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Cell Phone Radiation Chart
BjB writes "CNet has an interesting article on Cell phone radiation. More interesting is that they've included a chart of the radiation levels that various models of cell phones produce. They've even gone through the trouble of showing the highest and lowest on separate pages. It's lovely to see that your cell phone is #2..." Mine is in the middle of the pack... course, I'm not exactly reassured by that fact.
I haven't seen any of those phones in Europe... so, since the system is different in Europe, are the radiation levels too?
I recently saw a report on TV (I think it was Dateline) about the radiation cell phones emit. They found that clamshell style phones, such as the Motorola StarTAC, emit far less radiation relative to the skull. The amount of radiation exposure is proportional to the distance between the source and the target. Since clamshell style phones have the antenna angled away from the skull, versus flat phones that keep the antenna parallel to the skull, the skull does not receive as strong a dose of radiation. Yet this report show some clamshell style phones in the top 10 and some in the bottom 10. The whole reason I bought my phone (a StarTAC 7867) was for the reason of less radiation. For those that are interested in purchasing a phone that is radiation consious: 1) Buy a clamshell style phone (see above) 2) Use digital service since digital requires less power (less radiation) 3) Extend the antenna. The power output is proportional to the signal strength. Lowered antennas produce weaker signals so the phone compensates by increasing the power output (more radiation). 4) If you must use a flat phone, alter the angle to which you hold the phone. Or better yet, alter sides. If you are going to radiate your head, try not to repeat the exposure to the same area of the head. Remember that exposure is proportional to distance.
Actually, UV is nonionising radiation,
Depends what you're trying to ionize. Example: EPROM erasers (for those of use who remember the days before Flash memory). Someone else mentioned the photoelectric effect; even blue visible light can knock electrons out of metals with a low work function.
That's really arrogant. I just read the post you're replying to, and there was nothing wrong in what he said. You're using clunky academic "Philosphy 101" tools (you must like epistemology, because they literally struggle to know the simplest of things), which have absolutely no use when you're actually wondering, "Could this EMF emitter next to my brain get my ass killed?"
The burden on proof is on no one, because he's pointing possible holes that real scientists consider privately, in their minds. I'm sorry if you need a detailed proof, in 12 point font, by Monday morning.
Point by point, since undergrads like you put me in such a bad mood:
The burden of proof is on you. If you believe such a substance exists, please derive its chemical properties
Sure... you just fund him, little solipsist, since in the universe you inhabit, funding is limitless. While looking through your notes, did you forget to take down that the person with an idea needn't be the one who implements the experiment?
Please explain how such a substance could exist in such concentrations in the brain as to be heated several degrees above (due to the miniscule wattage of cell phones) ambient body temperature, and explain how this heating would be "bad" compared to the normal heating and cooling of the body by 1-2 degrees throughout the course of the day.
Localized heating. If the temperature differential is sharp in areas of the brain, consistent damage is possible. And our bodies sure didn't evolve with cellphones shoved next to our skulls.
Occam's Razor. Your theory requires the invention of Substance X to explain something that doesn't show up in the data.
Well, since we don't know much about the brain, then the probability is correspondingly higher that something in there might fit his criteria and lead to brain damage. In fact, you seem to have quite a bit of it.
Stop sitting so close to the screen.
Argumentum ad hominem and back to burden of proof again. Your argument smacks of "How do we know the moon isn't made of green cheese?
His argument isn't the only thing that wants to go around, smacking something. "How do we know that games darken childrens' hearts and turn them into shotgun killers?" Haha! Absurd to question such a thing!
Humans come up with concepts. Humans are notorious for being subjective; that is why we have computers. Pointing out someone suffers from arrogance (and why are you so defensive about that..?) is a point to consider, even if it's not an argument-turner.
I'm not a biotech geek, but did you check the volume level?
True, there are no studies which support the 'cell phones could be dangerous' proposition - however there are also
no statistically valid studies which support the 'being punched in the nose hurts' proposition either.
Oh I doubt that. I'm sure there are plenty of studies that prove being punched in the nose hurts. Any medical report of a boxing injury would satisfy your claim for instance.
It may not mean anything, but it sure produces purty pictures...
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
Not to mention rat skulls are just a wee tiny bit thinner than human skulls.
"Hot lesbian witches! It's fucking genius!"
It would be nice to see the same thing for GSM (for those of us in Europe/Oceana). Also comparing the settings for the phones and low power transmit and hi power transmit. As GSM signals are transmitted from the phone in relation to their distance from the base station (ie it only transmits the amount of power its needs to).
Hence GSM gets around EU restrictions radiation levels as on full output GSM goes way over the highest allowable wattage that anyone should be near, but GSM hardly every transmits at these levels so they let it through.
Also some projections for the new 3G stuff would be nice as well.
The *867 are 1900Mhz CDMA, while the 7860 is 800Mhz CDMA.
What about those women that wear so much perfume that it makes your eyes water? Forget the simple non-smoking section of the restaurant, I want a section of the place set aside where ALL of the aromas in air come from the food and NOT the customers!
Better yet, how about a perfume free elevator?
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
however there are also no statistically valid studies which support the 'being punched in the nose hurts' proposition either
Actually, there are many. In addition to anecdotal evidence which abounds rather than the third-fourth-fifth person urban legends referencing cell phone hazards, I can demonstrate. Place your nose right there, that's it, just an arms length away from my shoulder. If such a demo is unsatisfactory, I can show you direct evidence that blunt objects impacting your face can cause damage. Let's go to the emergency room at the nearest hospital.
