Overview and Scope
The Invisible Rainbow: A History of Electricity and Life by Arthur Firstenberg (2020) is an extensive historical and scientific investigation into the biological and health effects of electricity and electromagnetic radiation (EMR). Spanning 576 pages, the book traces the discovery and understanding of electricity’s influence on living organisms from the 18th century to the modern wireless era. It challenges conventional mechanistic views that separate electricity from life processes and critiques the widespread neglect of electrical environmental factors in medicine and public health.
The book is intended for readers interested in the intersection of environmental science, medicine, and public health, particularly those concerned with electromagnetic pollution, chronic illness, and ecological damage. It is also relevant to researchers, clinicians, and advocates exploring non-chemical environmental contributors to disease, including cancer and neurological disorders.
PART ONE: Historical Foundations and Biological Effects of Electricity
1. Captured in a Bottle
This chapter recounts the Leyden jar experiment (1746), which demonstrated that electricity could be stored and exert powerful effects on the human body. Early medical practitioners observed electricity’s therapeutic potential and dangers, leading to widespread “electromania” and electrotherapy in Europe and America. Electrotherapy was applied to nervous, skin, blood, respiratory, and kidney diseases, sometimes even as an abortifacient method. Despite extensive 18th-century knowledge about electricity’s effects on humans, animals, and plants, this understanding was largely forgotten in later centuries.
2. The Deaf to Hear, and the Lame to Walk
Early electrotherapy employed friction machines and Leyden jars to apply positive or negative electricity to patients, aiming to restore electrical balance through electric baths, shocks, and discharges. The London Electrical Dispensary reported an 84% cure or relief rate between 1793 and 1819. Notable successes included restoring hearing with gentle electrical pulses. Scientists such as Alexander von Humboldt and Alessandro Volta studied sensory perceptions of electricity, noting physiological effects like increased heart rate, secretions, menstruation, urination, as well as adverse symptoms like dizziness, headaches, fatigue, and respiratory difficulties. Importantly, exposure to electric fields without direct contact also caused biological effects, such as weight loss from increased perspiration.
3. Electrical Sensitivity
The chapter highlights that some early experimenters suffered lasting neurological damage or paralysis from electrical exposure. Electrical sensitivity varies widely among individuals, with some profoundly affected by small shocks. Symptoms included tremors, headaches, weakness, and mental disturbances. Historical medical literature recognized this variability and advised caution for pregnant and delicate persons. The author notes that modern electrical exposures—such as from cell phones and power lines—deliver far greater energy than 18th-century electrotherapy, raising concerns for sensitive individuals that are largely ignored today.
4. The Road Not Taken
In the 1790s, electricity was linked to nerve and muscle function. Luigi Galvani proposed “animal electricity” generated by muscles and nerves, while Alessandro Volta argued electricity originated from metals. Volta’s mechanistic view prevailed, marginalizing vitalistic perspectives that saw electricity as integral to life. Although later scientists demonstrated electricity’s physiological roles, society embraced widespread electrification without fully understanding biological effects, setting the stage for modern health challenges.
5. Chronic Electrical Illness
By 1859, telegraph lines extensively wired cities, emitting electric and magnetic fields stronger than natural Earth fields. Early telegraph systems caused stray currents and widespread exposure. Dr. George Miller Beard described “neurasthenia” in 1869, a disease of weak nerves linked to modern stress but not explicitly connected to electricity. Symptoms included fatigue, depression, headaches, insomnia, palpitations, and sensory sensitivities. Electrotherapy specialist Dr. Margaret Abigail Cleaves linked neurasthenia symptoms to heavy electrical exposure. Occupational diseases like “telegrapher’s cramp” showed neurological and systemic symptoms in workers exposed to electricity, with women and young adults more susceptible.
The chapter also discusses the overlap between weather sensitivity and electrical sensitivity, noting that about 30% of people are weather sensitive and thus electrically sensitive. Biometeorology studied natural electric and magnetic field effects on humans and animals but was undermined by telecommunications industry pressures. Despite detailed observations, modern science largely ignored biological effects of electricity, focusing instead on mechanistic and chemical explanations.
6. The Behavior of Plants
Sir Jagadis Chunder Bose pioneered the study of plant nervous systems and electrical sensitivity, demonstrating that plants have nerves generating action potentials similar to animals. He identified pulsating cells responsible for sap pumping with unique electrical properties. Bose showed plants respond to electricity and radio waves, affecting growth and sap flow; radio waves at approximately 30 MHz could rapidly alter growth rates. Earlier experiments showed electrical stimulation accelerated plant growth and flowering, while deprivation of natural atmospheric electricity stunted growth.
