"Is that the pulse of The Brain?" Lee asked.
"No," Gus snorted contemptuously. "The Brain isn't even operating. Nothing moves in The Brain now excepting those ebbing residual currents, too low in power to agitate anything but the amplifiers built into this thing. If these were normal operations with a million impulses per second passing through The Brain you could hear and see as little of the pulse as of the beatings of a million mosquito wings. In that case the dial to your right works a reduction-gear, kind of an inverted stroboscope; that cuts the speed down a hundred-thousand to one and you just barely see and hear the rhythm of the beat."
"I see."
Fascinated by the dance of the green line Lee said absently, "This touches upon another question I had in mind; The Brain is expanding, that is, new cell groups and circuits are constantly being added. Right?"
"Right."
"I also understand that The Brain is learning all the time. The cerebral mantle evolves through being worked; its cells enriched by the material submitted to them for processing; the richer the material, the richer their yield. Right?"
"Right."
"Okay; then what becomes of the new capacity which is being created by the adding of new workshops and the increased efficiency of the old ones? Is there a corresponding expansion of the apperception centers?"
Gus' smiling face suddenly turned serious. There was surprise mingled with respect in his voice as he said:
"Now there you've hit upon a funny thing, Aussie. I've been wondering about that myself of late: where does the new capacity go? Even the big shots like Dr. Scriven begin to ask questions about that; they don't seem rightly to know. They must have gotten their wires crossed somewhere; the new capacity is there all right, only it doesn't show up, it sort of evaporates.... Excuse me—"