"We are trained to perceive the surrounding world as three-dimensional. The fourth dimension is not a trick. In the same way that we don’t notice the air we are breathing, we do not notice a lot of things that are around us. One of them is time. We do live in four- (or even more) dimensional reality. Usually we just don’t pay attention to this. The first step to broadening our vision is to learn and to develop features that allow us to experience the world as four-dimensional."

In "Recognizing the Fourth Dimension," Alexakhin draws on a wealth of diverse yet connected material to help the reader exercise her awareness of spacial and temporal dimensions: from the geometry of the hypercube, to the philosophical allegory of Plato's cave; from astronomical observations of the planets and solar system, to the music of the spheres; from visual art, to the psychology of perception. Underlined in all of these exersises, however, is the idea that we have the chance to understand ourselves as four-dimensional beings, as not simply possessing bodies, but possessing time-bodies.

"Plato holds the idea, 'that the soul is immortal and has been born many times, and has beheld all things in this world and in the nether realms, she has acquired knowledge of all and everything; so it is no wonder that she should be able to recollect all that she knew before…' The idea of recollection and remembrance gave the title of this book, in which we try to recognize the fourth dimension in our everyday life and to recollect this kind of experience for our soul."

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