“The sun projects charged particles constituting an electric current which passes through a conducting stratum of the atmosphere approximately [6.214 miles] thick enveloping the earth. This is a transmission of energy exactly as I illustrated in my experimental lectures in which one end of a wire is connected to an electric generator of high potential, its other end being free. In this case the generator is represented by the sun and the wire by the conducting air. The passage of the solar current involves the transference of electric charges from particle to particle with the speed of light, thus resulting in the production of extremely short and penetrating waves. As the air stratum mentioned is the source of the waves it follows that the so-called cosmic rays observed at great altitudes must increase as this stratum is approached. My researches and calculations have brought to light the following facts in this connection: (1) the intensity of the so-called cosmic rays must be greatest in the zenithal portion of atmosphere; (2) the intensity should increase more and more rapidly up to an elevation of about 20 kilometers where the conducting air stratum begins; (3) from there on the intensity should fall, first slowly and then more rapidly, to an insignificant value at an altitude of about 30 kilometers; (4) the display of high potential must occur on the free end of the terrestrial wire, that is to say, on the side turned away from the sun. The current from the latter is supplied at a pressure of about 216 billion volts and there is a difference of 2 billion volts between the illuminated and the dark side of the globe. The energy of this current is so great that it readily accounts for the aurora and other phenomena observed in the atmosphere and at the earth’s surface.”

“For our existence and comfort we require heat, light and mechanical power.  How do we now get all these? We get them from fuel, we get them by consuming material. What will man do when the forests disappear, when the coal fields are exhausted? Only one thing according to our present knowledge will remain; that is, to transmit power at great distances. Men will go to the waterfalls, to the tides, which are the stores of an infinitesimal part of Nature’s immeasurable energy. There will they harness the energy and transmit the same to their settlements, to warm their homes by, to give them light, and to keep their obedient slaves, the machines, toiling. But how will they transmit this energy if not by electricity? Judge then, if the comfort, nay, the very existence, of man will not depend on electricity. I am aware that this view is not that of a practical engineer, but neither is it that of an illusionist, for it is certain, that power transmission, which at present is merely a stimulus to enterprise, will some day be a dire necessity.”

Were we to seize and eliminate from our industrial world the result of Mr. Tesla‘s work, the wheels of industry would cease to turn, our electric cars and trains would stop, our towns would be dark, and our mills would be idle and dead. His name marks an epoch in the advance of electrical science.

Electrical science is now so far advanced that our ability of flashing a signal to a planet is experimentally demonstrated. The question is, when will humanity witness that great triumph. This is easily answered. The moment we obtain absolute evidences that an intelligent effort is being made in some other world to this effect, interplanetary transmission of intelligence can be considered an accomplished fact. A primitive understanding can be reached quickly without difficulty. A complete exchange of ideas is a greater problem, but susceptible of solution.

Ha ha now that I have a keyboard for this thing I can ramble on...