NOTB 'BOOK OF THE CENTURY'
A History of Electricity and Life (2017) by Arthur Firstenberg
TRANSLATIONS OF THE SUMMARY
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I've bought 5 copies of The Invisible Rainbow for friends and family.
However, it is a doorstopper of a book, that I know a few friends admire on the coffee table, but have not read.
A large proportion of the book is the extensive reference section to back every droplet of fact, as we are taken on a wild journey through the history of electricity to a world-view changing conclusion.
For those that don't have time, or would just like a taster, here is a 20 min fast-read summary of the key points within the book.
The whole book in a few easy-to-consume bite-size chunks.
But first here are two forewards to whet your appetite.
The first is from Dr T and the second from Dr Andrew Goldsworthy
DR T - RETIRED GP
It is hard to comprehend how systematic and deliberate the silencing of the harm that electromagnetic radiation causes has been.
It is not accidental that the very youngest have been 'educated' into regarding many of the devices that have incredibly high EMF radiation as essential for their lives.
Whatever age we are we have been programmed to accept more and more EMF radiation into our lives. The other side of this is that those canaries in the coal mines that have been suffering from severe effects of the EMF radiation have been mocked and dismissed by all forms of the biased media.
Startling instances of men, women and children suffering harm have been suppressed. Moving forward to our present time we can now see that so many of these devices that are causing harm are also part of surveillance capitalism.
It is little wonder that this agenda of 'smart' everything would be pushed forward regardless of any harm it may be causing. This book is so valuable in that it tells the story from the beginning and is immensely readable (yes, I know it's long), and then has all that evidence to back up what is written.
I knew this book was important when it arrived as a gift from Mark, and I have been recommending it to others ever since.
Knowledge is power.
Dr T
DR ANDREW GOLDSWORTHY
RETIRED BIOLOGICAL SAFETY OFFICER
IMPERIAL COLLEGE - LONDON
This is an excellent summary of Arthur Firstenberg's book "The Invisible Rainbow", which is itself a much longer summary of the timeline linking the exposure of animals (especially humans) and plants to a wide range of illnesses and metabolic disorders. These include microwave sickness (aka electromagnetic hypersensitivity) diabetes, heart attacks, cancer and many more.
The villain of the piece is pulsed and other alternating electromagnetic fields in the environment that interfere with electric currents used by our own bodies and, in particular, the electric currents that flow through our cell membranes. Their main effect is to make these membranes leak. This short circuits and reduces the normal voltage (trans-membrane potential) that provides the energy for most of our bodily functions In effect, they starve us of our energy and this can have all sorts of unexpected effects.
For example, the mitochondria (the cells' powerhouses) use an electrochemical gradient across their membranes generated from the food we eat to make ATP, which is the main energy currency of our cells. But this ATP is used by the external membrane of the cell to absorb nutrients and excrete toxic byproducts, So, not only do these electromagnetic fields starve us of energy (giving, among other things, symptoms of chronic fatigue) they also poison us with our own toxins. Also, since ATP is needed by our immune systems, we become more susceptible to disease and also to cancer, which arises from the inability of the immune system to weed out precancerous cells.
That said, the body does try to fight back. In particular, the inflow of calcium ions through our leaking cell membranes stimulates metabolic activity in general and repair mechanisms in particular. If you think about it, this is the only way that a cell can "know" that its membrane has been damaged.
But the increased metabolic activity needed to repair the damage has side effects, particularly on the cells of the nervous system. Here the extra activity makes our sensory cells send false signals to the brain to give us the symptoms of electrical hypersensitivity, including ADHD as our brain cells become hyperactive and pain and false feelings of heat or cold anywhere on our body. When the inner ear is affected, we may experience tinnitus, loss of balance and all the symptoms of motion sickness, including nausea.
It is not nice to be electrosensitive and no one knows this more than Arthur Firstenberg, who is the most electrosensitive person that I have ever come across Please read on to see more details and the observations and experiments that inspired Arthur to write his book, "The Invisible Rainbow".
Andrew Goldsworthy PhD
Lecturer (retired)
Imperial College London
To read the quick read summary, keep reading below....
