The Theory of Magnetic Poles

Abstract

If one supposes that a particle with a single magnetic pole can exist and that it interacts with charged particles, the laws of quantum mechanics lead to the requirement that the electric charges shall be quantized—all charges must be integral multiples of a unit charge $e$ connected with the pole strength $g$ by the formula $eg=\frac{1}{2}\hslash c$. Since electric charges are known to be quantized and no reason for this has yet been proposed apart from the existence of magnetic poles, we have here a reason for taking magnetic poles seriously. The fact that they have not yet been observed may be ascribed to the large value of the quantum of pole.