328
The Body Electric
leading to our extinction before we're even aware of them.
All life pulsates in time to the earth, and our artificial fields cause
abnormal reactions in all organisms. Magnetic reversals may have pro-
duced the "great dyings" of the past by disrupting biocycles so as to
cause stress, sterility, birth defects, malignancies, and impaired brain
function. Human activities may well have duplicated in three decades
what otherwise would have taken five thousand years to develop during
the next reversal. What will we do if the incidence of deformed children
rises to 50 percent, if the cancer rate climbs to 75 percent? Will we be
able to pull the plug?
Somehow these dangers must be brought into the open so forcefully
that the entire population of the world is made aware of them. Scientists
must begin to ask and seek answers to the questions raised in this chap-
ter, regardless of the effect on their careers. These energies are too dan-
gerous to be entrusted forever to politicians, military leaders, and their
lapdog researchers.
Since our civilization is irreversibly dependent on electronics, aboli-
tion of EMR is out of the question. However, as a first step toward
averting disaster, we must halt the introduction of new sources of elec-
tromagnetic energy while we investigate the biohazards of those we al-
ready have with a completeness and honesty that have so far been in
short supply. New sources must be allowed only after their risks have
been evaluated on the basis of the knowledge acquired in such a mor-
atorium.
With an adequately funded research program, the moratorium need
las
t
no
mo
re
than
f
ive
yea
rs
,
and
the ensuing changes could almost cer-
tainly be performed without major economic trauma. It seems possible
that a different power frequency—say 400 hertz instead of 60—might
prove much safer. Burying power lines and providing them with
grounded shields would reduce the electric fields around them, and mag-
netic shielding is also feasible.
A major part of the safety changes would consist of energy-efficiency
reforms that would benefit the economy in the long run. These new
directions would have been taken years ago but for the opposition of
power companies concerned with their short-term profits, and a govern-
ment unwilling to challenge them. It is possible to redesign many ap-
pliances and communications devices so they use far less energy. The
entire power supply could be decentralized by feeding electricity from
renewable sources (wind, flowing water, sunlight, georhermal and ocean
thermal energy conversion, and so forth) into local distribution nets.
This would greatly decrease hazards by reducing the voltages and