The Heart Is Not a Pump #1

By Atom Bergstrom

Atom’s Blog

The Chinese knew the difference between the Heart Meridian and the Circulation-Sex/Pericardium Meridian.

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M.J. Rodermund, M.D. (“Does the Heart Circulate the Blood? A Startling View as to the Power that Circulates the Blood Throughout the Body,” 1909) wrote …

“The accepted doctrine that the heart is a pump and by its muscular contraction of the arteries propels the blood throughout the body is erroneous, absurd and an absolutely physical impossibility.

“The human body has often been likened to a machine, but in reality it is a machine shop, full of machines, each one of these machines having a particular duty to perform. All of the machines in this human machine shop are kept in running order and linked together so as to run by one center, by one power or source.

“To oppose a doctrine that has been one of the main pillars of physiology, one which has been advocated and promulgated by illustrious men for centuries past, may seem to be presumptuous, and theories so advanced have always been and, as medical history will show, have nearly always met strong opposition until the question of fact involved has been forced to be accepted by the medical profession by strong public sentiment. This is a lasting and disgraceful monument the profession has erected for themselves.

“The function of the heart, of propelling the blood, is to regulate, to distribute it to the arteries as demanded, and not to circulate the blood; otherwise, its function would be chaos instead of performing its steady life work just as the regulator of an engine regulates its motion; although a careful engineer will keep an extra reserve of steam that he can turn on at will. The machine works with the same evenness, unless the steam gets below its needed amount, then the whole machinery begins to slacken. So with the human system; a good supply of reserve energy should be kept on hand which, if allowed to go below par or its actual need, will give a sluggish action to the human machine, when obstruction, or in other words, disease will be apt to follow.

“Breathing is the source of all circulation, whether it be in animal life or vegetable life. In man and animals breathing is performed through the lungs, excepting fish, which breathe through the gills. All forms of vegetable life breathe through their leaves, the circulation fluid (sap) being carried from rootlet to bud with just as much certainty, and no doubt with much more force, than it takes to circulate the blood in a human being. But the plant has no heart. So are there other fluids in the body that need more force to circulate them than the blood requires, yet they have no heart, as lymphatic and glandular systems.

“The experiments to prove that the oxygen from the air is the element which makes it possible for the blood to circulate are made in the following manner:

“Take a large animal, weighing about three to seven hundred pounds, first giving the animal an anesthetic, then laying bare and open to examination the large blood vessels and their main branches leading from the heart to the end of the toes, hanging the animal up by the hind legs, then ligating both of the blood vessels that bring blood to and fro from the heart. This completely cuts off the heart from the circulation of the blood below the diaphragm, and the result is that immediately all of the arteries are empty, the blood flowing straight upwards for four or five feet through the fine network of capillaries.

“This certainly would be impossible if the heart had the control, or anything to do with the circulation of the blood. This demonstration proves beyond a question of doubt that the heart does not circulate the blood, but it does not prove what does circulate the blood.

“The animal is taken down and placed upon a table, the arteries being completely empty. I then proceed to transfer the blood from the veins, completely filling the arteries with this venous blood. The blood now fails to circulate, no matter how much force is used. This experiment demonstrates that the muscles of the arteries do not assist in circulating the blood, as is now claimed.

“The fine network of the capillaries between the veins and arteries is very complicated, but under the microscope the blood corpuscles can be seen to pass in and out through these minute vessels Yet these minute blood corpuscles seem to know their business and keep on nourishing the body, whether we understand their exact business methods or not. This process of the blood going on in the capillaries is a wonderful piece of nature’s handiwork, and some day may be better understood. For practical purposes, however, it is of little importance; but that the blood cannot circulate in the body without attractive or electrical force, is of great importance. By emptying the arteries of the venous blood with which I had filled them, and by removing my ligature near the heart, the arterial blood continues its normal flow from the lungs through the heart, and the circulation is again complete. When I compelled the animal to breathe impure air (artificially), the circulation of the blood would become less forcible and sluggish. It also became darker. This is due to impurities (carbon dioxide) retained in the blood, and the lack of sufficient oxygen.

“Yet, I will prove to the reader that, when I explain what I deem a much more important discovery, that these impurities were not taken into the blood from the impure air, but that the breathing of impure air containing poor quality or quantity of oxygen causes the retention of the impurities in the blood that are eliminated by the lungs and other organs when breathing air of good quality.

“These experiments positively refute the assumption made by physiologists that the heart and muscular contraction of the arteries cause the blood to circulate in the body. They also prove that the circulation of the blood is governed by the law of attraction, affinity, electricity, or call it what you will.

“I will give a few inductive reasons, and show how nicely they harmonize with the above demonstration, but have hitherto been unexplainable. Take, for instance, the fetal circulation before any real heart exists, and especially the circulation from the placenta (afterbirth) to the child in utero. In fact, it was the observation of the fetal circulation which gave me my first thought, and it was the nucleus which formed for me the theory that the circulation was caused by an electric or attractive force.

“Then we have the fluids circulating through the glandular and lymphatic systems without a heart.

“Another example is the sap circulating in a tree which has no heart to pump it.

“It proves why we feel so loggy and sluggish in muggy and hot weather, and immediately begin to feel brisk and exhilarated in a cool breeze. This is due to the difference between the quality and the quantity of oxygen of the air per volume, the result of the expansion and contraction of the air by heat and cold.

(To Be Continued)
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