A Short History of Digitalization - II
The Divine Power
A SHORT HISTORY OF DIGITALISATION
2 – THE DIVINE POWER
It is easy to understand why, in the 18th century, people considered electricity as a divine force. This belief had far-reaching effects: Abbé Nollet was among the first to suggest using electric shocks to treat the sick. Electricity was regarded as a vital life force – after all, small animals like sparrows and rabbits could be killed by electric shocks and then revived. A magician born to a Forester near Constance achieved true mastery of this new energy. He made his fortune in Vienna and, after several scandals, moved to Paris in 1778: Franz Anton Mesmer. Having initially treated his patients with electricity and mineral magnets, he soon realized that the »shock« effect happened even when electricity and magnets were not directly applied to each individual. The discovery of this apparent placebo effect led Mesmer to hypothesize the existence of a phenomenon known as the so-called animal magnetism. He built an apparatus with a wooden tub filled with water and iron filings, around which up to twenty metal stirrups were arranged in a circle. Usually, his patients would sit around this apparatus and press the part of their body they hoped to heal against the metal stirrup. Additionally, a small rope was placed next to each bracket, allowing patients to connect themselves to the device, which was meant to enhance the effect. To create an »electric circuit,« the patients held each other’s hands.
Mesmer’s machine was clearly modeled on the Leyden jar – even if it was entirely useless as a medical device. Nevertheless, the séances were highly suggestive. While waiting for the master to appear, patients lost themselves in the sounds of a glass harmonica, their mirrored reflections, or the astrological signs decorating the opulent room, which was darkened by heavy curtains. Eventually, the miracle healer Franz Anton Mesmer entered the room and, with a fixed gaze or a touch, caused the patients to burst into hysterical laughter, dramatic convulsions, or infectious nausea. If a patient lost composure, they were led by an assistant into a soundproof crisis room. In Mesmer’s séances, free-floating spiritualism, eroticism, and group psychology became a highly contagious social phenomenon. At the peak of his career, around 6,000 unauthorized Mesmerists were practicing in the greater Paris area alone. As astonishing as all this was, the most remarkable effect was how Mesmer’s cures became a political issue. The Société de I’harmonie universelle [Society for Universal Harmony] he had founded turned into a venue for seditious speeches, which ultimately led to Mesmer’s banishment from France (though this didn’t prevent Queen Marie Antoinette from asking Mesmer to train at least two assistants in his teachings before his forced departure). The idea of releasing blockages in a diseased body and encouraging the free flow of Mesmer’s fluida became a metaphor for political purification: that a sick, factitiously decadent society could only be healed if it was hit by Mesmer’s revolutionary convulsions.
While Mesmer was enjoying his Parisian fame, Luigi Galvani, an Italian researcher, was also observing strange phenomena in his laboratory. In his search for the mysterious vital force, he had been studying all kinds of animals, including birds, fish, and other small creatures. One day, when he wanted to dissect a frog, he put it on a table with an electrifying machine sitting on it and noticed the dead animal’s thighs began twitching when accidentally touched by the dissecting knife – while an assistant observed a spark. A systematic investigation showed that only conductive materials, such as metals, could stimulate the nerve—and only when they were electrified. In contrast, a glass cylinder (even if it contained an electrified substance) had no effect whatsoever. Because Galvani had read about Benjamin Franklin’s proof of the connection between thunderstorms and electricity, he hung his skinned frog legs on the metal balustrade of his balcony during a thunderstorm. Whenever a frog’s legs touched the metal, they started to perform a strange dance. As a systematic scientist, Galvani then carried out a series of experiments (in open air, underwater, and in oil) in which frogs were attached with brass clips and the nerve was touched with a copper wire. These experiments led him—unbeknownst to him, of course—to create a closed circuit: the metals acted as conductors, the salt water in the frog’s leg served as an electrolyte (moving the charge in a specific direction), and the twitching muscle acted as an indicator of the current. Galvani was convinced that his experiments proved the existence of what he called »animal electricity«.
Inspired by his discoveries, a series of strange experiments started. Galvani’s nephew, Giovanni Aldini, was at the forefront of these experiments, conducting them publicly near guillotines where the decapitated heads were brought to him. Aldini inserted wires into the ears of the severed head—and, when electricity was applied, it caused the head to writhe violently. Considering these events, it’s no surprise that British writer Mary Shelley, while staying at Lake Geneva, conceived the idea of Dr. Frankenstein, the new Prometheus who brings a monster to life using body parts and a lightning bolt.
