Excerpt from Wizard: Nikola Tesla - The Life and Times of a Genius: Mach's experiments in Wave Mechanics

Submitted by esaruoho on March 24, 2011 - 23:16

...in retrospect, it appears obvious that Stumpf's opposition did not stop Tesla from studying Mach's experiments in wave mechanics. Born in Moravia (now the Czech Republic) in 1838, Mach graduated from the University of Vienna in 1860. By 1864 he was a full professor at Graz, and by 1867 he was head of the department of experimental physics at Prague, with four books and sixty-two articles to his credit. Influenced by the research in psychophysics of Fechner in Graz and Ludwig von Helmholtz in Berlin, Mach studied the workings ofthe human eye, along with his Prague colleague "famed physiologist and philosopher" Jan Purkyne. Both the eye and ear collected information from the outside world, analyzed it, and transferred it, via electrical impulses in the nerves, to the respective processing centers in the brain. This traditional line of research had been taken by many other well-known scientists, including Isaac Newton, Johann von Goethe, and Herbert Spencer, all favorites of Tesla's.
In his laboratory, Mach had constructed a "famous instrument known as a wave machine. This device could make progressive [and standing] longitudinal [and] transverse waves..." Mach could display a number of mechanical effects with these acoustic waves and "demonstrate the analogy between acoustic and electromagnetic events." By this means, the "mechanical theory of the ether" could also be demonstrated.
By studying acoustical-wave motion in association with mechanical, electrical, and optical phenomena, Mach discovered that when the speed of sound was achieved, the nature of an air flow over an object changed dramatically. This threshold value became known as Mach I.
Mach also wrote on the structure of the ether and hypothesized that it was inherently linked to a gravitational attraction between all masses in the universe. Influenced overtly by Buddhist writings, which no doubt filtered down to esoteric discussions by the university students, Mach could hypothesize that no event in the universe was separate from any other. "The inertia of a system is reduced to a functional relationship between the system and the rest of the universe." This viewpoint was extended to the relationship of mental events to exterior influences. Like Stumpf, he agreed that every mental event had to have a corresponding physical action.
Since Mach's writings so closely parallel Tesla's later research and philosophical outlook, Mach seems a curious omission from Tesla's published writings.

Page 19 From Wizard- Nikola Tesla - the life and times of a genius

MERLib supports

MERLib supports the Wilhelm Reich Museum / Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust through using GoodSearch / GoodShop to gather money for this non-profit-organization. In addition to running the physical museum, they are in charge of producing two full-length documentaries on Wilhelm Reich, are working on a book which will have the 1947-1957 letters, diaries and scientific studies of Wilhelm Reich, so we will better be able to comprehend the latter decade of Wilhelm Reich's life. A Biopic and a full-length documentary would be beneficial at clearing the name of Wilhelm Reich after the travesties of "W.R. - Mysteries of The Organism", and the scant footage available on Wilhelm Reich or his devices. If you know there is something to Wilhelm Reich's orgone discoveries, his orgone accumulator, orgone shooter, orgone blanket, and orgone cloud-busting devices, if you find that there should be more information on the atmospheric orgone motor, and the human orgone-energy running motor, conditioned vacuum-tubes which respond to orgone.. if you believe orgone plays a part in the nuclear energy and preservation of nature question, then please start using GoodSearch from now on and point all of your search-"income" to the "Wilhelm Reich Infant Trust Foundation". As of September 2008, 17$ has accumulated by a few persons using it. That is 0.01$ per search and use. If you use eBay via GoodSearch (GoodShop), a larger percentage will be donated to the trust. The Wilhelm Reich Museum are attempting to collect over 200,000$ for the singular production of two of these films, they also require time and funds for the research, translation and compilation purposes of the 1947-1957 followup to "American Odyssey", a previous Wilhelm Reich study compilation which featured his encounters at explaining Orgone energy to Albert Einstein. And also, they now require funding for a new roof.