All this is irrelevant since you chose a poor example. The problem is, as you put it, the keyword "evidence". There is none, anecdotal or otherwise supporting this cell phone hazard claim.
We have never subjected large quantities of people to close up microwave transmitters
Actually, we have. The devices in question are often called ovens. They put out much more power than a cell phone and their effects are well documented.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
Good judgement comes from experience, and experience comes from bad judgement.
- W. Wriston, former Citibank CEO
How exactly is this insightful or funny? I think the problem with people using their phones while driving is way overblown. If you're going to ban that, then you should also ban talking to passengers, using a radio, eating, drinking, smoking, or anything else but driving... Personally, I use my phone with the hands free earpiece, and I've had no problems...
Just an odd sort of warm/numb/tingling sensation on that side of my head when I use the phone for more than a minute or so.
I don't get the effect when I use the headset, though.
Regards,
Regards,
-scott
There is quite a bit of evidence to suggest that small amounts of ionizing radiation help prevent cancer. The cancer rate might be a lot lower if there were more background radiation. If so, then even cellphones that produced ionizing radiation would still benefit rather than harm their users. You might want the one that gives the highest dose, to improve your health!
Here's a Japanese study called verifying radiation hormesis in laboratory animals.
The medical dictionary definition of hormesis is: "An effect where a toxic substance acts like a stimulant in small doses, but it is an inhibitor in large doses."
A relevant text (recommended on the web but I haven't read it) is:
Kondo, S.; Health effects of low-level radiation.
Osaka, Japan: Kinki University Press; Madison, WI: Medical Physics Publishing Co., 1993.
This page has some interesting examples, including the following:
Radiation hormesis in cancer mortality was found in 32,000 United States and 22,000 British military observers of atmospheric nuclear explosions (Robinette et al., 1985; Darby et al., 1988). The cancer mortality rate of Canadian military observers was only 88% of carefully selected military controls (Raman et al., 1987). The leukemia mortality rate of the Canadian observers was only 40% of that of the unexposed controls. In each study the cancer motality rate of exposed personnel was lower that that of the general population.
The cumulative data represents about 100,000 acutely exposed persons in four countries. This is convincing evidence that whole body exposure to low doses of ionizing radiation do not cause increased mortality. The supporting animal data showed that both acute and chronic exposure to low dose irradiation decreased cancer mortality (Luckey 1990, 1993). The combined animal and human results provide impressive evidence that cancer mortality is decreased by acute exposure to low doses of ionizing radiation.
I play Nerd-Folk!
The only way people get estimates to the contrary is by doing a straight-line estimation. So if being forced to drink ten gallons of water all at once drowns 99/100 people, being forced to drink a half gallon is assumed to drown 1/20th as many (about 5 people) and so on down the line; a straight-line estimate would allow you to deduce that even a cup of water a day is more deadly than no water at all. This is obviously the wrong way to estimate how dangerous water is; it's also the wrong way to estimate the danger of radiation (both ionizing and non-ionizing).
Here's a Japanese study called verifying radiation hormesis in laboratory animals.
The medical dictionary definition of hormesis is: "An effect where a toxic substance acts like a stimulant in small doses, but it is an inhibitor in large doses."
This page has some interesting examples, including the following:
Radiation hormesis in cancer mortality was found in 32,000 United States and 22,000 British military observers of atmospheric nuclear explosions (Robinette et al., 1985; Darby et al., 1988). The cancer mortality rate of Canadian military observers was only 88% of carefully selected military controls (Raman et al., 1987). The leukemia mortality rate of the Canadian observers was only 40% of that of the unexposed controls. In each study the cancer motality rate of exposed personnel was lower that that of the general population.
The cumulative data represents about 100,000 acutely exposed persons in four countries. This is convincing evidence that whole body exposure to low doses of ionizing radiation do not cause increased mortality. The supporting animal data showed that both acute and chronic exposure to low dose irradiation decreased cancer mortality (Luckey 1990, 1993). The combined animal and human results provide impressive evidence that cancer mortality is decreased by acute exposure to low doses of ionizing radiation.
I play Nerd-Folk!
...you're talking to your wife/girlfriend/lawyer/stock broker
about
getting a divorce/sleeping with your best friend/sleeping with your lawyer/sleeping with your wife/buying your stock at the wrong price/missing a purchase opportunity/spilling OJ on your leather couch.
I wouldn't worry about your phone causing you headaches. Otherwise the simple solution is to stop using your cell phone.
~afniv
"Man könnte froh sein, wenn die Luft so rein wäre wie das Bier"
~afniv
"Man könnte froh sein, wenn die Luft so rein wäre wie das Bier"
Richard von Weizs
What they don't mention is that the SAR rating assumes the phone is held a certain way in relation to the face and head. Phone manufacturers have used this as a loophole for sometime now - giving a phone a low SAR rating by testing the phone only in certain position(s) that the user might hold it in. While other positions that some might hold the phone in actually would produce a higher SAR rating.
If you point the antenna away from the face as much as possible, you reduce radiation exposure.
----
"Oh, bother," said Pooh, as he hid Piglet's mangled corpse.
I wouldn't say he was exactly right, but you're not right enough to be that rude.
Silly people.
