Spencer Heath Archive

Item 906

Penciling on notepad paper

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Now, just as the quantum of action itself does not occur as an event of objective experience in less magnitude or dimension than a particular small fraction of an erg-second, so, under the same principle of discontinuity, it is to be assumed that for each of its constituent magnitudes of mass, motion and time there is likewise a least quantity in less than which it does not enter into the constitution of the objective quantum. Unless the proportionately variable quantum constituents are without discontinuity and infinitely divisible, as the quantum is not, unless the parts are more divisible than the whole, then there is a fundamental unit for each of them in less than which it cannot integrate with the other two so as to constitute a quantum of objective action. Here, as in the quantum itself, lesser constituent magnitudes may be symbolized and conceived, yet they are not to be conceived as constituents of quanta any more than sub-quantum symbols can be conceived as representing whole-quantum actions or events.

The qualitative differences between otherwise equal quanta are due to differences in their organization, in the the proportions in which their three interior magnitudes (so to speak) are composed; and it is due doubtless to such compositional differences that individual quanta are capable of entering into the reciprocal and organizational relationships that constitute all the proceedings, actions and events of the cosmic reality. It is on these fundamental ratios that the rationality of the Cosmos depends. Assuming that there are basic units of mass, motion and time, whatever be the basic unit of mass or force, the number of these that is associated with a similarly basic unit of motion multiplied by the number of motion units per basic unit of time.

It would seem that these qualitative differences of internal proportions within the quantum might be so few as to limit unduly the quantum variety, but this would presuppose only a small number of its basic units being requisite to constitute a whole quantum. The smaller these basic related units the greater the number of them required and thus the greater the number of proportions in which they are capable of being arranged. But however small the units and however proportioned, their product when they are multiplied together cannot be less nor can it exceed that very small fraction of an erg-second by which the quantum of action is defined. Thus the qualitative variety of the quantum of energy per unit of time must be limited between that proportion between the basic units of mass and motion in which there is only one basic unit of mass and enough motion units (per unit of time) to constitute the total quantum, and that inverse proportion in which there is but one basic unit of motion and sufficient mass or force units to constitute the completed quantum. For example, supposing that the basic quantum units should be so very large that only 100 units would be requisite. Then the energy per unit of time could range between one mass or force unit times 100 motion units and 100 mass units times one motion unit. For when either mass or motion is at its minimum then the other must be at the maximum in order to maintain the constant quantum magnitude.

The first would illustrate at the quantum level two familiar phenomena: the evasiveness of the particle element in radiant energy and its correlate, the necessary maximum of velocity such as that of light, since the greatest possible number of motion units per unit of time is involved. The second illustrates the converse, the maximum of mass or force (cohesive) with the least possible number of motion units per unit of time, suggestive of the utmost density and the best proximation to the calculated absolute zero of molecular or atomic motion. Between these two extremes may be presumed to lie all those kinds of quantum action or events in which mass and motion are involved in the intermediate proportions, which, under this crude illustration would be only 100 different kinds of quantum events instead of that doubtless vastly larger number dependent only on the smallness of the basic units in the quantum composition. But however many or few the variety at the quantum level, the composition of multi-quantum action or events can still be inconceivably various and vast. For such events can compose all numbers as well as all varieties of quantum composition. And these events and structural forms that repeat and recur in wave-like succession, but in which there is a lower frequency of succession, longer period of action between integration and disintegration, must always tend to continue and endure after similar organizational forms having higher frequency of succession will have ceased. The more viable (so to speak) must outlive the less viable, and the viability of any structural type or form is related inversely to its frequency of succession which is to say, its durability in time.