Isn’t diagonality relative? Think about italics: they weren’t invented to be used alongside romans to create a hierarchy.

When I think about diagonals I often think back to a professor who would often catch lazy students using diagonals to try and whip up a dynamic composition. When confronted with the question “Why do the diagonals make this composition dynamic?” the students never had an answer.

But at the same time I guess one can always find diagonals from a strictly mathematical perspective: in a shape with an odd number of sides all sides are at diagonals to all others, none are parallel (At least I think it works that way, I’d have to write a program to test it). So within the mathematical structure of reality there are always some kinds of diagonals.

I’m not exactly sure what you mean with this question.

I think I may be trying to answer a different one here, but as I understand it, the brain distinguishes a diagonal line faster than a vertical or horizontal one. The theory, as I recall being that something that is on a diagonal is either moving or unstable and therefore a possible threat, or perhaps dinner.

In designing signage, it’s something that’s very consciously used to grab attention... as in, “this is a concrete wall. Don’t drive into it.”

-=®=-

> in a shape with an odd number of sides all sides are at diagonals to all others, none are parallel (At least I think it works that way, I’d have to write a program to test it). So within the mathematical structure of reality there are always some kinds of diagonals.

Well, a stair(case) is a DIAGONAL flight of PARALLEL stairs.

Think DIAGONALLY with Flowers

in a shape with an odd number of sides all sides are at diagonals to all others, none are parallel (At least I think it works that way, I’d have to write a program to test it).

Home plate asks you to reconsider! ;-)

Sorry Craig, I wasn’t being specific enough. I was thinking of those regular shapes in which all sides and angles have the same measure. I don’t know enough about geometry to know what they’re called.

An interesting question. I think the concept of the diagonal would be meaningless without our instinctive bodily awareness of the vertical and the horizontal as defined by gravity. This is very basic. Aziz’s stairs is an excellent example: They lead up (or down) and also cross a ’horizon’-tal distance. In geometry the diagonals join the corners of a square or a cube, or of the capital letter N; or can be found in the Arabic medial kaf. The formula for a diagonal is y=ax with ’a’ some constant defining the slope. If a=1 the line is at a 45 degree angle. In the case of the lower edge of the eyebrow in h