dimensional object on a two-dimensional plane surrounded by three dimensional space and objects. From that perspective, objects in z-space that do not intersect the xy-plane cannot be “seen” on the plane. Moreover, their intersection with the plane, while perceptible, is not perceived as a fully three-dimensional object. So, for example, a sphere that intersects the plane is perceived on the plane as a circle with a diameter equal to that of the sphere’s great circle at the intersection.
The Carl Sagan video below is also pretty good. In fact, he and I used the same reference Edwin Abbott's Flatland, a book written in 1884. When Sagan cuts the apple, that's the same as the cheese slicing conveyor belt.
You can pick up a copy of Abbott's Flatland for pretty cheap. It's easy to read and is pretty short.
https://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
I can't imagine many people picking:
Square (Flatland)
but he got it.
That depends on what you're interested in. There's a bunch of philosophy, psych books I could recommend but I'll go for some more general but still amazing books.
http://www.amazon.com/G%C3%B6del-Escher-Bach-Eternal-Golden/dp/0465026567
And
http://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X
I'm always very unsure about the positioning of adverbs in a sentence, especially those of time and, in some cases, of frequency and manner. Do they go at the beginning of a sentence, at the end, in the middle, whatever?
http://www.amazon.it/Flatland-A-Romance-Many-Dimensions/dp/048627263X/ref=aag_m_pw_dp?ie=UTF8&m=AUD0XHRTXJ1N9
EDIT: As a non native speaker, there's an even worse one: those particles, I don't remember their name, after verbs that are part of the verb, like throw up, flip out, take off etc. Some verbs can take a lot of them, and often it seems to me that there's no apparent logic behind the particle and the meaning
Here are some links for the product in the above comment for different countries:
Link: $2
|Country|Link|
|:-----------|:------------|
|UK|amazon.co.uk|
|Spain|amazon.es|
|France|amazon.fr|
|Germany|amazon.de|
|Japan|amazon.co.jp|
|Canada|amazon.ca|
|Italy|amazon.it|
|China|amazon.cn|
This bot is currently in testing so let me know what you think by voting (or commenting).
$4
$3
$2
I heartily recommend the book Flatland on the subject. Make sure you get the edition with illustrations as the others are rubbish. You can also read it for free on Project Guttenberg.
Just read this:
https://www.amazon.com/Flatland-Romance-Dimensions-Thrift-Editions/dp/048627263X/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1474906134&sr=8-1&keywords=flatland
and extrapolate to 3 dimensions. You'll have a great understanding, I promise, and it's fun to read. I'm assuming here you're wanting an expression of a 4th SPACIAL dimension, and not an exposition on "time as a 4th dimension of spacetime."
Think of a safe in 2 dimensions...a 3 dimensional person can hover OVER the safe and see everything that's in it. That same person could pluck an item out of the safe with ease. The 2 dimensional person would crap themselves when they opened the safe only to find that object mysteriously missing.
I doubt there are 4 dimensional people who can look into our safes and steal stuff, because, well, they haven't so far. Unless you count my socks that are constantly being stolen out of my dryer.
For the love of... we had to take tests. I'm jealous. You wouldn't be able to really appreciate most of them without some mathematical training, though. I'd go for the Monty Hall problem or "Set theory and different 'size' infinities". Flatland is certainly still worth reading, though, and there are fun videos about the type of person who sells Klein bottles.
If you're honestly interested in the Set Theory stuff, I'll try to find you some better resources. The Wikipedia articles are probably far too technical.
N-dimensional space. I literally just now started reading Edwin A. Abbott's Flatland: A Romance of Many Dimensions. I highly recommend this book if this type of dimensional thinking intrigues you.