DOCTRINE OF THE STABLE DATUM
  1. a confusing motion can be understood by conceiving one thing to be motionless. Until one selects one datum, one factor, one particular in a confusion of particles, the confusion continues. The one thing selected and used becomes the stable datum for the remainder. A stable datum does not have to be the correct one. It is simply the one that keeps things from being in a confusion and on which others are aligned. (POW, pp. 23-24)


Technical Dictionary