CHAPTER 8: ACCUMULATING ENERGY FOR WORK
On The Nature of Accumulators

In the previous Chapters, I discussed several different kinds of energies and their transformation. In this Chapter, I discuss how a man’s centers accumulate specific energies needed for maintenance of function and transformation.

It is a well-established fact that all machines require energy input to function. a combustion engine requires gasoline, a flash-light requires electrical power from a battery for illumination, a turbine needs hydraulic energy to turn its rotors so to generate electricity. The human machine with its several functioning centers is no different.

Gurdjieff taught that mankind has not fared well in recognizing, accumulating and transforming the vital and cosmic energies associated with life. Although it is generally true that one cannot utilize a concept to advantage until he or she is made aware of it, gaining knowledge of energy is only a small step in learning how to efficiently and efficaciously use energy. The greatest problem a person has is learning how to accumulate the proper type and amount of energy useful to his machine and his personal work. Most of the time we focus upon absorbing and transforming only the lower energies of consciousness, the vital and automatic. We foolishly fill our accumulators with the wrong energies.

Before discussing the accumulation of energy by the lower centers, it is useful to review how physical systems store and accumulate energy for later work.

As was mentioned earlier, energy is not something one can grab onto. Energy is an invisible ‘something’ visualized only by its effects in the environment as it is flows, is stored or is discharged. For example, compressing a mechanical spring accumulates or stores potential energy within the spring which becomes available for future work. The energy accumulated in a spring stretched from x1 to x2 is given by the equation below,

P. E. = k[(x2)**2 – (x1)**2] / 2                                                         (23)

where the appropriate terms have been defined previously.

Essentially, the more the spring is stretched, the greater energy stored (up to the deformation limit of the metal).

The energy of the spring can be controllably released through the mechanisms of a ‘wind-up’ watch or by returning the brake pedal of a car to the neutral position after slowing the automobile. When accumulated energy is ‘consciously or deliberately’ freed into the environment for a useful purpose, such energies, can be utilized for transformation. Stored energy uncontrollably released into the environment more often than not causes severe damage (a bomb).

a second example of an energy accumulator is shown by an electrostatic capacitor or condenser. a capacitor consists of two conductors (copper or silver) separated by a dielectric medium (usually air or a plastic compound). When a voltage or potential difference is placed across the capacitor, the conductor plates accumulate a specific quantity of electric charge (plates carry the same total magnitude of electric charge but of differing polarity). The amount of charge stored is proportional to the voltage applied across the condenser plates and the capacitance of the condenser,

Q = C(V2 – V1)                                                                       (24)

where Q is the magnitude of the stored charge, C is the capacitance and V2 – V1 is the voltage difference.

The energy stored is calculated by equation (25),

P. E. = C(V2 – V1)**2 / 2                                                             (25)

From these two simple examples, we see that different kinds of apparatuses are able to accumulate different kinds of energies. Proper accumulation for later utilization of an energy source requires that a user have a necessary understanding of the accumulator and its interface with the machine. Machines are of little use unless they are provided the proper form and amount of energy.