I have to use 12 Qualacomm QPC-860's to heat up my sandwich during lunch?
Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
Do a controlled study, get one of those earphone/mics - try that for twenty minutes - if you are still getting headaches its not the attenae's fault.
-josh
And so far observations has shown no link between EM radiation and cancer.
Believing in effects which are not observable, now that's religion.
-josh
And you happen to ignore the fact that there are studies which show the exact opposite - no effect whatsoever.
As for anecdotal evidence, it carries zero scientific weight. Certainly it would be looked at to inform or iniate scientific research, but 'My uncle bob lives down by dem der power lines and has a heap o trouble with his lumbago' is not going to prove any coorelation between power lines and lumbago. At best if a bunch of people made this claim someone might iniate some research to establish a clear statistical correlation between proximity to the power lines and the supposed resulting disease.
This has already been done in the case of cancer and power lines and no statistically significant coorelation has been found.
The claim that microwaves can't do anything because they are not ionizing radiation is at best doubtful. How do we know that there isn't a chemical substance in the brain which resonates at the frequencies of these transmitters and which will selectively absorb energy from them causing a breakdown of the chemical from selective heating?
Sure there are many many different possible ways in which EM could effect the body. I doubt very much EM is going to be found breaking up molecules. Most molecular bounds absorb and emit in the infrared range if I remember correctly from Chemistry. Again the RF bands used in cell phones are far too low energy.
By your theory exposure to a heat lamp would be much much more risky than using a cell phone.
But you can postulate possible scenarios until you are blue in the face, if there is no statistical link between the supposed disease causing agent and the disease, your scenario is not worth the paper it's printed on.
-josh
What are you suggesting? That cnet wanted the hits from all the nervous ninnies who don't have a clue? Now why would they do such a thing?
[for those missing a sarcasm bone - I believe some are available on ebay]
They rated the max radiation. So this would be the level when you are as far as possible from the basestation and also, only when you are transmitting (ie. talking). For the part of the phone call while your listening the phone isn't transmitting.
Basically, they make it seem like phone X is always cranking out Y radiation when in reality, none of the phones constantly are sending Y radiation.
-jon
Remember Amalek.
I have to say that I felt proud to see my phone (Ericsson T28) was #1 on the list. Wooohooo!!!!! Oh wait, this is a brain-frying list....
Anyways, shouldn't these ratings be based on just wattage, and not wattage per kilo??? My Phone is very lite (only a few ounces), yet puts out good power (I've yet to hit a dead spot in valleys, driving, etc...) So this rating would unfairly bias my phone verses one of the old brick phones that possibly put out alot more harmful radiation, but just weighed alot...
Is this logical or do I just have a screw loose?
Jeremy
Glutious
Jeremy
"Opinions are like assholes; everyone's got one..."
I've been working on a theory...I call it the 'dateline' theory. It was originally based on stories that 'Dateline NBC' broadcasts. It's a theory that every study sponsored, researched, or published by a media house is designed to scare you. Examples include:
-Airlines are out to take all of your money then have the plane fall from the sky.
-Crap in the air is going to kill you.
-Don't leave the house; there are scary things outside.
-Your house is trying to kill you.
Since I've started working on this and told a few friends I've been told I should shoot for federal funding..heck, I should even turn my findings in to NBC.
...I always had headaches with my nokia 5160 after talking for 20 minutes or more. Then I find it at number 2 on the list, the high list. I complained to nokia once and it's reproducable but they told me there was no confirmed link, not responsible, ect ect. I don't know what to think, but this shocked me a little. My new startac on the other hand is low on the list, reception is a little off though, makes sense.
The article you referenced is about power lines and EMF, not about cell phones. While the principle behind the article is quite similar, there are nonetheless significant differences. I would argue that the jury is still out regarding cell phones, and that while I feel that power lines do not presently pose a significant threat to human health, we should still be concerned about other sources of EMF.
One of the replies to your post mentioned radiation output from TVs and microwaves, and they are quite a bit higher than cellphones. One recent article from Fortune is by a neurologist who has studied EMF for the last 30 years. Even though we haven't seen an explosion of cancer rates from young children watching 8 hours of TV a day, the human body doesn't always show drastic changes when it has been affected.
Bottom line, true, not everything with the word "radiation" is bad for you, but it shouldn't be necessarily ignored either. The FCC is only in its first year or two of its five year study on the effects of cellphone radiation.
In the context of cellphone emissions, SAR stands for "search and rescue".
MJP
Don't try that "protecting the children" shit you people use to keep the tits and bad words off my TV. --Seanbaby
Does anyone know how to convert these values (w/kg) into useful units of radiation (rad) or exposure (rem)?
That's not quite true. The only difference between a photon emitted from a cell phone (or visible light for that matter) and one emitted from the fission of U-235 is energy(frequency). In theory you could make a radio transmitter that operated at the same frequency but it would require a great deal of effort. It's true that the radiation from a cell phone is not energetic enough to cause ionizations in human tissue which pretty much eliminates any chance of it increasing cancer rates in any signifigant way.
There are a bunch of granola hippies around my home town (Ithaca, NY) who are going around posting these obnoxious flyers that come just short of advocating violence against those who use cell phones for creating a demand for technology that produces "massive amounts of harmful radiation" bla bla bla. I fucking hate them, they can go eat a bag of dicks. It makes me think of the scientist guy in Repo Man who was going off about all those Damned Lies you hear about radiation (as he was dying of radiation exposure...)
