From: esz001@cck.coventry.ac.uk (Will Overington)
Subject: Re: VR theory?
Date: Mon, 16 Sep 1991 15:46:45 GMT
Organization: Coventry Polytechnic, Coventry, UK



16th September 1991
England

In article <1991Sep12.181705.17181@milton.u.washington.edu>,
tbm19061@uxa.cso.uiuc.edu (Thomas B MacIukenas) writes:

>How about other types of Virtual Reality than just copies of our
>world?  It seems that all the work in Virtual Reality is really
>focused on producing a Virtual Copy of Reality (hence the need
>for 3-dimensions, tap-dancing on airplane wings, etc.).
>
>I would be interested to know if anyone is working on other
>types of Virtual Reality.
>
>Here are some ideas I've had.  Probably none of them are actually
>useful, but they would be interesting to explore:
>
>     4 or more dimensions

I have just returned from holiday and so missed the start of this thread,
but your suggestion of 4 dimensions is interesting and links to
something that I was going to try to find out about.

I was recently looking through a report from the (British) Science and
Engineering Research Council, entitled Mathematics, strategy for the future.
June 1991, ISBN 1 870669 32 0.

On page 8 of the report is the following ....

	Seemingly abstruse recent pure mathematical results in geometry and
	topology concerning the existence of certain kinds of structure in
	four-dimensions (but no other!) have proved to be of enormous interest
	to theoretical physicists probing the ultimate mysteries of space and
	time. As a result there is now intense activity at the interface of
	physics and pure mathematics, in which UK researchers are playing 
	leading roles.

Does anyone know what these structures are, and whether they could
be vizualized and manipulated in some sort of virtual reality?