From Wilhelm Reich’s book The Orgone Energy Accumulator: Its Scientific and Medical Use, Orgone Institute Press, pp. 9-16
The Cosmic Primordial Energy, called COSMIC ORGONE ENERGY (COE), was discovered between 1936 and 1939 in Norway. The initial discovery was basically completed in 1940 in Maine in the USA. It was then the result of complicated researches in the realms of nature in general and human bio-energetic functions in particular over a period of some 20 years. The discoverer is WILHELM REICH, M.D.
Since 1940, a scientific organization, comprising physicians, psychiatrists, physicists, biologists, educators and social workers, and with daughter institutions in several countries, has slowly developed around the discovery of the cosmic orgone energy.
This basic and revolutionary discovery has forced its own way into the public.
[…]
There were many and very serious reasons for not following the usual way of getting the discovery across in a big and sudden way:
First, the facts were flowing in much too rapidly to be handled properly and fully by a very few people.
Second, each single new fact which revealed itself to the orgonomic researcher seemed to contradict most cherished scientific beliefs of long standing, as, for instance, the air germ -theory in bacteriology; the theory of “static electricity” in electrophysics; the theory of “heat waves” in meteorology; the theory of “cosmic radiation” allegedly coming down to us from faraway “empty space”; the interpretation
of the many varied and lawful functions of the spontaneous elcdtroscopic discharges as “mere” results of an incomprehensible “natural leak”; The Second Law of Thermodynamics with its entropy; the theory of atoms and electronic particles as the primal constituents of the universe; the utter awe which governed any and every thought of a concrete, measurable, and actionable life energy; the clear-cut microscopic observations which disclosed the natural organization of singlecell organisms from decaying tissue and even from free orgone energy in frozen, highly-charged water (Experiment XX) and which so sharply refuted the basic trends in present-day biology; and many, many similar facts, each single one of cosmic dimensions.
Third, the one and paramount question that seemed to resist an answer was why no one among many thousands of skilled, conscientious, hard-working scientists had ever hit upon the interconnections between these abundant facts and observations which conclusively demonstrated the existence of a visible, measurable and manageable, ubiquitous cosmic energy.
Fourth, the emotional reactions to the discovery in some quarters of laymen and scientists alike were of such a dangerous nature that it became necessary first to comprehend and to meet this animosity.
Fifth, with each new year that passed in hard labor on the new functions the basic laws became simpler but at the same time the dimensions of the discovery grew to frightening proportions. It became necessary to restrict oneself to small sectors of the orgone energy functions and to proceed only very slowly and cautiously. A big sweep in publicity would have swamped the few orgonomists with arguments and counter-arguments, with details as yet unexplored, and with a tremendous amount of public debate which would certainly have choked the basic research job to death.
We may stop at this point. The arguments for not following the usual way of proclaiming discoveries were many and weighty. Dangerous as this procedure was, due to suspicions which it aroused (“Why aren’t you mentioned in the newspapers?,” and, “Physicist so-and-so has never heard of you”), it was unavoidable.
However, the basic findings had been published since 1938 in a continuous stream of publications. which were available in many libraries all over the world, but which were little appreciated by the shapers of public opinion.
This situation began to change as the international crisis grew and spread all over the world. With atomic warfare on the horizon, and with our knowledge of the bio-energetic effects of orgone energy at our disposal, we decided to proceed at a faster rate, but not too anxiously. Over the years since 1940 more and more people came to know about the orgone energy in many lands- therefore, it seemed possible now to meet the growing interest with an increased effort at dissemination of information.
[…]
3. What is life energy and how is it related to cosmic energy?
The existence of a specific kind of energy which directs and maintains life has been theoretically assumed for a long time by many natural philosophers and scientists. Wilhelm Reich succeeded in connecting known facts and in finding new facts which he coordinated with the known facts in such a manner that the existence of a specific life energy became concretely demonstrable, usable, and measurable. Orgone energy is the name given by Wilhelm Reich to this specific life energy within the living organism. The existence of orgone energy outside the living organism, in the atmosphere, was also demonstrated. The inner (life-) energy derives from the outer orgone energy in the atmosphere. This is quite logical, since nothing can exist within the living organism that did not previously exist in the environment of the living organism.
4. What are, concretely, the facts which prove the existence of such a universal life force?
In order to comprehend the many known facts and phenomena as related to the existence of a specific life energy, it is necessary to abandon several misconceptions in scientific thinking.