Seriously though, i think a lot of people are way to quick to believe that any new technology is evil, and then others are too quick to believe that any new technology is perfect. The jury is still out, but for the moment i'll keep using my phone 'cause it's actually cheaper than a land line for how often i move, and what New York Telephone, i mean NYNEX, i mean Bell Atlantic i mean Verizon charges to move or hook up a bloody telephone!
---
Play Six Pack Man. I
Agreed. It would have been more useful to put a comparision there to other forms of radiation exposure. For example, you are subjected to radiation just by hanging out in Grand Central Station in NYC. The radiation comes from the granite. The list goes on flying, x-rays etc...
"I don't think it's selfish, to eat defenseless shellfish." -NOFX
As a laser physicist and someone who has ACTUALLY READ several research papers on both sides of the subject, I'd like to express that I agree wholeheartedly with Mr. Tackhead's post saying there is basically nil evidence for health risk from low-level, low-frequency EM radiation.
The American Cancer Society, the USFDA, and numerous government reports have reached the conclusion that EMR from cell phones is not a risk to human health.
I'm glad Mr. Tackhead's post was moderated up, this means the moderators must be getting a clue.
When microwaves are absorbed my molecules, the microwave energy is turned into heat.
While I will stop short of saying that reports implicating microwave energy as causing damage to living cells are junk science, I will say that such results have been very difficult to reproduce. We can't raise the alarm about possible risks from microwaves based on a few (IMO shoddy) research results. You have to wait until the number and quality of research results reaches a critical number. Many millions of dollars have been spent, many, many articles have been written, and the vast preponderance of data point to the conclusion that low-level microwave radiation does not pose a health risk.
OK, first of all, I'm relatively certain the magnetic fields in the papers you are talking about are MUCH higher than the earth's magnetic field or the transient magnetic field of a cell phone.
Secondly, are you siding with the quacks who are prescribing "magnetic therapy" for backaches and cancer and such?
Point 1: Ultraviolet radiation IS ionizing, silly. And you're right, it does cause cancer.
Point 2: I don't believe you should believe EVERY empirical result seriously. There is statistical (sampling) error and often human error. A few papers with iffy results is not enough to overturn hundreds of papers to the contrary. Do you believe the earth is flat, too, because there are a few people out there that believe that? From what I've read, NOT ONE of the results you point to has been reproduced.
You're right, that's what you'd expect, and at least some of the research indicates that's what happens. I'm not going to reiterate them here, but I've discussed this very issue in a couple of other posts in this topic, one of which has a couple of good links to articles and papers on this exact topic.
In short, TDMA and GSM do exhibit an effect that is more "harmful" than does CDMA. That's the reason I wil only carry and use a CDMA phone (and why I rant elsewhere about Handspring's bone-headed decision to support only GSM in their upcoming VisorPhone, which is probably the coolest and most useful piece of tech to come along since the original Pilot 1000.
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
though a saucepan that fits nicely over your head might not be a bad idea either, in addition to affording you protection from sonic lasers fired from black hellicopters. But the aluminum foil is much more fashionable. For example, you could form it into the shape of a swan, like they do for leftovers at fancy resturaunts.
there are phones w/ voice dialing, but none (in USA) w/ Voice Activation.
nmarshall
The law is that which it boldly asserted and plausibly maintained..
nmarshall
The law is that which it boldly asserted and plausibly maintained..
--Colonel Burr 1783
The chart says that the phones are being rated in W/kg. Does this mean that they are factoring in the weight of the phone?
Wasn't that on Oprah or one of those other talk shows that are long on emotion and short on facts? 8^)
Anyway, I'm very, very suspicious of cancers "in the general shape of the antenna." Why? Because if you could see radio waves, you'd see that the entire antenna and some parts of the phone are "glowing" and emitting RF energy.
In other words, it would be like holding one of those rod shaped fluorescent trouble lights up next to your head and expecting the light to cast a shadow of the rod. But, that's silly. The light illuminates the entire side of your head.
No, if that cancer were really caused by the cell phone, it would be a broad splash across the side of the head, centered around the phone's usual position.
So, what's really the cause? We'll never know for sure, but I betcha that you're looking at the `Elvis' Face on a Tortilla' phenomenon. Out of the zillions of tortillas made, a few have blotches on them vaguely in the shape of Elvis' face. Likewise, of the tens (or hundreds) of millions of people who use cell phones, at least a few will have skin cancers that are roughly in an oblong shape of about the dimensions of a cell phone antenna.
--
"You've crossed my Line of Death!" "What? No! Where is it?" "Here in the fine print...."
If you want to know how dangerous cell phones are (RF wise), you need to look at the population of ham radio operators and various professionals who use UHF radios on a regaular basis.
Based on the Hamfests I've been to I have come to the conclusion that long-term exposure to such RF turns you into an old coot.
Has anyone ever done a study on the effects of mobile phones on male/female fertility?
I try and keep my aerial as close to my balls as possible, as an alternative to the snip... but I doubt it works.
Oh well.
I would think very little radiation is emitted when it is on your belt, as it is in recieve only mode© _Getting_ radiation, not emitting it©
I would think that it would only emit during active use©
--
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Colin Davis
I bet it has a lot more to do with how you're cocking your head, with the quality of the sound reception, etc., than it does with anything that the phone itself is emitting.
