clifford_a-_pickover_surfing_through_hyperspacebookfi-org

MIRROR WORLDS 125
Figure 5.4
A string cannot be knotted in 2-D space.
You start walking again. The city's fashionable shopping section has
given way to a series of smaller shops. Many of them look a little seedy.
You walk slowly, passing windows of secondhand clothing stores trying
to pass themselves off as grunge boutiques. Some of the store signs read
SAVE JOBS—BUY PRODUCTS MADE IN THE THIRD DIMENSION.
One of the stores is called Earthlings Unite and it sells a startling array of
goods—handcuffs, skimpy nightgowns, and golden watches displayed on
black velvet. A woman in the store, perhaps the manager, has a gaudy
punk hairdo—half purple, half orange—and looks as if she might weigh
around eighty pounds. She stares at you and Sally and grins, revealing
two large white canine teeth. They remind you of the teeth of some small
but dangerous animal—a hyena, perhaps.
You turn back to Sally. "Zollner devised three tests for Slade to see if
Slade could use the fourth dimension to perform miracles. One: He gave
Slade two oak rings that were to be interlocked without breaking them.
Two: He gave Slade a snail shell and watched to see if a right spiral could
be turned into a left spiral, and vice versa. Three: He gave Slade a rubber
band and asked him to place a knot in one strand of the band. Actually it
was band made from dried gut, but you get the idea."