Spencer Heath Archive

Item 759

Random taping be Spencer MacCallum from conversation with Heath

April, 1956

 

 

 

 

The atom has energy organized in itself, called atomic energy. It also takes on and puts out energy from environment. Its function is to resist this energy. The individual in society, like the atom, is an organization of energy within itself. It also takes on energy, transforms it and puts it out. But it does not resist this energy as the atom does. On the contrary, it accepts this energy and must do so to keep itself alive. This is its function — at the biological level. At the social level, individuals exchange energy, thereby serving one another and by this social metabolism, they sustain one another and thus society sustains itself.

 

smallest unit through which energy can be transformed, either biological or sociological

has a rate and it can continue

The whole period through which this unit acts is its whole biological energy-in-action

The adult individual is in effect a rate, like one erg-second per second. For his biological functioning, this rate must be multiplied by his entire life span. For his societal functioning, it must be multiplied by that portion of his adult life years during which he functions creatively with his fellow men.

 

/The recording was faulty, and I could transcribe into pencil notes only scraps that were intelligible. -SM/