varies; and the next step is to find a mathematical formula expressing this dependence. There are virtually four things to connect, the circuit counting double since, for example, a rectangular circuit would be described by specifying two sides. Each of them has to be specified by four identification numbers (either monomarks or derived from monomarks); consequently, to allow for all combinations, the required mathematical formula contains
or 256 numerical coefficients. These coefficients give a numerical measure of the structure surrounding the initial relatum.
This completes the first part of our task to introduce numerical measure of structure into the basal material. The method is not so artificial as it appears at first sight. Unless we shirk the problem by putting the desired physical properties of the world directly into the original relations and relata, we must derive them from the structural interlocking of the relations; and such interlocking is naturally traced by following circuits among the relations. The axiom of comparability of contiguous relations only discriminates between like and unlike, and does not initially afford any means of classifying various degrees and kinds of unlikeness; but we have found a means of specifying the kind of unlikeness of
and
by reference to a circuit which “transforms” one into the other. Thus we have built a quantitative study of diversity on a definition of similarity.
The numerical measures of structure will be dependent on, and vary according to, the arbitrary code of monomarks used for the identification of relata. This, however, renders them especially suitable for building the ordinary quantities of physics. When the monomarks become co-ordinates of space and time the arbitrary choice of the code will be equivalent to the arbitrary choice of a frame of space and time; and it is in accordance with the theory of relativity that the measures of structure and the physical quantities to be built from them should vary with the frame of space and time. Physical quantities in general have no absolute value, but values relative to chosen frames of reference or codes of monomarks.
We have now fashioned our bricks from the primitive clay and the next job is to build with them. The 256 measures of structure varying from point to point of the world are somewhat reduced in number when duplicates are omitted; but even so they include a great deal of useless lumber which we do not require for the building. That seems to have worried a number of the most eminent physicists; but I do not quite see why. Ultimately it is the mind that decides what is lumber—which part of our building will shadow the things of common experience, and which has no such counterpart. It is no part of our function as purveyors of building material to anticipate what will be chosen for the palace of the mind. The lumber will now be dropped as irrelevant in the further operations, but I do not agree with those who think it a blemish on the theory that the lumber should ever have appeared in it.