this post was submitted on 17 Apr 2025
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Science Memes

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What else are they hiding from us? (lemmy.world)
submitted 3 days ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 2 days ago (1 children)

If you think about a number line, multiplying 2 by -1 takes you to -2. Multiply it again by -1 and its back at 2.

If you think of the arrow from 0 to 2, all you did was rotate that arrow by 180 degrees to point along the negative axis and back again.

Multiplication by -1 is already a rotation of 180 degrees!

All were doing now is extending that concept to 90 degrees by imagining a second line perpendicular to the original number line.

Two 90 degree rotations need to get to -1 to complete the 180 degree rotation we already expect in normal multiplication.

Giving it the symbol i, this means definitionally i * i = -1. It has to because -1 flips us around the other way on the number line.

That means i is the square root of negative 1.

Any values that use i to store information, even time, could be called "imaginary time". Really it's just constantly oscillating between the real and imaginary spaces like a constantly spinning arrow.

[โ€“] [email protected] 2 points 1 day ago

Thanks for this! I think it's the clearest visualization explanation I've ever heard for i