That was a fun one. Long time ago (a century) people thought that the atom was like a solar system. Then they made exactly that question. It got weird because they were testing by heating a body and watching the resulting spectrum (like the rainbow, the dispersion of light in a prism). They said, “we keep adding energy, and this thing goes from red, to yellow, to blue as we expect. But it goes then to white. Not to ultraviolet.” That was very weird for them. Because, if the atoms were like a solar system, things should go smoothly. And colors not changing smoothly was weird.
So they developed a new theory. That’s the deal in science (don’t let the politicians in weather ‘science’ make you think otherwise). The theory was, “no, this is not like a solar system. Because it’s not smooth. The new theory is, «Electrons can’t move smoothly around the atom. Electrons can only take very specific positions. When they change positions, they absorb or emit energy, frequently on the form of light».” Then they set up the equations and made lots of experimentation to confirm that the equations fit. Because, as we’ve already established, it’s all about the equations fitting. Well, one consequence of assuming the electrons can’t jump from state to state without a discrete exchange of energy is that electrons then can’t go from the state nearer to the nucleus straight to the nucleus without a lot of effort. Incidentally, that also explained why gold doesn’t react with almost nothing.
Again, this is an excessive oversimplification. And may be wrong. But it works fine when building computers, and sometimes that’s enough
I was sort’a following you ... right up to the last sentence, and I think I thank you ... which may be enough.