The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1903-05-31
THE HUMAN
POWER HOUSE
The Brain of Man is d Power
House.
NERVE CENTERS DYNAM0s
The Eyes May Demand and Get
an Excessive Supply at the
Expense of Other ORGANS.


The brain of man is power house in
which there are many dynamos. Wires
lead out from the dynamos to all parts
and every organ of the body. The vari-
Gus organs and parts of the body are
motors or engines that keep up their
action by the energy they receive over
the wires from the dynamos in the
brain. The food we consume is a fuel
which contains latent energy. Diges-
ton prepares this fuel for admission
into the blood The blood carries it to
the nerve centers, or dynamos, where
much of it is finally burnt up, con-
sumed, and the latent energy, which
held the food together in its fuel form.
is transformed into nerve energy, which
IS conducted by the nerves to every
part of the human plant'-the body.
1t IS quite proper to call the human
body plant, the brain a power house
and the nerve centerS dynam0s; for it
Is in the nerve centers, as in an electric
dynamo. that a transformation of en-
ergy takes place. 1t is here. in the hu-
man dynamo, that the form of energy
known as nerve force first makes its ap-
pearance
OF all organs in the body the eyes
are most capable of demanding and get
ting an exec ssivs share of the general
fund of nerve energy from the human
power house, for the following reasons:
a.. The feeling of vision is the most
acute of all the senses, because it is ac-
lively aroused by one of the most inn
pOndeTable elements known to science
light. BY the impact of its delicate
waves our consciousness is made to feel
shape, motion and color. Light is i'm
ponderable; its rays reflected from va
riOus objects pass through the crenea,
the acqueOUs humOr, the vitreous body,
and there reach the retinal nerves. The
delicacy OF this touch, or impact, on the
retinal nerves is beyond the conception
CT the human mind, yet il establishes
from this point an impulse which is
conveyed to the sight centers at the
base CT the brain, with which nc uncer-
tainty determines form, color, motion,
quantity and space. Here we have the
most positive sense of feeling known to
man, produced by the most imponder-
able agency known to science. It is
through the feelings produced by sight
that in reading a book and looking at
its illustrations. we are enabled to live
in the very atmosphere of the scene
that is depicted. and to drink and sa-
tate ourselves to the fullest extent,
feeling, tasting, smelling and hearing
the various things and surroundings
that the author suggests.
% This work of seeing requiring en-
ergy, is kept up continuously for six
teen out of twenty-four hours, or two
thirds of our entire life
90 The dynames governing the func-
ton of vision are the largest in area of
any in the human brain, and most ex-
tensively distributed.
"a The conductors from the dyna-
mos to the eyes are very large and
capable Of conducting much energy.
90 The distance between the eyes
and their dynamos is short, thus offer
ing little resistance to the transit Of
energy.
For the above reasons. when vision is
being exercised the demand on the COM
mon fund of energy is more imperative
and surer to be responded to than a call
made from smaller, less senitive and
less exercised nerve centers.
Again. it is a physiological fact that
any excess Of nervous expenditure to
one organ over the normal amount is
done at the expense of other organs of
the body.
If anatomical perfection existed in
the eyes and the muscles that move
them. even then vision would be an
important and complicated function;
but anatomical perfection is uncom-
mon if it exists at all.
The vast sensitive area of the brain
is under the command of the modern
eye specialist, so by the aid of glasses
through the eyes he can influence the
work in these various large brain cen
tiers: and as all nerve centers are con-
nected by association fbres, it can be
seen that nerve centers governing other
parts of the body would be Influenced
The time is at hand when the modern
physiological eye specialist can put his
finger on the switchboard of the human
brain. changing the action of its many
dynamos and the functions of the or
gans which they control.
DIR. WILLIAM z. DODD,
Eye Specialist, Kenyon Hotel.