Orgone & Plant Growth

Orgone is a term created by Wilhelm Reich. He was the founder of somatic psychology and a psychoanalyst. Orgone is a life force or energy that Reich believed came out of the body. He attributed it to the pleasurable sensations one gets when they are not repressed. He believed this life force has a beneficial effect on organisms, including plants.

What is Orgone?

Reich believed orgone is an energy that comes from bions. Bions are supposedly balls of energy that emit radiation. He said objects that are near bions become highly charged. Orgone is made up of these bions and form a life energy around every living organism. Reich believed in the energy source and its beneficial effects so much he developed an orgone energy accumulator that was meant to produce concentrated orgone energy. He thought that orgone could cure a variety of ailments, including cancer.

How Orgone Works

Reich conducted experiments which he sadi showed that orgone from an orgone accumulator, or ORAC, slowed the discharge of static electricity from an organism, elevated temperature, accelerated plant growth and healed animals and people. Inside an orgone accumulator, excess orgone from the atmosphere is harvested and stored. The energy may be absorbed by the skin or in the case of plants, leaves. Energy is like fuel and makes cells divide and grow. This is what happens in exposure to orgone, Reich and his followers said. It fuels the growth and health of a person or a plant.

Orgone and Plants

It stands to reason that someone who believes in the life force called orgone and its health benefits would attempt to use it on plants. A plant may simply be placed inside an orgone accumulator and grow faster. Reich did numerous experiments on plants. He observed the vesicles in grass tissue, swelling in response to exposure from orgone. He also worked with mosses and believed he observed a change from inert plant material to living motile animal tissue.

Orgone Experiments

Several academics have continued Reich's experiments with orgone. Seeds were exposed to orgone for one hour in one experiment done by a university agronomist and showed an increase in yield by 50 percent. The agronomist also tried exposing them for 10 hours, but yield was only increased by 23 percent. Reich experimented with a machine called the "cloud buster," which supposedly altered the weather using orgone technology. If such a thing were possible, plant growth could accelerate exponentially due to superior heat and moisture conditions.

Potential Uses

If orgone were scientifically found to increase budding, fruiting and yields of food plants, its use could potentially end world hunger. Plants would be able to produce more and therefore feed more people. Genetic manipulation is a practice that concerns many consumers. Orgone doesn't add any chemicals or change the DNA of an organism which could make it theoretically safer than genetic manipulation. Orgone energy can be taken from anything that can be made to swell and break down, including sand, coal and soil. This increases the availability of the beneficial effects of orgone to plants.