Odic force

However, they regarded the Odic force as not associated with breath (like India's prana and the qi of Chinese martial arts) but rather mainly with biological electromagnetic fields.

Baron von Reichenbach expounded the concept of Odic force in detail in a book-length article, Researches on Magnetism, Electricity, Heat and Light in their Relations to Vital Forces, which appeared in a special issue of a respected scientific journal, Annalen der Chemie und Physik.

In Britain, impetus was given to this view of the subject following the translation of Reichenbach's Researches by William Gregory, professor of chemistry at the University of Edinburgh.

[7][8] The French parapsychologists Hippolyte Baraduc and Albert de Rochas were influenced by the concept of the Odic force.

That he came to think that the odic force could explain dozens of disparate phenomena, while being unable to convince other scientists that he had discovered anything, signifies the pathological nature of his investigations.

In western popular culture the name is used in a similar way to qi or prana to refer to spiritual energies or the vital force associated with living things.