韩愈《幽兰操》:
兰之猗猗,扬扬其香。
不采而佩,于兰何伤。
今天之旋,其曷为然。
我行四方,以日以年。
雪霜贸贸,荠麦之茂。
子如不伤,我不尔觏。
荠麦之茂,荠麦之有。
君子之伤,君子之守。
and an operator
with corresponding eigenvalues and eigenvectors given by
then the physical quantities
are said to be "good quantum numbers" if every eigenvector
remains an eigenvector of
with the same eigenvalue as time evolves.

in order to call
a good quantum number.
commute with the Hamiltonian
. Proof:
. If
is an eigenvector of
, then we have (by definition) that
, and so :