/
No... I too get a headache while using a cell phone after 5 minutes or so. I switch sides often, as the sensation is not pleasant. It has nothing to do with 'holding my head a certain way', etc. It doesn't last, and I'm fine .
Interestingly, I also get a headache at the Museum of Science Theater of Electricity display.
...bringing you cynical quips since 1998
Obviously you aren't trying hard enough. Once you rub a hole in that annoying skull, it's pretty easy. :)
---
RobK
Myddrin
I think you've just reinvented homeopathy.
-- Life is short. Forgive quickly. Kiss slowly. ~ Robert Doisneau
Unfortunately the ones who gab on hands-free phones will be immune. But they'll still die off eventually, because a hands-free phone is almost as dangerous in terms of causing accidents. It's not about where your hands are, it's where your focus of attention is. And anything more than trivial commentary in talking and listening to someone in the cabin is just as bad.
Haven't you ever noticed that when something "interesting" happens on the road, you can't remember the last few seconds of radio play? This is a good thing, because you can only spread your focus of attention so far before it's too dilute to do any good. The radio sound is unimportant, so you can tune it completely out of your attention no matter how loud it is, but an involved conversation with a real human isn't so easy to back out of.
You can do a couple of other simple things while driving in a familiar, easy situation, but throw in a kid on a skateboard spilling in front of you and you'd better not be doing anything else that you can't completely and instantly ignore. I've felt the tearing of my attention when my passenger is trying to talk to me while I'm driving in busy traffic, and nowadays I politely tell them to wait. A cell phone conversation is no different. The only time you should be talking on one is when the car is stopped.
-- Life is short. Forgive quickly. Kiss slowly. ~ Robert Doisneau
Actually, UV is nonionising radiation, though it is clearly cancer-causing (compare the wavelength with gamma and X rays). Both cancer and radiation are so poorly understood that no one really knows why, but it's worth extrapolating on your point about visible light and the retina - if one type of molecule in your body responds (and can be harmed) by the visible and near-visible wavelengths, is it now possible that others respond to microwaves?
:) The best advice is to use these things in moderation (a course that also has other lifestyle benefits for most people). But for CNET to turn this into a pseudo buyer's guide is just irresponsible.
Personally I think that your point (previously raised by dublin in several posts) about bandwidth and power spread (ie. TDMA vs. CDMA) is an important one. Aside from the waveform rise/fall time and what effects it might have, CDMA should theoretically be safer, since transmission power and bandwidth will be inversely related via Shannon's theorem.
As with anything of note or value, no one is likely to ever really know for sure.
-- Life is short. Forgive quickly. Kiss slowly. ~ Robert Doisneau
Similarly you should be disallowed from driving while talking with a passenger.
Trees can't go dancing
So do them a big favor
Pretend dancing stinks!
I think as the ammount of energy that manages to get through the skull is irrelevant with the power that the handsets emmit. The only thing it will do is ever so slight heating.
There have been about a zillion studies done on the effects of radiation on animal tissue going way back before I was born, they all find that ionizing radiation can alter tissue enabling cancers and they all fail to find evidence of non-ionizing radiation causing the same.
In my books, this is pretty hard evidence that non-ionizing radiation either does not elevate cancer risk at all or at least if it does, it is unmeasurably low.
Cell phones, microwaves, etc are non-ionizing.
Forget about the "dangers" of mobile phones and concentrate on the real dangers! The giver of all life on Earth, our Sun. Hell the monitor you are looking at now most likely is more dangerous giving out miniscule amounts of X-Rays. And the food we eat is most likely the biggest killer of all (besides all the crazies that smoke, etc).
If they find evidence to the contrary, I might start worrying, for now, it is media blown up hype.
War crimes, torture, lies, illegal spying... Would someone give Bush a blowjob, already, so he can be impeached?
It doesn't matter how much is reflected/absorbed by the skull.
Photons from powerlines, cell phones, radio towers etc are about 1 million times too weak to ionize DNA (UV or higher energy is needed, your light bulb gives off higher energy photons than a cell phone). Which means no mutations.
Which means no cancer, even if 100% of the radiation were absorbed by the brain. (The skull will absorb more than the brain though, for what its worth)
So then what do the numbers mean? Sure, the FCC has in their omnipotence (some would say impotence) decided that >= 1.60 W/kg is an acceptable level.
But at what level would we begin to see damage to our neurons? Since our only reference point is an FCC ruling, we can't say how much worse one phone is over another. If it takes 1500 W/kg before damage is done (although at that point, it would probably melt down), then a mere tenth of a watt difference between phone A and phone Q is INSIGNIFICANT!!!
Put another way...if my farts are rated 37 AUS (Arbitrary Units of Smell) and yours are rated 54 AUS, how much worse are yours? at what AUS rating would it knock me unconsious or even dead?
Give me my freedom, and I'll take care of my own security, thank you.
Dude, do something about the special characters. Putting a link in your post with all the periods replaced by %A9 is just shitty.
/.
What the hell are you using for an editor? Seriously, I would like to know what excuse for an editor mangles characters that badly. Email me if you are embarassed to say what you are using on
Try the preview link next time!
-Peter
Speaking of radioactive emissions, I am wondering if my CRT has any radioactive emissiosn I should be concerned about. I recently purchased one of those scotch monitor guard things to get rid of glare. But am I going to radiate my brain by staring at this screen all day? I'm more worried about that than any cell phone.
