IN his comment on my report “Alpha Rhythms in the Hyperkinetic Child”1, Davidson2 stated that my data support Lippold's hypothesis3 that “Oscillation in striate muscle control systems is the source of alpha rhythm”. He quoted the work of Mulholland and Evans4,5 which suggested that presence or absence of alpha rhythms was not determined by the presence or absence of relaxed wakefulness, but by oculomotor function. Many arguments have been presented against such a hypothesis6–9, Butler and Glass10 have presented findings inconsistent in a number of respects with the view of ocular tremor as a generator of alpha rhythm, and suggested that eye movements in their turn may be modulated by alpha rhythms when conscious control of fixation waned or was interrupted by eye closure. Chapman et al.11 repeated the basic experiments of Mulholland and Evans4,5, taking care to eliminate effects of differential visual input, and demonstrated that alpha activity was influenced by visual input and not by eye position.