While his sensation-seeking peers still clung to a belief in electrical miracles, another researcher set about transforming the Leiden jar into a permanent energy storage device. In 1800, Alessandro Volta succeeded in creating a battery with his voltaic pile, making a constant supply of energy possible for the first time. After replicating Galvani’s experiments, he concluded that in this situation, the frog wasn’t the source of the miraculous substance but simply acted as a conductor—meaning it could be dispensed with. So, Volta focused his attention on different metals and liquids. In the absence of precise measuring instruments, he primarily relied on his own tongue to investigate the electrifying effect of metals. When the metal touched the tip of his tongue, he experienced a sour taste. When he combined two different metals (such as zinc and silver), a slight electrical discharge occurred, whereas no effect was observed when the metals were connected by a small wire, a phenomenon still known as the Volta effect.
Endowed with a capacity for suffering and a sharp tongue, Volta now set about testing different combinations of metals to see which produced the strongest sparks, with the combination of zinc and silver proving to be the most effective. Volta then stacked zinc and copper plates on top of each other, placing a piece of saltwater-soaked (and later acid-soaked) cardboard between each pair. This setup was similar to Leyden jars, which, according to Nollet, could be linked together to form a battery. Unlike the Leyden jar, which only permitted a single, sudden discharge of current, Volta’s column allowed electricity to flow continuously instead of discharging it all at once in a violent flash.
In any case, the religious dispute between Galvanists and Voltaists was finally resolved as it became clear that the frog wasn’t the source of electricity, but rather the electrical voltage was caused by the potential difference between different metals. This marked the dawn of modern science, which, equipped with the battery, succeeded in systematically breaking down and analysing the different elements. Humphry Davy, who immersed Volta’s column in water, observed that it started to bubble, leading him to conclude that water was composed of different basic elements and that all existing substances were composed of various fundamental elements. Following this strand of history, we reach a gallery of luminaries that includes Michael Faraday, James Clerk Maxwell, and Albert Einstein, whose theory of relativity—and the realisation that what were once considered different substances are, in fact, manifestations of a universal energy—led to significant advances in our understanding of the world.
While we observe how everything in Nature is transformed into energy, we also notice a corresponding movement toward a unifying underlying Universal Code, seen as the concept of a Universal Writing. Just as the gradual discovery of the atomic world is full of twists and turns, so too is this story. With the Voltaic pile making electricity a reliable energy source, various researchers began to seriously consider whether Grey’s »Lines of Communication« could be developed into a functional means of communication.
In fact, people had been thinking about telegraphy even earlier, during the French Revolution, when Claude Chappe built an optical telegraph that could send a message across the country in a matter of minutes. Because such a line, which transmitted messages from hill to hill, required a whole series of manned structures to be maintained, it was clear that an electric telegraph would be far superior.
In 1809, Thomas von Sömmerring created a device that, powered by a voltaic pile, assigned a letter to a specific voltage, which could then be converted back into a letter on the receiving end using a similar device. However, this system was quite complex and only supported one-way transmission, so the proposal wasn’t put into practice. In 1816, English inventor Francis Ronalds developed a working electric telegraph that he presented to the Admiralty; however, they dismissed it as completely superfluous. Their attitude changed with the advent of the railroad, a vehicle that could no longer be overtaken by a horseback rider – creating the urgent need for controlling a departed or runaway train. There was also the risk of two trains colliding in rugged terrain, as exemplified by tunnels; necessitating the need for a suitable early warning system. Here, telegraphy proved to be extremely helpful. Initially, the needle telegraph of Charles Wheatstone and William Fothergill Cooke was used, which was installed alongside the railway line connecting London and West Drayton.
Nevertheless, the most convincing solution was discovered by Samuel Morse – a moderately successful American portrait and art painter who, while crossing the Atlantic on the SS Sully, struck up a conversation with an electricity researcher who was entertaining the passengers with electrical instruments he’d built himself. He expressed the idea that electricity could be used for telegraphy. Morse, enthusiastic about the concept of such a communication medium, quickly transformed his easel, his canvas stretcher, various pieces of scrap metal, and the precious wall clock from his studio into a telegraph, which he demonstrated for the first time on September 4, 1837. The language he used for his prototype was still rather imperfect; a numerical code that required the sender and receiver to consult a bulky dictionary. It was on the suggestion of his assistant Alfred Vail that Morse developed the logic of translating the letters into a binary pattern of long and short signals.
With the help of chemistry professor Leonard Gale and his resourceful assistant, Morse overcame another major technical challenge. The further the electrical signal travelled from the transmitter, the more it was lost in the transmission line noise. To compensate for this, the transmission battery was strengthened, and an electromagnetically operated switch, known as a relay, was installed every 16 kilometres to boost the original signal. This made it possible to bridge the entire American continent, and by 1858, the first transatlantic telegraph cable had been laid across the Atlantic Ocean, opening up the world to telegraphy worldwide and sparking what historians have called the globalisation of the 19th century.
Translated by Hopkins Stanley and Martin Burckhardt
