Physical premise (IDWT): Physical spacetime has infinitely many ordinary spatial dimensions plus time. Matter occupies up to ten spatial dimensions; all remaining spatial directions are unbound for every particle. Depth counts a pattern's bound spatial involvement within that space. “Observed” and “unobserved” describe an observer's access, not different kinds of dimension. Older projective and nested-geometry calculations below retain their additional hypotheses; they do not establish a separate physical manifold or compactified direction. See spatial meaning and mathematical scope.

Summary: Localized electron detections and accumulated spatial distributions constrain a measurement model but do not directly reveal a smeared physical electron or select a dimensional ontology.

What the experiments measure

Single-electron interference experiments record localized detection events; the accumulated events form interference fringes. Neither the detector spot nor the accumulated pattern is a photograph of a particle's physical boundary. The distinction is visible in the experimenters' own Hitachi account.

The hydrogen photoionization-microscopy experiment measures outgoing-electron patterns. Its identification of atomic nodal structure uses the relationship between the near-atom state and the continuum wavefunction in a specified electric field. This is an experimental constraint mediated by a mathematical model, not a direct picture of a fuzzy material body surrounding the nucleus. See the AMOLF primary publication record.

Conversely, localized detector events do not by themselves prove a pointlike underlying object. A model must explain the localized events and the distribution, including interference, together.

Exact projection statement

Let a point trajectory in the six-coordinate model be (X(t),Y(t))(X(t),Y(t)), with three visible and three unobserved coordinates. Its instantaneous marginal is

∫δ(x−X(t))δ(y−Y(t)) d3y=δ(x−X(t)). \int \delta(x-X(t))\delta(y-Y(t))\,d^3y=\delta(x-X(t)).

Unobserved-coordinate marginalization does not spread a point. For a normalized extended joint density, its visible marginal can instead be extended. A time-averaged trajectory also gives a different object,

ρ‾(x)=1T∫0Tδ(x−X(t)) dt. \overline\rho(x)=\frac1T\int_0^T\delta(x-X(t))\,dt.

Identifying this time measure with detection probabilities requires a sampling and interaction law. Convolution with an apparatus response additionally assumes the relevant spatial response is translation invariant. These assumptions must be tested; ordinary motion averaging alone is not a derivation of interference.

Correction to V2 inference

The argument “one nuclear ontology produces a smeared electron, therefore it is the real ontology” is withdrawn. No such selection follows from a spread alone. The cylindrical nuclear field in Bound within, free without remains the chosen working premise, not an observationally selected conclusion. The electron's mass-formula depth assignment is unchanged; it is not inferred from an assumed appearance.