Some elementary aspects of 4-dimensional geometry (Q2406207)

The square of the area of a triangle can be explicitly expressed with the edge lengths \(a\), \(b\), \(c\) of the triangle by Heron's formula: \[ 16A^2=(a+b+c)(-a+b+c)(a-b+c)(a+b-c) \] \[ 2a^2b^2+\quad 2a^2c^2+2b^2c^2-a^4-b^4-c^4. \] The authors of this paper interpret this formula as a scissors congruence in four-dimensional space. In the process of demonstration, they examine a number of decompositions of hypercubes and other elementary four-dimensional solids. In Section 3, a geometric interpretation of the multinominal theorem is given. In Section 4, the method of demonstration of the Pythagorean theorem is applied for the decomposition of a hyper-rectangle. Beside a four-dimensional geometric proof of Heron's formula, the primary purpose of the authors is ``to develop the reader's intuition and interest in elementary four-dimensional geometry.''