136 Generating Economic Cycles 



and approaching the magnetic field of the Earth. It 

 can readily be understood that the mathematical prob- 

 lem was difficult to formulate and the arithmetical 

 computations were extremely laborious. As is usual 

 in complicated mathematical problems, Stormer was 

 compelled to proceed by first simplifying his hy- 

 pothesis and then adding, one by one, the actual com- 

 plicating circumstances. His first assumption ignored 

 the perturbations due to the magnetic fields of the inner 

 planets Mercury and Venus, which perturbations would 

 of course vary not only with the strength of the respec- 

 tive magnetic fields of the planets, but also with their 

 relative positions and velocities with respect to the Sun 

 and the Earth. From^ the nature of his equations 

 Stormer came to a conclusion of critical importance in 

 the theory of the influence of Venus upon the radiation 

 of the Sun to the Earth: ''The trajectories . . . give 

 a good idea of what enoniious perturbations the planets 

 Mercury and Venus will have on the movement of the 

 electric corpuscles from the Sun to the Earth, if these 

 planets are surrounded by a magnetic field of about the 

 same strength as the magnetic field of the Earth." ^ 

 Thus far the argument has tended to show reason 

 for believing the periodic configurations of the Sun, 

 Venus, and the Earth to be a periodic source of terres- 

 trial meteorological cycles. The criticism may be made 

 with some fairness that if such an effect exists it should 

 have been observed by scientists long ago. The reply 

 to the criticism would take this form : 



1 Carl Stormer: "On the trajectories of electric corpuscles in space 

 under the influence of terrestrial magnetism, applied to the aurora 

 borealis and to magnetic disturbances." Archiv for Mathematik og 

 Naturvidenskab, B. XXVIII, nr. 2, p. 35. 



