Baron Doctor (Or possibly Doctor Baron) Karl Ludwig Freiherr von Reichenbach thought he had discovered an basic force in nature, which he dubbed the “od.” But the best evidence shows that rather than this being a groundbreaking advancement, this was instead an instance of a revered scientist wasting his years by becoming fixated on an idea that only he can validate.

Reichenbach had made numerous contributions prior to becoming fixated on his subjects, which he called “sensitives,” and their claims that they perceived things that others were unable to. He spent his last three decades researching and defended his discovery of this unknown physical force, detectable only by him. When his subjects failed in their tests to, say, detect positive currents from negative ones, von Reichenbach retorted with an ad hoc claim that a known current was impacting the “odic” one and confusing the sensitives. There was no way to test this claim.

That the baron doctor thought his odic force explained dozens of unrelated items, while never backing any of this with a controlled study, speaks to egomaniacal thinking. He insisted the odic force ran through everything, yet no machine detected it. Only sensitive people, that is to say those so labeled by von Reichenbach, could do so. In a precursor to Feng Shui nonsense, he suggested buildings face a certain direction to gain odic benefit. Similarly, Southern hemisphere sleepers were advised to lie on their left side, while northerners do the opposite.

While conducting what passed for an experiment, the Baron adhered to a diet and rest regimen and ensured that he never touched metal. At the end of the day, he touched the subject’s hand, while he or she noted when they detected odic force movement. This was not a scientific study and certainly not of the double blind variety. There were no controls, no stated guidelines, and no way of confirming this.

Still, believers insisted the force emanated as aura, yet only they could see it. Scientists of the time almost uniformly rejected the concept, owing to the lack of data and use of established protocols.