Can Humans Sense Magnetic Fields?

Huge thanks to:

Special thanks to Patreon supporters:
Donal Botkin, James M Nicholson, Michael Krugman, Nathan Hansen, Ron Neal, Stan Presolski, Terrance Shepherd

Additional filming by Whitney Clavin

[Eudomac]

Do you just wander into research facilities at universities and go, wassup, what've y'all got for me today"?

[Nighthawkinlight]

I feel a disturbance in the force like a billion dads just cried out: "we've been telling people about the compass in our heads for years!"

[msamberhunter]

While undergoing a brain MRI at Steinberg Diagnostic in Las Vegas I experienced unusual perceptions such as a sharp bank turn and others. Afterwards needing to check my sanity I was assured that, while not common, what I experienced was not uncommon either.
This was certainly induced by the shifting of a powerful magnetic field slicing through each part of my brain. I felt as if I had been moving forward and then sharply banking right and continuing in a different direction entirely.

[joshm]

I once had a friend with an amazing sense of direction. When traveling by car to places neither of us had previously visited, she always gave the correct directions (while I was ready to puzzle over a map). Best navigator I ever had.

[hendersonlamar]

"And you're sure that this isn't just to make people look stupid?"

"No, no, no. That's just a bonus."

[saqibmudabbar]

I love how they are crouching at the entrance explaining neuroscience. 😆

[gordoncouger]

We may have lost the ability to sense magnetic fields from not navigating in ways that needed their use. Very few of us have ever needed that. If there are any Polynesian navigators that navigate the Pacific without instruments still alive it would be interesting to see how they did in the test.

[herbieowen]

I didnt really know what it was before now, but i personally have an incredibly potent sense of direction. In the past i have been in many situations, both on my own and with others, where i am "lost" yet i still have a distinct idea of "this way is back home" and it is always right.

[dreska]

"It's Joe's reclining chair, not used for this purpose but it's very relaxing."

[mr.feghouli]

When you were sleeping in the car as a kid and you could feel that one turn that meant you were home

[fuocogeneroso]

Thanks for showing this.

This is hard to prove, but in the early 2000s with the old bar and flip cellphones I used to be able to sense when the phone was going to ring a half a second before it rang.

It was a very strong and confident sensation.

I became convinced it had to do with the pre-ring handshake the cellphone tower and the cellphone make. Back then stereos weren’t as well EM shielded and you could hear a ticking sound sometimes before the cellphone rang. But I would know even before that or This would also happen if there wasn’t an active speaker around.

However, I stopped getting the sensation after newer phones in the late 2000s started to come out. So, I’m not sure what changed but perhaps it was some kind of subconscious sound related phenomenon after all with the stereos or some EM sensation I perceived, or I just got old haha.

Anyways, I don’t have a way to prove this so purely anecdotal. Thanks for listening.

[bigfoottoo]

I am a Amateur Radio operator. Years ago I was transmitting at around 4 Mhz with 1800 watts into my antenna. Whenever I keyed down, I felt a change in my mind very similar to getting up quickly or a moment of quick movement. It only happen that one time. I figured it was RF messing with the fluid in my inner ear.

[veritasium]

So the most common question seems to be: how do we know the magnetic field isn't creating this result by interacting with the electrodes and wires in the cap? The truth is that *while the magnetic field is changing* there is induction in the cap and you can see this as an orange blob 10:12 - However after the field stops changing, there is no more induction and this is the time when the response is measured for decreases in alpha power.

[jean-pierrecampbell]

What if they check a blind person's reaction to the magnetic fields? Particularly someone born blind.

[angelhelp]

My father had what I always felt was a nearly infallible sense of direction, meaning that he could accurately identify north despite being indoors and following a convoluted path through subway tunnels, buildings, caves, etc. As one of five siblings with the same father, I am the only one who did not inherit this ability; I had a different mother and my four siblings all shared the same mother. Her sense of direction wasn’t as acute as our father’s; my own mother’s sense of direction was as nonexistent as my own. One of my brothers is fond of telling folks that I can’t even find my way out of a doctor’s office after having been seen at an appointment. I poke fun at myself saying that I grabbed the “music chips” but forgot to grab any “direction chips”, so that part remains a gaping hole/socket. All of us have some music abilities but I was the one who inherited perfect pitch from my paternal grandmother. Obviously there’s no connection between musical ability and the sense of direction, but I find it interesting to note the extremes. Not having been raised with my siblings, I don’t know how well any but one sibling can identify direction, and suffice it to say that that sibling seems as infallible as my father was. I have always wondered if it had something to do with them both being able to sense the magnetic fields…

[BettyAlexandriaPride]

After my car accident, I sustained a traumatic brain injury. Now, whenever there's a significant change in the atmosphere, I can feel it without knowing a thing about it. I was in a partial day hospital program and all of us would get headaches and fall asleep during eclipses. I was so frustrated I kept missing planetary phenomena.

I'm convinced that our brain being forced to rewire itself after trauma heightens our sensitivity and perception- for better or for worse. What's even crazier is that sometimes the changes can't be captured with our current level of technology, so some are suffering with so many symptoms without knowing the root cause. I hope that we're able to continue more to science and research to advance society in the future.

Have a great day everyone. :)

[dank]

TL;DR: we got the hardware, we lost the firmware

[HarmonHeat]

Super high tech testing.... in a 1970's recliner. That's balance

[tomaszprzetacznik]

This is actually something new to me, and very interesting. I have always thought that as species we lost natural ability to interact with magnetic fields.

[anarchycoww]

Ive discovered recently that I must be quite sensitive to electromagnetic frequencies through my study of solar flares. I get this nervousness in my stomach and can somehow “feel” a change in my environment. My cat will normally come to me when this happens and start meowing. From this feeling I’d check my space weather app and find that a solar flare or cme would have impacted earth exactly around the time that I felt weird. I can’t explain it but this video certainly helps!