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About Arthur Firstenberg the author Arthur Firstenberg is a scientist and journalist who is at the forefront of a global movement to tear down the taboo surrounding this subject.
After graduating Phi Beta Kappa from Cornell University with a degree in mathematics, he attended the University of California, Irvine School of Medicine from 1978 to 1982.
Injury by X-ray overdose cut short his medical career. For the past thirty-seven years he has been a researcher, consultant, and lecturer on the health and environmental effects of electromagnetic radiation, as well as a practitioner of several healing arts.
About the Book This remarkably well-documented and -referenced book is a cornerstone in the sense that it traces the deployment of electricity in our civilization, in terms of its interaction with living organisms, from its initial discovery in the 1740s all the way to our time, and even projected into the future.
It should be noted that the title refers to the entire electromagnetic spectrum comprising the colors of the rainbow, including the invisible frequencies such as radio frequencies and the fields generated around conducting wires.
THE SUMMARY
PART 1
1. Captured in a Bottle
1746 saw the first discoveries involving electricity in Europe. Leyden’s experiment consisted of revealing the electric fluid by means of rubbing the hand on a glass globe spun rapidly on its axis. The static electricity thus produced made a great impression in the schools, fairs and on private persons who had the financial means to acquire this device, with some producing electrical arcs and others brief electric shocks.
The phenomenon was so popular that it was not socially acceptable to suggest that electricity could be dangerous, even though the shocks caused headaches, nosebleeds and fatigue in certain experimenters and in the animals used in the tests.
Society was taken over by electromania and the most fervent exponents of being electroshocked in good company between two glasses of champagne began to perceive harmful symptoms. In spite of this, the medical establishments equipped themselves with the Leyden flask (the forerunner of the condenser), for the purpose of carrying out medical experiments for abortions or other applications.
In this way a completely new field of knowledge emerged concerning the biological effects of electricity on people, plants and animals – knowledge that was then much more extensive than that of our contemporary physicians, who daily see patients suffering from the effects of electricity without recognizing them for what they are, and who are generally ignorant of the very existence of this knowledge.
2. The Deaf to Hear, and the Lame to Walk Noting the – rarely positive, and far more often negative – effects of the application of electrical voltage on living organisms, the researchers and physicians concluded that living organisms function in conjunction with electricity. Certain cures were brought about using electricity – as for example in 1851, when the neurologist Duchenne treated deafness in dozens of patients by means of locally applied electrical impulses. Experiments were carried out – notably by Volta in Italy, as well as other researchers in the western world – which found evidence that the nervous, cardiac, cardiovascular, gustatory, sudatory and other systems could be stimulated using the electricity produced by galvanic couples. It was found that the number of curative effects were significantly fewer than the harmful effects that were listed, which include the symptoms of electro-sensitivity (ES) known today, such as headaches, dizziness, nausea, mental confusion, fatigue, depression, insomnia, etc.
3. Electrical Sensitivity The French botanist Thomas-François Dalibard – who carried out electrical experiments on living organisms – confided in a letter to Benjamin Franklin dated 1762 that he was unable to continue his work as his own organism had developed an intolerance to electricity. He was one of the first people to be officially declared electro-hypersensitive (EHS). Reading that account, it is clear that this botanist must have been severely affected. Other professors and researchers had the same unfortunate experience and were thus forced to stop their work. Even the famous Benjamin Franklin was affected by a neurological illness during his researches on electricity from 1753 onwards, and the symptoms are largely reminiscent of electro-hypersensitivity. So much so that, at the end of the 18th century, it was generally acknowledged that electricity could make people ill, depending on the sex, the morphology and the physical condition of the individual concerned. It had similarly been observed that certain individuals reacted strongly to changes in the weather, which often correlated with electrical changes in the atmosphere. The names of some of those individuals are still famous today – among them Christopher Columbus, Dante, Charles Darwin, Benjamin Franklin, Goethe, Victor Hugo, Leonardo da Vinci, Martin Luther, Michelangelo, Mozart, Napoleon, Rousseau and Voltaire.
