PROBLEMS OF MODERN SCIENCE 



The quantum view is thus essentially something 

 superposed on the results of ordinary or classical 

 dynamics, rather than something in contradiction 

 with it. It is, in fact, a selective or restrictive 

 principle applicable to atoms, which is all-import- 

 ant in any phenomenon involving one atom only, 

 but in wide ranges of phenomena, as in ordinary 

 mechanics, where there are multitudes of such atoms 

 which we treat as a statistical whole, its effects 

 disappear in the average. Let us take an illustra- 

 tion of something similar the similarity may be 

 far-fetched, but I want to indicate the possibility 

 of an almost infinite number of effects cancelling 

 out. An ordinary electrically-charged conductor 

 is known to produce no force at an internal point. 

 Yet every bit of charge on it produces a force at 

 this point, in some direction, though if we consider 

 the whole charge at once, all these separate forces 

 completely cancel, whatever be the shape of the 

 conductor. Though this problem has no relation 

 whatever to the one we are discussing, it serves 

 to shew that effects shewn by something whether 

 matter or electricity in bulk may completely fail 

 even to give us an indication of what may be the 

 fundamental law of the indivisible unit. The 

 ultimate laws of dynamics of an atom can thus 

 only be found by the study of the particular 

 phenomena shewn by that atom behaving as an 

 independent unit. 

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