To repeat the observations already made, let the cube be held in front
of the observer, and suppose the Dark-blue square extended on every side
so as to form a plane. Then let this plane be considered as independent
of the Dark-blue square. Now, holding the Brown line between finger and
thumb, and touching its extremities, the Gold and Light-blue points,
turn the cube round the Brown line. The Dark-blue square will leave the
plane, the Orange line will tend towards the -Y direction, and the Blue
line will finally come into the plane pointing in the +X direction. If
we move the cube so that the line which leaves the plane runs +Y, then
the line which before ran +Y will come into the plane in the direction
opposite to that of the line which has left the plane. The Blue line,
which runs in the unknown direction can come into either of the two
known directions of the plane. It can take the place of the Orange line
by turning the cube round the Brown line, or the place of the Brown line
by turning it round the Orange line. If the plane-being made models to
represent these two appearances of the cube, he would have identically
the same line, the Blue line, running in one of his known directions in
the first model, and in the other of his known directions in the second.
In studying the cube he would find it best to turn it so that the line
of unknown direction ran in that direction in the positive sense. In
that case, it would come into the plane in the negative sense of the
known directions.
Starting with the cube in front of the observer, there are two ways in
which the Vermilion square can be brought into the imaginary plane, that
is the extension of the Dark-blue square. If the cube turn round the
Brown line so that the Orange line goes away, (_i.e._ +Y), the Vermilion
square comes in on the left of the Brown line. If it turn in the
opposite direction, the Vermilion square comes in on the right of the
Brown line. Thus, if we identify the plane-being with the Brown line,
the Vermilion square would appear either behind or before him. These two
appearances of the Vermilion square would seem identical, but they could
not be made to coincide by any movement in the plane. The diagram (Fig.
5.) shows the difference in them. It is obvious that no turn in the
plane could put one in the place of the other, part for part. Thus the
plane-being apprehends the reversal of the unknown direction by the
disposition of his figures. If a figure, which lay on one side of a
line, changed into an identical figure on the other side of it, he could
be sure that a line of the figure, which at first ran in the positive
unknown direction, now ran in the negative unknown direction.
We have dwelt at great length on the appearances, which a cube would
present to a plane-being, and it will be found that all the points which
would be likely to cause difficulty hereafter, have been explained in
this obvious case.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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