In ancient Greece, a shepherd boy discovered a strange magnetic stone that attracted his iron-tipped stick without touching it, surprising him. He brought it to the philosopher Thales, who tested it and found it only attracted iron, calling it the "magnetic stone" after the city of Magnesia. Thales also found that rubbed amber attracted light objects at a distance, calling this new force "electric force". This was the earliest recognition of "action-at-a-distance" in Western civilization. It was not until the 16th century that physicist William Gilbert began formally studying magnetism and the origin of the terms "electric" and "electricity".

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ELECTRICAL AAAD
First Encounters with:

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Again in Ancient Greece
In the Western civilization, the
first ‘observation’ (recognition)
of such a remote-action event
happened a long time ago in
ancient Greece in a place close
to the city called Magnesia
near the western coast of
modern Turkey.
GREECE
TURKEY
Magnesia
Abydos
Ephesus
Pergamon
Sardis

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Attractive Stone
About 2,500 years ago in a
mountain, a shepherd boy found
that his iron tipped stick got
lightly attracted to some stone on
the ground.
It surprised him because it was
different from his normal
experience of force which acted
on contact, like a push or pull.
When he tried to touch the stone
with his finger, nothing happens.
It only acted on the iron tip of his
stick.
He went back and told his friends
about this weird stone.
The
magnetic
stone
Iron-tipped
rod

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Magnetic Force
The incident was made known to a
wise man (a philosopher in ancient
Greece) Thales (c 640 - c 546 BC) in a
place called Miletus in the vicinity.
Thales tested a sample of the stone
brought to him and found that it
attracted iron objects and nothing
else.
Thales called the stone the “magnetic
stone” after the name of the city.
This kind of “magnetic force”, as we
call it today, can operate at a distance
without touching the affected object.
This was the earliest time how
“action-at-a-distance” (AAAD) or
“remote action” was made known to
the western civilization.

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Electric Force
With great curiosity, Thales also
tried other materials such as
amber which, when rubbed,
attracted light objects at a
distance.
The force was even stronger if
rubbed with his fingers. It was
different from the action of
magnetic stones which only
acted on iron.
Amber in ancient Greece was
called “electron” and this kind
of new force exerting at a
distance was called “electric
force”.

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Naming the ‘thing’
Not much was heard from this
strange force for nearly two
thousand years. It was not until
1570 that the English physicist
William Gilbert (1544-1603) began
to study the effect of magnets.
William noted that ‘amber’ in
Greek was called ‘electron’, and in
Latin ‘electrum’. He therefore
called all the objects with the
power to attract after being
rubbed ‘electric’.
After 1650, an English
philosopher Walter Charleston
(1619-1707) called it ‘electricity’.
Electron
Electrum
Electric
ELECTRICITY

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THEORIES ABOUT AAAD
To be continued on:
ABCC