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HOME | NEXT E-MAIL | PRIOR E-MAIL | E-MAIL INDEX | SUMMARY Subject: Remote Date: Thu, 16 May 2002 13:01:35 -0400 From: Flash Light lightart@flash.net Organization: Solid State Light, Inc. To: Carl Weiman cweiman@optonline.net Carl, It was a pleasure seeing you at the ASCI meeting at Remote. I'm writing today because I have a physics question, and I wonder if you have the patience to respond. The next ASCI symposium is based on Einstein. He famously declared that time was a dimension. My question is this: Why did he stop there? Mass also shows relativistic changes, why not also regard mass as a dimension? And since energy, mass, time and distance are related, why not also regard forms of energy as dimensions? To put it another way, as an artist I am accustomed to using the word dimension more loosely than the 4 dimensions of Einstein's physics. I might speak of Walter De Maria's "Lightning Field," as exploring the dimension of electrical charge, or Thomas Wilfred's "Lumia" pieces exploring the dimension of light. I have to wonder therefore, why space and time should be the limits to the dimensions physics recognizes. Mathematics, I'm told, recognizes multiple dimensions, and some physicists, I understand, have theories involving multiple dimensions of space. Why not also regard mass, charge, light, magnetism, etc. as dimensions? We take measurements in these units, why not regard those as measurements through dimensions, just as measurements through space and time are regarded as dimensions? I'm currently working on an art review, and this physics question is relevant to my thesis, so I'm hoping you will be kind enough to respond. Sincerely, Flash HOME | NEXT E-MAIL | PRIOR E-MAIL | E-MAIL INDEX | SUMMARY |
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