A physiological effect of an alternating magnetic field

Abstract

Down to the present time it has been held by all physicists and by all physiologists that magnetism produces no physiological effect either on the human subject or on any living organism. Many persons have looked for such effects. Lord Lindsay (now the Earl of Crawford), assisted by Mr. Cromwell F. Varley, constructed many years ago an enormous electromagnet, now in the Observatory at Edinburgh, so large that it would admit between its poles the head of any person who wished to test whether was perceived as the result. I have, however, recently succeeded in domonstrating a real physiological effect due to magnetism. Some six years ago, when experimenting with an alternating electro-magnet which had been constructed for showing Prof. Elihu Thomson’s well-known experiments on the repulsion of copper rings, I observed a faint visual effect when my forehead was placed close to the magnet.