So, the X-ray was discovered by Willhelm Conrad Röntgen, a Dutch-German physicist who was experimenting with electricity and a cathode ray tube. He called them "X-rays" because he had discovered an unknown ray. The "X-ray" has been called "the first invisible substance generated by scientists to profoundly affect human perception" and when it was eventually discovered to be dangerous, people had to adjust to a brand new idea: that something they couldn't perceive or trace could hurt them months or years later. 

Before people knew of its effects, they would receive X-rays for about an hour when being examined. The first person to open up an X-ray lab in Californian, Elizabeth Fleischmann, predictably died from cancer induced by X-rays.

Even more interesting are the metaphysical ideas people started thinking about because of X-rays. A popular term for the rays was "The New Sight". If X-rays were powerful, but invisible what other rays might exist? Could people soon revive the dead, make ghosts visible, reveal human thoughts, turn invisible, or even locate a fourth dimension? These were all on people's minds at the turn of the century.

It's no wonder that H.G. Well's wrote "The Invislble Man" around this time. The cause for his invisibility was "roentgen rays" named after "Röntgen" the discoverer of the X-ray.

With all that we know today, I'm not sure things still dazzle us as much as the X-ray did over a century ago. Still, there are some world view-altering ideas floating around, like always. Maybe the most exciting idea of our time is string theory which has been called "the best candidate for the theory of everything" (basically it will explain and link all known physical phenomena) and also sometimes proposes the existence of eleven dimensions. Still, I'm not seeing anyone's thoughts just yet!