I could worry about the insignificant radiation I am exposed to when I use my cell phone...
or I could worry about the insignificant radiation I am exposed to while working on the linear motor at work. I should point out that there are remarkably few bugs in the lab during the summer. Maybe tomorrow I'll check the area out around the motor... I can almost guarountee that my cell phone usage is completely insignificant in comparrison.
You say you want a revolution?
but hell, there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that the 'Psychic Friends Network' can really tell you if you significant other is cheating on you.
Hey, don't believe the hype! Everybody knows that the REAL money is on Miss Cleo's Psychic Tarot phone readings! Miss Cleo wouldn't lie to you.. she has a pseudo-Jamaican accent!
-The Reverend (I am not a Nazi nor a Troll)
-The Reverend (I am not a Nazi nor a Troll)
=(.\')=
IS-95 CDMA is deployed in both the cellular (~850 MHz) and PCS (1.9 GHz) bands in North America. CDMA in the cellular band is often used to implement an "overlay". In a dense urban environment, the cellular phone company can use an overlay of CDMA and analog to increase capacity while still serving analog-only customers. As one moves away from the city center, at some point the CDMA coverage ends and we're in analog country.
The CDMA protocol used in the two different bands is identical, merely the carrier frequencies are changed. The same code can be used in the base stations to service cellular and PCS band mobiles (I know, I used to program it).
With the second phone, one gets CDMA service in the big city, but can still make calls when out in the boonies with nary a digital cell around.
"Mit der Dummheit kaempfen Goetter selbst vergebens." - Schiller
Could it be that after using a cell phone, they were all so wound up that they lost all sense of patience and had to get through the test as fast as they could? After all, people who use cell phones seem to think that they can't wait long enough until they get to a regular phone.
--
And the men who hold high places must be the ones who start
To mold a new reality... closer to the heart
The poster didn't claim that there was a hazard, just that there might be one that hasn't yet been validated. Something can be true without having been proven, just as a man can be guilty of a crime before being declared so by a jury. By your logic, nuclear fission didn't exist before 1939.
Furthermore, Occam's Razor assumes that a significant amount of data from which to draw a conclusion is present. Otherwise, the "simplest explanation" of why volcanoes erupt would still be "because God is mad at us." I think the poster was more supporting caution until more results are in than Chicken-Littling.
The phones that generate the most power and have the best reception are on the "worst" list. Of course it's a tradeoff I suppose. You could always use a can connected to a string if your truly afraid of having your brain fried ;)
I have the same phone, but no headaches. Hmm ...
Somebody moderate the parent post +1 (Funny)!!!!
The Web is like Usenet, but
the elephants are untrained.
It operates on a different frequency, that's why. Plays havoc with our office phone system, too. Makes a persistent, loud, clicking noise in any nearby handset while it's transmitting.
The Web is like Usenet, but
the elephants are untrained.
makes me wonder what this laptop is doing to my balls, since it is parked there 16 hours a day.
Can you prove that you will die, someday? Medical science is getting better all the time.
This person had probably never before had a problem with driving & talking on the cell phone either. Then one day she misses a red light, and a little MR2 comes out of nowhere and causes a little damage. You never expect to get into accidents, they just kinda happen.
Learn the rules so you know how to break them properly.
www.teslabox.com
People are probably getting more dangerous radiation from their (crt) computer monitor than they would ever get from a cell phone. Also, everyone knows that the real danger of cell phones is that people tend to use them while driving, which is known to cause car accidents. I think whole cell phone-radiation scare is just another case of people making a big deal about a really insignificant risk factor.
I used to be one of those folk who drove with a cell phone pressed to my ear at all times.
Then I started riding a motorcycle. Aside from the fact that it is difficult to talk on a cell phone while riding, my cell phone usage while driving my car significantly dropped. You see while riding a motorcycle you are much more aware of what is going on, and quite frankly watching many people talk and drive at the same time scared the heck out of me, and I began to wonder if I was like that.
As far as I'm concerned headset usage should be mandated for cellular users in a car.
Stand Fast,
Stand Fast,
tjg.
So thats why the StarTAC costs so much for so little. Nokia, may have inovation with silly things like swapable face plates and a nice user interface but...
AF-Design, web development.
Yabut: will it take them out of the gene pool before they breed?
-Eldurbarn
is to use a hands-free car kit with external antenna. Aside from the extra hand to use for driving, you reduce the amount of RF inside the car rather dramatically, since a phone inside a car will most likely be putting out max power, just to get the signal out of that metal box. An antenna on the other side of the metal car roof will keep that RF away from you and give you better connections as well!
The phone is clipped to your belt, and you are using a headset/earbud and microphone. You are then in full-mode, just as if you have it by your head.
--
What are you talking about?- --------
That is what this whole discussion is all about - there is a groups lobbying against them but so far no evidence has really been brought up. And to get rid of your phone is a bit silly (unless you were joking, then disregard all of this) - and some other people that have posted have made good points - there are tons of sources of this "radiation" thing and the phone is not necessarily the worst.
-----------------------------------------
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
I had always been impressed with the apparent average IQ of people reading and posting to Slashdot - but some of the postings on here are just embarassingly stupid. How can people possibly truly get by in life being so oblivious? Go and read the studies - there is no proof that any of this is bad, and there are tons of worse things out there.- -----
this is a great case of people being too stupid to understand a technology, so they fear it.
