25.8 The connectedness of the characters which events receive from a given electron is expressed by the notion of transmission, namely the characters are transmitted from the occupied events according to a regular rule, which depends on the continuity of events arising from their mutual relations of extension. This transmission through events is expressible as a transmission through space with finite velocity.
25.9 Thus in an event unoccupied by it an electron is discerned only as an agent modifying the character of that event; whereas in an event occupied by it the electron is discerned as itself acted on, namely the character of that event governs the fate of the electron. Thus in a sense there is no action at a distance; for the fate of each electron is wholly determined by the event it occupies. But in a sense there is action at a distance, since the character of any event is modified (to however slight a degree) by any other electron, however separated by intervening events. This action at a distance is in its turn limited to being a transmission through the intervening events.
[26. Duality of Nature]. 26.1 There are two sides to nature, as it were, antagonistic the one to the other, and yet each essential. The one side is development in creative advance, the essential becomingness of nature. The other side is the permanence of things, the fact that nature can be recognised. Thus nature is always a newness relating objects which are neither new nor old.
26.2 Perception fades unless it is equally stimulated from both sides of nature. It is essentially apprehension of the becomingness of nature. It requires transition, contrast, and newness, and immediacy of happening. Thus essentially perception is an awareness of events in the act of passing into what has never yet been. But equally perception requires recognition. Now electrons—in so far as they are ultimate scientific objects and if they are such objects—do not satisfy the complete condition for recognisability.
26.3 Such ultimate scientific objects embody what is ultimately permanent in nature. Thus they are the objects whose relations in events are the unanalysable expression of the order of nature. But the recognition in perception requires the recurrence of the ways in which events pass. This involves the rhythmic repetition of the characters of events. This permanence of rhythmic repetition is the essential character of molecules, which are complex scientific objects. There is no such thing as a molecule at an instant. A molecule requires a minimum of duration in which to display its character. Similarly physical objects are steady complexes of molecules with an average permanence of character throughout certain minimum durations.
26.4 Thus the recognition which is involved in perception is the reason for the importance in physical science of Lorentz's hierarchy of microscopic and macroscopic equations.
26.5 The further consideration of objects, in particular their instantaneous spatial positions and the quantitative distribution of material through space, is resumed in [Part IV], after the theory of space and time has been established.
[5]Cf. [Chapters XIV] and [XV] of Part IV.