Original paper about the all or none law for neurons I am looking for the original paper about the all or none law for neural activity. I know that there is a very old article about the all or none law for mammalian heart muscle fibers, but I'm specifically interested in when this idea was first stated about neural activity. In **A logical calculus of the ideas immanent in nervous activity** from 1943 this law is already mentioned like an established hypothesis, so it is probably quite old.

This probably goes back to Lucas (1909), Adrian (1912), and Bernstein (1912). But the idea might have started from Helmholtz (1850).

* Lucas, K (1909). The ``all or none'' contraction of the amphibian skeletal muscle fibre. Journal of Physiology; 38: 113--133.
* Adrian, ED (1912). On the conduction of subnormal disturbances in normal nerve. Journal of Physiology; 45: 389--412
* Bernstein, J (1912). Electrobiologie. Braunschweig: Vieweg.



See also: Galvani's Spark: The Story of the Nerve Impulse and The great Era of English Electrophysiology: from Francis Gotch to Hodgkin and Huxley