THE FOURTH DIMENSION SIMPLY EXPLAINED

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sides and angles of the other. We can lift one triangle up and turn it over on the other so that the two triangles fit exactly together. But, mind, we could not do it otherwise

Figures 5, 6, and 7
than by lifting. Hence, these two triangles could never be fitted together by the mathematicians of flatland, since to them lifting is inconceivable. Possibly, however, they might suspect this method by noticing that an inhabitant of one-dimensional space -- say, for simplicity, one living on a straight line -- might experience a similar difficulty in comparing the equality of two segments, AB and B'A' (Fig. 6), each defined by a set of two points. We may suppose that the segments are equal and so that the corresponding points in them could be superposed by rotation round C. This movement, so simple to a flatlander, would be inconceivable to our onedimensional being. In fact even if he were moving along the lines from A to A',
Page 238 he would not arrive at the corresponding points in the same relative order, and thus might hesitate to believe that the corresponding distances were equal. So, judging from this being's difficulties, the dweller of the plane might infer, by analogy, that by turning one of the triangles over through three-dimensional space they could make them coincide.

We have a somewhat similar difficulty in our geometry. Let us suppose two pyramids (Fig. 7) similarly related. All the faces and angles of the one correspond exactly to the faces and angles of the other. Yet lift them about as we please, we could never fit them together. If we fit the bases together, the two will lie on opposite sides, one being below the other. Again, we may conceive of two solids, such as a right hand and a left hand, which are exactly similar and equal, but of which one cannot be made to occupy exactly the same position in space as the other does. These are difficulties similar to those experienced by the inhabitants of flatland in comparing the triangles. But it may be conjectured that in the same way as such difficulties in the geometry of an inhabitant in space of one dimension are explicable by moving the figure temporarily into space of two dimensions by means of rotation round a point, and as such difficulties in the geometry of flatland are explicable by moving the figure temporarily into space of three dimensions by means of rotation round a line, so such difficulties in our geometry would disappear if we could temporarily move our figures into space of four dimensions by means of rotation round a plane -- a movement quite inconceivable to us. That is, the dweller in fourdimensional space would take our troublesome pyramids and fit them together without
Page 239 any trouble. By merely turning over one of them he would convert it into the other without any change whatever in the relative positions of its parts. What he could do with the pyramids he could also do with our hands or our right shoe and left shoe, or, in fact with one of us human beings, if we allowed him to take hold of us and turn a

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