SHUFFLING 67 



difference of plus and minus. It stands aloof from all 

 the rest. But this law has no application to the behaviour 

 of a single individual, and as we shall see later its sub- 

 ject-matter is the random element in a crowd. 



Whatever the primary laws of physics may say, it is 

 obvious to ordinary experience that there is a distinction 

 between past and future of a different kind from the 

 distinction of left and right. In The Plattner Story 

 H. G. Wells relates how a man strayed into the fourth 

 dimension and returned with left and right interchanged. 

 But we notice that this interchange is not the theme of 

 the story; it is merely a corroborative detail to give an 

 air of verisimilitude to the adventure. In itself the 

 change is so trivial that even Mr. Wells cannot weave 

 a romance out of it. But if the man had come back with 

 past and future interchanged, then indeed the situation 

 would have been lively. Mr. Wells in The Time-Machine 

 and Lewis Carroll in Sylvie and Bruno give us a glimpse 

 of the absurdities which occur when time runs back- 

 wards. If space is "looking-glassed" the world con- 

 tinues to make sense; but looking-glassed time has an 

 inherent absurdity which turns the world-drama into 

 the most nonsensical farce. 



Now the primary laws of physics taken one by one 

 all declare that they are entirely indifferent as to which 

 way you consider time to be progressing, just as they 

 are indifferent as to whether you view the world from 

 the right or the left. This -is true of the classical laws, 

 the relativity laws, and even of the quantum laws. It 

 is not an accidental property; the reversibility is inherent 

 in the whole conceptual scheme in which these laws 

 find a place. Thus the question whether the world does 

 or does not "make sense" is outside the range of these 

 laws. We have to appeal to the one outstanding law — 



