---
title: Persinger's Magnetic Field Hypothesis
date: 2011-01-01
techne: :done
episteme: :believed
---

Normally, I'd do an introduction who [Michael Persinger][] is, but I'm not in the mood, so let's just say that he is a (awesome!) mind researcher who developed the infamous God Helmet, which induces just the right kind of magnetic field around a brain to trigger, in most people, a sense of wonder and presence of somebody invisible being with them in the room, and in few, a full-blown religious experience. Also, there's his great lecture on drugs:

<%= google_video "http://video.google.com/googleplayer.swf?docid=4292093832329014323" %>

So, the real point. Persinger once hypothesized that small fluctuations in the Earth's magnetic field might cause changes in the temporal lobe, triggering in extreme cases spiritual experiences, and more typically, raising the rate of reported UFO abductions and so on. He suspected that earth quakes would be sufficient to cause these magnetic fluctuations.

Regardless if that is true, there's a more reliable source of magnetic disturbance available - the Sun. Its magnetic field fluctuates quite a bit. You can find the current data on [NOAA's site][NOAA]. The bottom-middle diagram shows the current Kp index, which is just a simple classification how rapidly the field changes right now. &lt;4 means the field is quiet, 4-6 is a normal storm, &gt;6 is huge. Normal storms are enough to disturb international radio transmissions, huge one's might even fry unprepared electronics in orbit. A storm typically lasts about half a day.

So, like any self-respecting empiricist, I decided to test the hypothesis. If Persinger is right, then an index &gt;4  should be enough to trigger a noticeable change in the temporal lobe. My brain is sensitive enough to go in full-on religious experience mode when probed and I strongly suspect that I have mild to normal temporal lobe epilepsy, so I'm the perfect test subject. If *I* don't notice anything, then it must be bullshit.

Of course, I can't just look up the current value and ask myself, "Am I more spiritual today than usual?". Confirmation bias, self-fulfilling prophecies and nastier stuff would wreck my results. So I just subscribed to the official NOAA mailing list and archived the Kp index. I also took an automatic screenshot every 10 minutes so I could later reconstruct what I did that day. I then let two months pass (May and June) without reading any of that mail.

So, what are the **results**? Well, I had 6 very quiet days (Kp index 0), 5 turbulent ones (5-6) and the rest very normal, typically about 1-2. I noticed that on all 6 quiet days, I got almost nothing done and slept a lot. On 4 of the 5 turbulent days, I didn't just feel very spiritual, but read lots of Buddhist literature and had multiple strong insights. The 5th day I played NWN2. (This was the only time the storm happened during the day. The temporal lobe (and matching epileptic seizures) are most active around 0-4 at night, due to hormonal levels.) Of my 7 really productive days during that period, 4 were the turbulent ones and one came after the NWN2 session. Furthermore, I had no really lazy or spiritual day during the rest of the time.

That's... a strong confirmation. I didn't believe my data, so I continued to measure. Another 2 months, similar results. Now another 4 months, similar results (but I did look at the measurements in advance this time). So I guess I'll  have to believe the basic idea now. It's definitely among the crankiest beliefs I have.
