Oschman, James L. Energy Medicine in Therapeutics and Human Performance

According to Oschman, contributions from quantum physics explain that the energies of the body are subtle, instantaneous, and highly efficient in regulation and healing at the cellular level. The body is best understood as a living crystal, which can semiconduct energy, translate physical energy (such as touch) to piezoelectricity, and maintain coherence and continuity. Given our evolutionary heritage, we can sense from healers their intention, empathy, and healing energy. Our bodies heal themselves with energy provided by both standard and nonstandard medicine.

Commentary While some of the text is highly technical, this is a groundbreaking and prophetic book that expands our sense of what medicine is, well beyond the scalpels of surgery and the drugs of internal medicine. Oschman believes that all medicine, including contemporary high-tech medicine, is energy medicine, even including ancient shamanic practices and recent "alternative" medicines, which he sees not as alternative but as complementary.

While shamans, reflexologists, and others have not had scientific theories to explain their powers, they have experienced in their patients (and in themselves) a wide range of healing. Now comes Oschman's theoretical framework, from the cellular level "up" through organisms and even social groups, combined with quantum physics, which gives a coherent and scientifically testable set of hypotheses that makes a grand synthesis between standard and nonstandard medicines.

Oschman has read widely in speculative approaches and has a gift for synthesizing theories and observed phenomena in scientific labs. As of this writing, he is a popular speaker at conferences and massage schools. It seems likely that his thinking will be pivotal as medicine moves from some of its more positivistic tenets to a post-Einsteinian basis that is much more inclusive of a wide range of healing techniques.