--------------------------------------------
There are some odd things afoot now, in the Villa Straylight.
in the sense of science, it is nothing, save bad science.
semantics are everything!
NO.
Just because we "don't know" is not a reason to throw good science out the window.
without strong evidence, the claim that cellphone radiation can cause tumors is weak to worthless.
semantics are everything!
Why aren't there any siemens handys in this list? Does anyone know anything about them? i own a C25 and i'm using it about 1 hour each day and after about 30 min talking i always get a light headache - time to buy a new one???
Seeing that there are as many reports that indicate there is no danger as there are that indicate that there are health risks, it would appear that nobody really knows. It's always better to play it safe and assume that placing a powerful transmitter next to you brain is unhealthy.
"Mmmmmm, beer." Homer Simpson
I learned in my introductory college physics course about EMF, and we determined (based on decade-old, proven scientific formulas) that power lines could not possibly cause genetic mutation or reformation of any kind. Therefore, I do not understand why people keep getting caught up in the whole cell phone cancer scare.
The only possible danger of using cell phones is memory loss, as noted in this Wired article. The article describes how scientists have found that radio frequencies have been proven to cause long-term memory loss in rats, and thus may be equally harmful to humans.
______________________________
Eric Krout
If you celebrate Xmas, befriend me (538
That's funny! Wouldn't it be nice if tumors were so accommodating?
"I'm sorry, Mr. Johnson, but there's a cigarette shaped tumor in your lungs. Ordinarily, this would be operable, but the bacon shaped tumor in your liver complicates things...."
There go the research grants for determining causation, now we can concentrate on a cure. Perhaps tumor shaped pills.
--
As a matter of fact, I am a lawyer. But I play an actor on TV.
Let's see... 1) You get lost trying to find someone's house, can't call because you don't carry a cellphone, have fun driving in circles 2) A close family member has a medical emergency, you are out driving, they can't get ahold of you, I'm sorry. 3) You are at the grocery store, your wife needs something, you don't have a cell phone, you get to go back out for it. now now, all those situations benefit from a cell phone, and aren't employment related...go tell your family to piss up a rope?
- nick
Do consider:
1) The wavelength is wrong to resonate the molecule (ala microwaves and water), but that does not mean that no energy is adsorbed.
2) The amount of energy available is going to depend on both the wavelenth and the intensity of the field (which will be proportional to the power of the field source). Personally, I doubt cellphones have enough power to make a real impact. High tension powerlines, on the other hand, I am less copacetic about.
3) This statement: "there is a biological effect of the energy imparted by extremely low frequency EMF (ELF-EMF) on living systems" is probably making inappropriate assumptions about the mechanism of effect (or, more likely, the PI was dumbing it down for the reporter). There are other ways in which a magnetic field could interact with living tissue, other than simply heating it. Biological mechanisms are subtle, strange, and poorly understood. We certainly don't know enough to categorically rule out the possibility.
"Research is what I am doing when I don't know what I am doing." -- Wernher von Braun
"Research is what I am doing when I don't know what I am doing." -- Wernher von Braun
I can talk with a passenger without using any hands. Only if you have a cell phone that allows you to do the same, should you be able to use it while driving.
Care about freedom?
I'd rather be lucky than good.
why isn't anyone replying to this? this is easily the most interesting post iv'e seen this week(granted it is monday).
"Given the same total amount of energy being transmitted, a narrower bandwidth means a higher peak intensity of electric and magnetic fields. Therefore, wouldn't the GSM ones be more likely to cause adverse non-thermal effects in surrounding devices?"
my first inclination would be to think it might be the other way around. possibly.... of course i may have no clue on this one and if so correct me. but.....
assuming the CDMA phones have a broader bandwidth wouldn't they have a greater chance of matching the vibrational mode of a particular protein with a certian molecualr weight; and therefore denaturing a larger variety of possibly important enzymes/hormones etc? also would the spectral purity of the cell phone emission really have any effect on the total amount of absorbed energy anyway? i think the answer to the first question might be answered by finding out how much energy per protein molecule it takes to break enough hydrogen bonds between alpha helices/beta sheets etc. to actually cause it to deform(denature) and if a cell phone cannot exceed the minimum requirement to do that, then it would be safe to assume it is not causing damage.
anyway i dont know the answer to that but thanx for making me think today.
- "Hear that?! The percolations are imminent! Cease your ingress!"
Because of the way the antenna is connected to the LOWER part of the phone, the antenna (and transmission equipment) is farther away from your head.
/. and all that's as good as fact :)
I'm no expert on this, but I've heard a couple people tell it to me. This being
>Buddy, I've got news for you. The classical model is wrong.
Please detail for us all with quantum mechanics how you find the radiation pattern of an antenna. I believe that the antenna radiation pattern here *might* be important since it answers the question of does the radiation enter your head or not (answer - yes).
The classical model is perfectly adequate to describe the primary problem in this case, to what extent does the radation heat up the brain.
Oh, and don't be so patronizing about your physics class, some of us have a degree in physics (and I'm sure there are others with more than that).
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. (Einstein)
> In science, the burden of proof is upon the one making the claim.
Sure,
I claim that there is a significant possibility that I am unlikely to ever die.
I take a random sample of people who have lived at many points throughout time.
If I sample n people there will be a fraction q who are still alive at the moment. Therefore the probability that I will die is (1-q).
