Can you sing?

There is an old joke - when asked 'can you sing?' the answer being 'no, but I hum a bit in the summer'. But are we all singing along with the natural frequency of the Earth. For decades, thousands of people worldwide have reported an elusive low frequency buzzing noise that has become known as 'The Hum'.

Some people think think their ears are faulty. However, it has been generally accepted that the hum exists, but the source of the sound is unknown or varied.   There have been suggestions that it could be radiation from power lines. As you might expect the conspiracy theorists think sinister forces could be at work. Most victims of the hum, claim only to hear the noise at a specific locations.  The hum is a phenomenon that has been reported in towns and cities across the world from the UK to New Zealand.

In Britain, the most famous example was the so-called "Bristol Hum" that made headlines in the late 1970s. The problem persisted for years. Experts eventually found traffic and factories were to blame. Various other features of modern life have been blamed, mobile phone masts, wind farms, nuclear waste, low-frequency submarine communications, secret military activity, even alien contact. It could be said that the internet is humming with speculation. 

Being a Radio Amateur, I can remember a time when some high frequency amateur bands were made almost unusable by the “woodpecker” a high frequency pulsing signal that started in the late 70's. Which back then was reputed to be over the horizon radar. Very low frequency communications are also known to be used to contact submerged submarines. There are also a number of spot frequencies in various parts of the radio spectrum which are known to be useful for underground communications.  I suspect that what is being heard/felt/detected is some sort of very low frequency communication system. 

The Earth itself has a pulse - In 1953, Professor Schumann of the University of Munich was teaching his students about the physics of electricity when they discovered that the Earth’s produces very specific pulsations. In 1954, measurements taken by Schumann and Dr. Herbert König, who later became Schumann’s successor, confirmed an Earth frequency of 7.83 Hz. In the years to follow, investigators worldwide began to research what had been dubbed 'Schumann Resonances.'

Dr König compared human EEG recordings with natural electromagnetic fields of the environment. Eureka! They discovered that indeed there was a correlation between Schumann Resonance and brain rhythms. This relationship between earth frequency and brain waves was then studied by researchers around the world. Dr König carried out further measurements of Schumann resonance and eventually arrived at a frequency of exactly 7.83 Hz, which is even more interesting, as this frequency is one which applies to mammals. For instance, septal driving of the hippocampal rhythm in rats has been found to have a minimum threshold at 7.7 Hz 

Dr Wolfgang Ludwig, a foremost researcher on this topic, has been investigating Schumann Resonance and the man/nature connection for many years while writing his thesis on Schumann Resonance. His goal was to determine what frequencies are present in a healthy environment. Ludwig discovered that while the Earth vibration could be clearly measured in nature and on the ocean, it was almost impossible to measure the earth’s pulse in the city, where man made signals drown out the natural signals that nature has created for eons.

Professor Wever from the Max Planck Institute for Behavioural Physiology. Built an underground bunker which completely screened out magnetic fields. Student volunteers lived there for four weeks in this hermetically sealed environment. Professor Wever noted that the student's circadian rhythms diverged and that they suffered emotional distress and migraine headaches. As they were young and healthy, no serious health conditions arose, which would not have been the case with older people or people with a compromised immune system. After only a brief exposure to 7.8 Hz (the very frequency which had been screened out), the volunteers health stabilized again.

Electrical engineer Lewis B. Hainsworth, MA, was among the first to suggest that human health is linked with geophysical parameters by way of the naturally occurring Schumann's ELF. His hypothesis identified naturally occurring features which determine the frequency spectrum of human brain-wave rhythms. The frequencies of naturally occurring electromagnetic signals, circulating in the electrically resonant cavity bounded by the Earth and the ionosphere, have governed or determined the 'evolution' or development of the frequencies of operation of the principal human brain-wave signals. In particular, the alpha rhythm is so placed that it can in no circumstances suffer an extensive interference from naturally occurring signals.

Research in Biophysics seems to suggest, that our biological system is "tuned into" the background frequency of our planet - the `Schumann Resonance'- a steady pulse of 7.83 Hz which beats around the planet within the earth/ionosphere cavity. Living beings evolved in this natural electromagnetic environment and came to live in harmony with it. Since life began, the Earth has been surrounding all living things with this natural frequency pulsation. 

There is some concern that the wide spectrum of artificial man-made EMF radiation masks the natural beneficial frequency of the Earth. Electro-pollution may cause us to feel more stressed, fatigued and "out of balance." Any adverse effects of exposure would arise slowly over a long period of time. Fortunately, public awareness of EMF is also growing. Which brings me around to a positive effect from spending time on and in a narrowboat. Although we have electrical items aboard that can create various magnetic fields, such as pumps. For long periods such items are not in use. Neither are they in use for extended periods. There is a secondary effect that the shell of the boat creates a Faraday Cage. 

A Faraday cage is an enclosure formed by conducting material. Such an enclosure blocks external static and non-static electric fields by channelling electricity through the shield providing constant voltage on all sides of the enclosure. Since the difference in voltage is the measure of electrical potential, no current flows through the space. A Faraday cage operates because an external static electrical field causes the electric charges within the cage's conducting material to be distributed such that they cancel the field's effect in the cage's interior. This phenomenon is used, for example, to protect electronic equipment from lightning strikes and electrostatic discharges.

Faraday cages cannot block slowly varying magnetic fields, such as the Earth's magnetic field, for instance a compass will still work inside. To a large degree, though, they shield the interior from much of the external man made electromagnetic radiation. The reception or transmission of radio waves (a form of electromagnetic radiation) to or from an antenna within a Faraday cage is heavily attenuated or blocked by the cage. As part of my hobby in Amateur Radio the walls of my 'Radio Shack' were constructed using an internal shield  constructed of fine mesh chicken wire. This had the effect of creating an electromagnetic quiet room, where only radio signals from the various antenna could enter.  The  antenna were located as far away from sources of interference as possible and tuned to reject out of band signals.

So there may be some additional health benefits from owning and spending time on a metal hulled vessel.  As well as the more usual, relaxing, stress free environment provided by the inland waterways. Well until the next boat passes at speed, you come into conflict with high speed cyclists or someone wants to discuss cassette -v- pumpout!