4. The Road Not Taken During the 1790s, science was faced with an identity crisis regarding the interpretation and unification of the four different fluids – electricity, light, magnetism and heat. Where electricity was concerned, on the one hand there was Luigi Galvani, who regarded electricity as an integral part of the living organism, and on the other Volta's theory that electricity was only a “secondary” effect of internal chemical reactions in the living organism. Volta, the inventor of the extremely useful electric battery, which had the potential to become a great money-spinner, succeeded in winning the argument against the more global view of the interaction between electricity and the living organism.
5. Chronic Electrical Illness From the end of the 19th century onwards, urban landscapes were transformed by the installation of telegraph lines throughout the industrialized countries. This technology used voltages of the order of 80 volts on a single conductor, with the return current being earthed.
That period saw the emergence of the first stray currents to which living beings were exposed. It was then that one saw the appearance of diseases of civilization such as neurasthenia, which afflicted Frank Lloyd Wright and Theodore Roosevelt, among other well-known figures. It should be noted in passing that neurasthenia is very similar to electrohypersensitivity, which is the more modern term for the same sensitivity to electricity. Around half of the telegraphists who were employed to manipulate the electrical current sent through the lines, and were thus exposed to very strong electromagnetic fields, were afflicted by telegraphic sickness. Once again, the symptoms were the same as those of EHS. Later on, in around 1915, it was the telephone operators who were experiencing the same symptoms – for they were exposed to electromagnetic fields from the communications for hours on end at their desks. In 1989, it was noted that in Winnipeg 47% of the telephone operators were suffering from the same symptoms.
However, in 1894, the noted Viennese psychiatrist Sigmund Freud wrote an article whose effect was disastrous for all the unfortunates who suffered from telegraphic sickness, neurasthenia, microwave syndrome or EHS. Rather than seeing the external cause ‒ which was electromagnetic pollution – he attributed these symptoms to disordered thoughts or poorly controlled emotions. As a result, today millions of citizens affected by electronic smog are being medicated instead of reducing their exposure to this pollutant. Sigmund Freud renamed neurasthenia – which was known to be caused by electricity – as a neurosis anxiety, an anxiety attack or a panic attack. This opened the way for the reckless deployment of electrification to continue unimpeded.
It should be noted that in Russia, neurasthenia is listed as an environmental illness, as Freud's damaging redefinition was rejected there.
6. The Behavior of Plants Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose and other researchers conducted numerous electrical experiments on plants and other living organisms, whose results showed definite effects. He discovered that the nerves of plants or animals display variable behavior and that their resistivity can vary considerably, depending on the application of the current and its polarity. He also noted that the intensity of current necessary to modify the conductivity of the nerves is infinitesimal in terms of the voltage applied – something in the order of 0.3 microamperes (0.3*10-6). That current is significantly less than the current that is induced through a telephone conversation using a cell phone. Bose likewise discovered that the threshold of a current’s bioactivity is 1 femtoampere (1*10-15)! As this researcher was also familiar with radio-frequency transmissions, he carried out an experiment in which a plant was exposed to a radio signal of 30 MHz at a distance of about 218 yards (200 meters) and found that the plant's growth was retarded during the emission period. He likewise showed that the circulation of sap in the plant slowed down when it was irradiated by the same radio signal.
7. Acute Electrical Illness During the 1880s, London was supplied with direct current, but certain physicists had discovered that the distribution of alternating current generated fewer ohmic losses in the wires. There followed a battle of the currents, even though many scientists, including Edison, strongly criticized the more dangerous effects of alternating current. Ironically, it’s precisely because alternating current is more harmful that it is used in the electric chair. And as everyone knows, the electrical current of the power grid is... alternating!
In 1889, full-scale electrification was carried out in the USA and, shortly thereafter, in Europe. That same year, as if by chance, doctors were inundated with cases of flu, which had until then appeared only infrequently. The victims’ symptoms were far more neurological in nature, resembling neurasthenia, and did not include respiratory disorders. The pandemic lasted for four years and killed at least a million people.
In 2001, Canadian astronomer Ken Tapping showed that the influenza pandemics over the previous three centuries correlated with peaks in solar magnetic activity, on an 11- year cycle. It has also been found that some outbreaks of influenza spread over enormous areas in just a few days – a fact that is difficult to explain by contagion from one person to another. Also, numerous experiments seeking to prove direct contagion through close contact, droplets of mucus or other processes have proved fruitless. From 1933 to the present day, virologists have been unable to present any experimental study proving that influenza spreads through normal contact between people. All attempts to do so have met with failure.
