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OverviewThe three spatial characteristics of length, height and depth are used in the same unreflective way by laymen, technicians and scientists alike to describe the forms, positions and measure of bodies and hollow bodies. But how do we know that the space we live in has just these three dimensions? The question has occupied philosophers and scientists since antiquity. The answers proposed have become ever more presumptuous and have increasingly lost sight of everyday intuitions and have sacrificed explanatory power. In Euclid's Heritage Janich shows that all explanations of three-dimensionality hinge on an unreflective geometrical language which seems to accept the lack of an alternative for the three sorts of entities -- points, lines and planes -- that bound the three extended entities -- lines, planes and solids. This is a Euclidean heritage in a dual sense: Euclid himself adopted a geometrical language from the art of figure drawing, and left a tradition of doing geometry as planimetry and of doing stereometry by rotating plane figures. The systematic approach offered here starts out from operational definitions of the spatial forms -- plane, straight edge and perpendicularity -- and proofs that only three planes can intersect pairwise orthogonally. This is the constructive solution in the frame theory of action, providing an unequivocal characterisation of spatial relations in the physical world. The traditional order of geometric concepts turns out to be the most important obstacle to the methodical ordering of everyday scientific concepts. Full Product DetailsAuthor: P. Janich , David ZookPublisher: Springer Imprint: Springer Edition: Softcover reprint of hardcover 1st ed. 1993 Volume: 52 Dimensions: Width: 15.20cm , Height: 1.30cm , Length: 22.30cm Weight: 0.368kg ISBN: 9789048142170ISBN 10: 9048142172 Pages: 231 Publication Date: 28 October 2010 Audience: Professional and scholarly , Professional & Vocational Format: Paperback Publisher's Status: Active Availability: Out of stock  The supplier is temporarily out of stock of this item. It will be ordered for you on backorder and shipped when it becomes available. Table of ContentsOne The History of the Problem.- One / The Purely Spatial Approaches.- Two / Grounding Three-Dimensionality in Motion.- Three / Argument for Three-Dimensionality from Laws of Force.- Four / Causalistic Explanations and Three-Dimensionality.- Five / The Biological and Perception-Theoretical Approaches.- Six / Euclid’s Heritage: A Review of the History of the Problem.- Two Space Is Three-Dimensional: What Does It Mean, and Why Is It True?.- Seven / Knowledge about Space.- Eight / The Construction of the Terminology.- Nine / The Spatial Concept of Dimension and Its Universality.- Appendices.- Index of Names.ReviewsAuthor InformationTab Content 6Author Website:Countries AvailableAll regions |
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