Large-scale agricultural experiments reported significant crop yield increases (up to 50–70%) using friction machines and atmospheric electricity collectors. Bose disproved Pflüger’s Law, showing very low continuous currents alter nerve conduction speed and sensitivity in plants and animals. Currents as low as 0.3 microamperes can change nerve impulses by about 20%; tiny currents stimulate plant growth, while higher currents inhibit it. Bose’s work implies modern electrical safety codes overlook effects of low-level continuous currents. Plant sensitivity to electromagnetic stimuli suggests living organisms are profoundly affected by environmental electric fields and radio waves.
7. Acute Electrical Illness
The rapid expansion of electrical infrastructure in the late 19th century coincided with new health issues. By 1889, electric power generation and distribution became widespread; the “battle of the currents” ended with alternating current (AC) dominance. The 1889 influenza pandemic coincided with this expansion, lasting four years and causing over one million deaths. Influenza’s behavior changed: it became seasonal, predictable, and endemic worldwide, unlike previous sporadic outbreaks.
Despite extensive virological knowledge, influenza’s epidemiology puzzles remain: non-contagious patterns, rapid simultaneous outbreaks worldwide, seasonality, and selective age-group impact. Researchers linked influenza outbreaks to solar magnetic activity and atmospheric electricity rather than direct contagion. Influenza epidemics often coincide with peaks in the 11-year solar cycle; pandemics start simultaneously in widely separated locations, inconsistent with person-to-person spread. Symptoms include neurological and cardiovascular manifestations often without respiratory symptoms. Post-influenza mental health effects were severe, with increased psychosis, depression, and mania, especially in adults aged 21–50.
The 1889 pandemic and subsequent waves suggest environmental electrical disturbance as a primary cause, challenging the viral contagion model. Historical reports describe influenza outbreaks on ships far from land and simultaneous epidemics across continents, supporting a non-contagious atmospheric trigger. The Maunder Minimum (1645–1715), a period of low solar activity, coincided with absence of global influenza pandemics, reinforcing the solar-electrical hypothesis. Physicians described influenza as a “toxic neurosis” emphasizing nervous system involvement over respiratory infection. The chapter critiques Freud’s reclassification of neurasthenia as anxiety neurosis, which led to neglect of environmental causes. The need to reconsider environmental electrical factors in disease etiology is highlighted.
8. Mystery on the Isle of Wight
Influenza consistently targets adults aged 20–40, unlike typical infectious diseases affecting children. Historical records show simultaneous influenza-like illness in diverse animals during human epidemics, suggesting a common environmental cause rather than contagion. Influenza virus presence does not always correlate with illness; many cases lack virus isolation or antibody response. Household transmission studies show low secondary attack rates; simultaneous infections suggest common exposure. Vaccination programs have not stopped epidemics; meta-analyses show minimal impact. No experimental proof exists for person-to-person transmission despite extensive attempts.
The Isle of Wight experienced severe bee mortality near four Marconi radio stations in 1904, termed “Isle of Wight disease,” later disproved as contagious. Marconi’s radio experiments caused chronic illness in his family, possibly linked to radio wave exposure. Public complaints near radio stations were dismissed. World War I saw rapid expansion of powerful radio transmitters coinciding with the 1918 influenza pandemic, which struck primarily healthy young adults and pregnant women with unusual symptoms including hemorrhages, bradycardia, neurological symptoms, and mild respiratory signs. Treatments focused on blood coagulation correction, not infection. Experimental transmission attempts failed.
Similar influenza pandemics coincided with major advances in electrical/radio technology: the 1957 Asian flu with radar lines, the 1968 Hong Kong flu with military communication satellites. Healthy, electrically sensitive populations suffered most; elderly were less affected.
9. Earth’s Electric Envelope
The universe is filled with plasma forming cosmic electromagnetic circuits. Earth is enveloped by the magnetosphere, ionosphere, and Van Allen belts shaped by solar wind and Earth’s magnetic field. Earth’s atmosphere maintains a vertical electric field (~130 V/m), with ground negative and ionosphere positive, creating a global electrical circuit maintained by lightning (~100 strikes per second). Living organisms generate electric fields aligned with Earth’s field; life and Earth’s electrical environment are interdependent. Trees influence atmospheric electricity and rainfall through electrical interactions.
Lightning excites the Earth-ionosphere cavity, producing Schumann resonances at low frequencies (8, 14, 20 Hz). Human brain alpha waves (8–13 Hz) and theta waves (4–7 Hz) closely match these frequencies. Experiments show atmospheric low-frequency electromagnetic fields influence human reaction times and health: alpha-range frequencies improve reaction times and relaxation; delta-range frequencies induce headaches and fatigue. Similar brainwave frequencies occur across many animal species, suggesting a deep biological connection to Earth’s electromagnetic environment with health implications from disturbances.
