.[34]
Turning to the physical significance of the
numbers, we may note that it is these
magnitudes which enter into the expression of a distance, hence which serve to define congruence. If we are dealing with a purely amorphous continuum in which no particular definition of congruence or distance is pressed upon us by nature, there can exist no particular distribution of
numbers inherent in the continuum. But if, on the other hand, as in the case of space, or, better still, of Einstein’s four-dimensional space-time, a precise definition of practical congruence is imposed upon us by nature—if, in other words, our continuum, in place of being amorphous, possesses a definite metrics or structure—there will exist a
-distribution inherent in the continuum, and this distribution will define its metrical field.