Sometimes you’re just reading Cosmos on the toilet, as you do, trying to understand the section on hypercubes. And you see this footnote on page 263, which you can’t help reading in Sagan’s voice:
If a fourth-dimensional creature existed it could, in our three-dimensional universe, appear and dematerialize at will, change shape remarkably, pluck us out of locked rooms, and make us appear from nowhere. It could also turn us inside out.There are several ways in which we can be turned inside out: the least pleasant would result in our internal organs and viscera being on the outside and the entire Cosmos — intergalactic gas, galaxies, planets, everything — on the inside. I am not sure I like the idea.
I still don’t understand hypercubes (which I’ve been trying to do, to a degree, for the better part of a decade). Sagan makes no mention of the mechanism by which we might be turned inside out by a hypercube, either.
This is part of why I’m such a fanqueer for Carl Sagan, though. (The rest being that he’s an exemplary figure in making scientific education inspiring and accessible, and that I derive tremendous intellectual, aesthetic, and spiritual pleasure from his works and many others.)
I misread “Cosmos” as “Cosmo”, which made the following passage surreal.
Sometimes you’re just reading Cosmo on the toilet, as you do, trying to understand the section on how to please your man with hypercubes. And you see this footnote on page 263, which you can’t help reading in Hilton’s voice:
If a fourth-dimensional creature existed it could, in our three-dimensional universe, appear and dematerialize at will, change shape remarkably, pluck us out of locked rooms, and find our g-spots with ease. It could also turn us inside out, the latest fashion trend. There are several ways in which we can be turned inside out: the least pleasant would result in our internal organs and viscera whooshing around inside the Cosmos — intergalactic gas (talk about bloating!), galaxies, planets, bananas, everything — on the inside. I am not sure I like the idea. Do you and your man speak the same sexual linguo-geometric instability? Take this quiz and find out!
I actually read Amy’s “cosmo” version in Carl’s voice.