The Orgone Energy Envelope of the Earth
Probably everybody has seen the wavelike quivering and flickering of the atmosphere on the ground, above mountain tops, on roads, lakes, on the ocean, etc. These wavelike phenomena are commonly called “heat waves.” However, they have nothing to do with “heat.” Heat itself is a subjective feeling, and not energy or an objective fact. Objective is only the expansion of quicksilver in a thermometer. Heated air ascends; the waves visible on mountain tops do not ascend, but move on clear days front West to East, in the direction of the rotation of the earth. They move faster than the globe; otherwise, they could not be seen moving at all. If these waves were “hear,” they should always be visible on “hot” days and should disappear on “cold” days. This is not the case: One can see the “heat waves” on high mountain tops and through telescopes even at 300 below zero; and one can see them disappear on hot summer days shortly before heavy rain or thunderstorms. Therefore, these waves have nothing to do with “heat.” “Something” is moving from West to East in a wavy manner; it cannot be air, since air is not visible; one cannot see a gust of wind move, even if it has a speed of 60 miles per hour. Furthermore, these waves usually move from West to East, while the wind may blow from any direction. It is more likely that winds and storms in the atmosphere arc results of shifts in atmospheric energy rather than the other way around. The “heat waves” of the weather man are the same thing as the
Device for visual observations of orgone energy.
“Bad Seeing”
of the astronomer. Astronomers suffer greatly in their observations of stars from what they call “bad seeing.” The required sharpness of the stars is greatly disturbed by the wavy flimmering and movement in the atmosphere. Recently attempts have been made to eliminate this bad seeing. It is the manifestation of exactly what orgonomy studies and uses as “atmospheric orgone energy.”
Arrangement for measurement of orgonotic temperature difference, used in daily measurement of atmospheric tension.
“Static”
In electrophysics the atmospheric energy is referred to as “static.” Every radio listener knows the crackling noises heard on the radio, especially before and during stormy weather. He dislikes the shock he gets at times if he touches metal on his car on dry days. The flier knows the static charges at the tips of his plane wings very well and fears them. Devices have been invented to eliminate these charges on airplanes. Now, while it is well known that the air is full of “static” and that a single bolt of lightning discharges millions of volts of energy, it is at the same time assumed that the air is free of electricity: Otherwise it would not and could not be a good insulator for electricity, a fact well-known to every electrician. How can the air at the same time be full of energy and free of energy? This is impossible in terms of electricity. It is not only possible but necessary to assume that “static” is not the same energy as the one we obtain by moving wires in magnetic fields, the so-called galvanic electricity, “static” is one OF THE MANIFESTATIONS OF THE ATMOSPHERIC ORGONE ENERGY. This energy eluded electrical science heretofore because it is not electricity. It follows entirely different laws than electricity. It is somehow, no one knows how to this day, the source of all electrical and magnetic energy.
The Blueness of the Sky
BLUE IS THE SPECIFIC COLOR OF ORGONE ENERGY WITHIN AND WITHOUT the organism. Classical physics tries to explain the blueness of the sky by the scattering of the blue and of the spectral color series in the gaseous atmosphere. However, it is a fact that blue is the color seen in all functions which are related to the cosmic or atmospheric or organismic orgone energy:
Protoplasm of any kind, in every cell or bacterium is blue. It is generally mistaken as “refraction” of light which is wrong, since the same cell under the same conditions of light loses its blueness when it dies.
Thunder clouds are deeply blue, due to high orgone charges contained in the suspended masses of water.
A completely darkened room, if lined with iron sheet metal (the so-called “Orgone Room”), is not black, i.e., free of any light, but bluish or bluish-gray. Orgone energy luminates spontaneously; it is “luminescent.”
Water in deep lakes and in the ocean is blue.
The color of luminating, decaying wood is blue; so are the luminating tail ends of glowworms, St. Elmo’s fire, and the aurora borealis.
The lumination in evacuated tubes charged with orgone energy is blue. (Cf. photo on the home page of this site.)
The metal-lined orgone energy dark room at orgonon.
Change of Form
In its naturally given condition or seen in the darkened orgone energy room, orgone energy is patterned like slow-moving fog, i.e., more or less evenly dispersed, with ever-changing, thread-like concentrations. If excited in any way, e.g., by the presence of living organisms or electromagnetic energy, the concentrations increase in density and speed; they appear in the completely darkened room as heavy streaks changing further into bright, fast-moving, yellowish sparks.
Universality
There is no known way of delineating orgone energy, of separating a certain amount from the rest of- the cosmic orgone energy ocean. Or gone energy penetrates everything at different speeds. It is present everywhere, different only in density or concentration. Orgone energy accumulators operate everywhere.
Absorption and Reflection
Matter which is a good insulator for electrical energy, or, what amounts to the same thing, is a poor electrical conductor, is a good absorber of orgone energy; on the other hand, metallic matter does not hold orgone energy but repels it rapidly after attraction. This can be demonstrated by certain experimental set-ups.
The qualities of the atmospheric orgone energy just described— universality, absorption by non-metallic and reflection by metallic matter—are the basic principles on which rests the construction of the orgone energy accumulator.
The first 20-fold orgone energy accumulator ever built.
