Abstract
IN the third volume of his “Experimental Researches in Electricity” Faraday returns again and yet again to the discussion of lines of magnetic force and of their physical existence. The first paper in the volume bears the suggestive title, “On the Magnetisation of Light and the Illumination of Magnetic Lines of Force.” He defines the latter by saying: “By line of magnetic force, or magnetic line of force, or magnetic curve, I mean that exercise of magnetic force which is exerted in the lines usually called magnetic curves, and which equally exist as passing from or to magnetic poles, or forming concentric circles round an electric current.” He then goes on to describe his discovery of the magnetic rotation of the plane of polarisation, a phenomenon which Lord Kelvin regarded as a demonstration of the reality of Ampere's explanation of the ultimate nature of magnetism. In the celebrated letter to Richard Phillips, published in the Philosophical Magazine for May, 1846, under the title, “Thoughts on Ray-vibrations,” Faraday writes:—
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ALLEN, H. Faraday and the Quantum. Nature 108, 341–342 (1921). https://doi.org/10.1038/108341a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/108341a0