8. Mystery on the lsle of Wight In 1904, bees began to die on the Isle of Wight following the installation of radio transmitters by Marconi. These transmitters work at frequencies close to megahertz levels.
On the other side of the Channel, Jacques-Arsène d'Arsonval showed that “sharp and hooked” electromagnetic signals are far more toxic than sinusoidal signals. The truth was that, after a year and a half of experimenting with radio transmitters in full health at the age of 22, Marconi began to develop fevers. These attacks continued for the rest of his life. In 1904, while working on setting up a transmitter powerful enough for transatlantic communications, these fevers became so intense that they were thought to be malaria. In 1905, he married Beatrice O'Brien and after their honeymoon, they settled on the island close to a transmitter. As soon as Beatrice had settled in, she began to complain of tinnitus. After three months, she fell ill with severe jaundice. She had to return to London to give birth to a baby who only lived for a few weeks and died of “unknown causes.” During the same period, Marconi spent several months suffering from fever and delirium. Between 1918 and 1921, he suffered suicidal depression while working on a shortwave transmitter. In 1927, while on his honeymoon from his second marriage, he collapsed with chest pain and was diagnosed with serious cardiac disorders. Between 1934 and 1937, while he was developing microwave technology, he had nine heart attacks – the final one killing him at the age of 63.
On the same island, at Osborne House, Queen Victoria suffered cerebral hemorrhages and died on the evening of January 22nd 1901, just as Marconi was putting a new transmitter into operation less than 13 miles away.
In 1901 there were “only” two transmitters, while in 1904 there were four, making this island the most irradiated place on the planet, leaving bees no room for survival. In 1906, a survey revealed that 90% of the bees had completely disappeared for no apparent reason. New colonies were brought to the island, but these likewise died within a week.
This epidemic spread across England and then across the western world, and then gradually stabilized, until the armies equipped themselves with various high-powered radio transmitters towards the end of the First World War – triggering (as we have seen) the Spanish flu pandemic in 1918, which actually began in the United States, at the Naval Radio School of Cambridge, Massachusetts, with 400 initial cases. This epidemic rapidly spread to 1,127 soldiers at Funston Camp (Kansas), where wireless connections had been installed. What intrigued the doctors was that while 15% of the civilian population were suffering from nosebleeds, 40% of the Navy suffered from them. Other bleeding also occurred, and a third of those who died did so due to internal hemorrhaging of the lungs or brain. In fact, it was the composition of the blood that had been altered, as the measured coagulation time was more than twice as long as normal. These symptoms are incompatible with the effects of the influenza respiratory viruses, but totally consistent with the devastating effects of electricity. Another incongruity was that two-thirds of the victims were healthy young people. A further atypical flu symptom was that the pulse slowed to rates of between 36 and 48, whereas this is a common result of exposure to electromagnetic fields. In addition, it was possible to successfully treat some sufferers with massive doses of calcium.
The military physician Dr George A. Soper testified that the virus was spreading faster than the speed of movement of people. Various experiments were conducted attempting to infect subjects either by direct close contact or by inoculation with mucus or blood – but the experimenters were unable to demonstrate any infection by this means.
It can be seen that each new influenza pandemic corresponds to a new advance in electrical technology, such as the Asian flu of 1957-58, following the installation of a powerful radar surveillance system, and the outbreak of Hong Kong flu from July 1968 onwards, following the commissioning of 28 military satellites for space surveillance at the altitude of the Van Allen belts, which protect us from cosmic radiation.
9. Earth’s Electric Envelope With a core consisting mainly of iron, the rotating earth is primarily protected by the ionosphere, then the plasma sphere – delimited by the Van Allen radiation belts at an altitude of between 1,000 and 55,000 km – and by its tail: the magnetosphere, which is exposed to solar winds originating from our sun and constitutes a kind of dynamo, a complex electrical system. The exchanges of electricity between the earth's crust, the atmosphere and even the ionosphere are permanent and const