effect started a shrinkage in our sector about ten-to-the-ninth years ago. Now then, I've just been doing some figuring on the back of this envelope and if I haven't made a mistake the present diameter of the solar system out to Pluto is 3.2 X 108 kilometers, or about two hundred million miles. Is that right?" Everyone looked expectantly at the speaker.
"I work entirely with the generalized formulae; never with numerical values," Friedmann replied with cold dignity. "However, I do not question the accuracy of Dr. Fosberg's arithmetic. Naturally the shrinkage would be quite imperceptible with ordinary measuring rods. It would be necessary to make some observation involving explicitly the velocity of light."
"I'm willing to grant you that," Fosberg returned, "but aren't you going to get into serious trouble with the law of gravitation due to all this shrinkage? Why, in a few more years the congestion in the solar system will be worse than the campus parking problem!" It was a remark that was always good for a laugh and one of the principal reasons he had asked the question in the first place.
"The gravitational difficulties that so worry Dr. Fosberg do not follow as a necessary consequence," said Friedmann, entirely unruffled. "As I have demonstrated, the laws of Newtonian mechanics may fail to hold even as a first approximation. At these extreme limits, however, the integration of the equations becomes quite insuperable by ordinary methods. One of my pupils at the University of Pennsylvania plans to explore these regions next year with the EDVAC."
Fosberg wagged his bald head. "Just the same all this crowding together still worries me," he declared. "And I don't 'like the idea of being reduced to the size of a microcosmic midget either."
Friedmann's shrug plainly indicated that it was a matter of complete indifference to him if Fosberg were reduced to the dimensions of a neutrino, and as there were no more questions, the meeting broke up. Stoddard, who had grown thoroughly bored with the whole proceedings, made a bolt for the door but Arnold was only a few lengths behind.
"Wasn't Friedmann good," he demanded. "Don't you think it's the most satisfying cosmological theory you ever heard?"
"No doubt about it," said Stoddard, continuing on down the hall. "You know, I was thinking," Arnold went on, falling into step beside him, "why couldn't we test the Xi effect ourselves?"
"Test it ourselves!"
"Why not? After all, it shouldn't be too difficult. As Friedmann said, we would only need to make some observation that depends explicitly on the velocity of light."
Stoddard snorted. "Bet he's never made a bona fide observation in his whole life."
They stopped on the steps outside Dickinson Hall before wending their separate ways homeward. The sun,