Natural Very Low Frequency (VLF) radio waves originate mainly from thunderstorms, traveling along Earth's magnetic field lines and producing sounds such as whistlers and dawn chorus, influencing biological systems by resonating within auditory and nervous system frequency ranges. Reinhold Reiter's 1954 German studies showed significant increases in births, deaths, suicides, injuries, and neurological complaints on days with strong VLF sferics, indicating VLF's regulatory role in biological rhythms.
Experiments with golden hamsters demonstrated natural atmospheric VLF frequencies trigger hibernation; artificial VLF fields could induce or terminate hibernation at very weak strengths. Rütger Wever's isolation chamber studies showed human circadian rhythms remain synchronized only when Earth's natural electromagnetic fields are present; shielding causes desynchronization reversible by artificial 10 Hz signals near the first Schumann resonance.
The body's electrical polarity aligns with Earth's global electrical circuit, corresponding to acupuncture meridians described in ancient Chinese medicine. Acupuncture points function as electrical amplifiers and antennas receiving environmental electromagnetic signals. Modern research confirmed acupuncture points have lower electrical resistance and higher potential; electroacupuncture using microampere currents is widely used, especially in China since 1934. Bong Han Kim identified a network of electrically conductive ducts and corpuscles (primo vascular system) corresponding to acupuncture meridians; this system contains DNA and exhibits slow electrical pulsations. Subsequent research confirmed primo vascular system existence using radioactive tracers.
This chapter emphasizes the profound interconnection between Earth's electromagnetic environment and biological systems, suggesting that disruption of natural electromagnetic fields by man-made sources may underlie many modern health problems.
Summary of Part One
Part One of The Invisible Rainbow lays a foundational understanding of the intimate relationship between electricity and life, tracing historical medical observations, plant electrophysiology, and epidemiological patterns of disease linked to electrical phenomena. It challenges the dominant mechanistic paradigm that excludes electricity’s biological role and highlights the overlooked health consequences of chronic electrical exposure from telegraphy to modern wireless technologies.
The author presents compelling historical and scientific evidence that environmental electromagnetic fields influence nervous system function, plant growth, infectious disease patterns, and human health. The part underscores the need to reconsider environmental electrical factors in disease etiology, including cancer and neurological disorders, and to recognize electromagnetic pollution as a significant public health and ecological threat.
Relevance to Cancer and Disease Context
While Part One primarily focuses on nervous system disorders, infectious disease patterns, and ecological effects, it sets the stage for later discussions on metabolic diseases and cancer linked to electromagnetic exposure. The detailed exploration of electrical sensitivity, chronic electrical illness, and bioelectrical mechanisms in plants and animals provides a biological framework for understanding how electromagnetic pollution may contribute to cancer risk and progression.
The historical context of occupational electrical exposure causing neurological and systemic symptoms parallels modern concerns about EMF exposure from wireless devices and power lines. The book’s emphasis on the nervous system’s electrical nature and its vulnerability to environmental EMR is particularly relevant for clinicians and researchers investigating cancer-related neurological symptoms, immune dysregulation, and environmental triggers of chronic disease.
Strengths and Limitations
Strengths:
- Comprehensive historical review integrating medical, scientific, and environmental literature.
- Detailed presentation of early electrotherapy and occupational electrical illnesses often neglected in mainstream medicine.
- In-depth discussion of plant electrophysiology and Earth’s electromagnetic environment, providing a broad biological context.
- Critical examination of influenza epidemiology challenging conventional viral contagion models.
- Integration of biophysical and bioelectrical concepts with epidemiological and ecological data.
Limitations and Cautions:
- The book’s thesis challenges mainstream scientific consensus and may be controversial; some interpretations require cautious evaluation.
- While historical and epidemiological correlations are compelling, direct causal mechanisms for many health effects remain under investigation.
- The book does not provide clinical protocols or nutritional/lifestyle interventions but rather a conceptual framework for understanding electromagnetic impacts.
- Readers should consider the book as a synthesis of diverse evidence rather than definitive clinical guidance.
Utility for Cancer-Options Reference Database
This book offers valuable insights into the environmental and bioelectrical factors potentially influencing cancer and other chronic diseases. It broadens the understanding of non-chemical environmental contributors to disease etiology, particularly electromagnetic pollution, which is increasingly relevant in modern society. The historical and scientific context provided can inform clinicians, researchers, and caregivers about the importance of considering electrical sensitivity and environmental EMR exposure in patient assessment and public health strategies.
While not a treatment manual, The Invisible Rainbow supports a holistic view of disease causation that integrates environmental, neurological, and ecological dimensions. It may inspire further research, advocacy, and precautionary measures to reduce electromagnetic pollution and protect vulnerable populations, including cancer patients with heightened sensitivity or neurological complications.
