Extra Dimensions Could Explain Entanglement

We can understand quantum entanglement if particles in our 3-dimensional space are actually strings in a 4-dimensional space.

One of the most counterintuitive aspects of quantum mechanics is entanglement: We have seen in experiments that there are correlations between events that are far away from each other – so far, in fact, that no signal or anything else can travel from one to the other to cause the correlation. Words cannot express how bizarre this is (although Einstein came a long way when he called this “spooky action at a distance”)*.

But what if the universe has four spatial dimensions of which we are aware of only three? Could points in space we think of as far away from each other actually be connected through some invisible, higher dimension?

Visualisation

This image shows a circle in an xy-coordinate system; Extra Dimensions Could Explain Entanglement?
A two dimensional circle moves down the y-axis and crosses the x-axis.

I illustrate the matter by considering a two dimensional circle that crosses a one-dimensional space. Suppose the circle moves down the y-axis and crosses the x-axis (in the negative y-direction; see image). A lower dimensional observer who sees only things along the x-axis will see a point appear at $x_2$ when the circle touches the x-axis. As the circle moves further down, the observer sees the point split into two points that move away from each other along the x-axis until they reach $x_1$ and $x_3$. As the circle moves accross the x-axis, $x_1$ and $x_3$ start moving towards each other again, until they finally meet in $x_2$ just before the circle disappears from the observer’s view – as it is now wholly beneath the x-axis.

Could it be that Einstein’s “spooky action at a distance” is less spooky than we thought? Perhaps particles that seem to be entangled are part of a higher-dimensional string.

*) “Spukhafte Fernwirkung” in German.


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