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Scientists discover things either by making plans for experiments and then following them doggedly, or by pursuing the implications of unexpected events or findings. It was in the latter way that Michael Faraday made one of his most important discoveries in the field of electricity. Dr. Posin discusses the men preceding Faraday, who had worked with electricity -- Volta, Benjamin Franklin, the Danish scientist HC Oersted (1777-1851) -- and the discoveries each made. He then turns to the work, and some pictures and models of the apparatus, for which Faraday is best known. In particular, he demonstrates the experiment by which Faraday proved that magnetism can produce electricity. He also performs an experiment with electrically charged fish like the electric eel or the Gymnotus.
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