Now q is the number of people alive at the moment divided by the number who have ever lived, I belive this number to be around 0.8 (ish) thanks to an exponential population growth. Therefore the probability of me dying is about 0.2 and my original statement is true.
I have made my hypothesis, I have done study and concluded it was true. Can you refute my findings please?
Only two things are infinite, the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the former. (Einstein)
Maybe as a species we should be raised with a cellphone krazyglued to one ear, sitting in an office chair from costco, in front of a 19" (or larger) monitor. It might prepare us better for the future.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
>then you should also ban talking to passengers
:-)
Talking to passengers doesn't require the use of your hands. It also still allows free movement of the head to look for traffic, since human ears are somewhat omnidirectional, whereas a cell mic is (or for best sound reception, should be) somewhat unidirectional, and turning ones head can make cell use difficult.
Passengers generally don't startle the driver by screaming out loud for no apparent reason. A cell phone does this whenever it rings.
Although, heated debates are best left outside the vehicle.
>using a radio
Radio is the same as just listening to a passenger. Without them talking to you, you now have the advantage of being able to pay (almost) full attention to the road.
>eating, drinking, smoking,
Agreed. These all take your hands off the wheel and force you to look away from the road. If you are _that_ hungry or thirsty, pull over for a moment and refresh yourself. If you are in that much of a rush that is _your_ problem; it's when you eat/cell/drink/smoke and drive it becomes _my_ problem. Then I get a say in it.
Taking the hands off the wheel, and keeping your eyes off the road causes the most problems. When you look away from the wheel your hands naturally turn the wheel towards that direction.
>Personally, I use my phone with the hands free earpiece...
That's not too bad. At least you have your hands on the wheel most of the time, and you can look to your side for passing. Although I think the right solution is the voice activated phone. In that case drivers can have proper attention to the road at all times. Most people don't bother with either. Bad idea.
Well, that's just my 2 cents.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
Doesn't section 5 of the GPL allow you to reject the license and be bound by the usual copyright laws as they might be in your country?
Sounds freer than any other license to me.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
>which is a limitation on your freedom to use the software.
Which is imposed (and decided upon) by the local government and which has no effect on the GPL (as it is only an extension of current law, not a law unto itself).
If your government chose to make all software licenses invalid, and chose to make copyright null, then you would have more freedom. But that isn't anything to do with the GPL. That's the government in action. It could happen to Windows for all we know (but likely won't).
So the GPL only adds more rights for the user to select. If they chose to waive those rights, they will be bound by the laws of the country (which, as I say, aren't affected by the GPL).
ie: The non-acceptance of the GPL causes no loss of freedom over and above what you already have. Acceptance of the GPL causes you (by choice) to limit yourself. Ultimately, choice is, in itself, freedom.
If you could be told what you can see or read, then it follows that you could be told what to say or think - BoC
They've been noticing more instances of brain cancer in the area where a cell phone's antena is next to the head, often times in the general shape of the antena.
_______
"With sufficient thrust, pigs fly just fine." -- RFC 1925
That one's easy. You are a hypocondriac.
Friends don't let friends use multiple inheritance.
Wouldn't it be possible to include some sort of radiation reducer, like a steel mesh or some such, on the user's side of the phone
They do!
Stay up and watch late night TV. In between the Psychic Network and the Sharper Image Personal Cooler ads you will find a handy little attachment for any cell phone. It comes with the signal booster you buy for $19.95.
Remember, You are unique...just like everyone else.
This article doesn't affect me one bit. Why not?
Because I refuse to carry a cell phone.
My offtime is more valuable to me than any paycheck. Cellphones and pagers and the like are digital chains that I will not wear. When someone says to me, "I need to get ahold of you any time, any where" I tell 'em to go piss up a rope and start faxing out my resume.
-Those who dance are considered insane by those who can't hear the music.
But seriously, considering what AIDS is doing to Africa, and how many kids in the world still aren't getting immunized against serious diseases, why is the U.S. only interested in proving that our citizens are scientifically illiterate, and can't understand an explanation of the difference between ionizing and nonionizing radiation?
I wish the money spent on this cell phone "research" had gone to buy fancy medical equipment for veterinary clinics instead. I'd rather see a dog get gallbladder surgery than enrich some bottom-feeding "scientist" who should know better than to make irrelevant measurements and publish them.
Find free books.
The things people read into my sig that aren't there is a never ending source of fascination to me.
Obviously people can choose whatever license they want, but that has nothing to do with my sig. It's the limitation of freedom of usage imposed by GPL'd software that it's referring to.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Doesn't section 5 of the GPL allow you to reject the license and be bound by the usual copyright laws as they might be in your country?
I'm not sure what you're trying to say, but section 5 basically says you can't modify or redistribute the software if you don't accept the license, which is a limitation on your freedom to use the software.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
The non-acceptance of the GPL causes no loss of freedom over and above what you already have. Acceptance of the GPL causes you (by choice) to limit yourself. Ultimately, choice is, in itself, freedom.
Fine, but that's still less freedom than other licenses that let you use the software in any way you choose, without the restrictions on freedom that the GPL imposes.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Yes, you are *allowed* to. The question is: *Can* you?
From what I have seen on the Washington Beltway, the answer for most people is "no". :-b
Um, I don't have a cell phone, but mine's on the list.. I have a wireless phone.
;) so I'm not worried.
Most phones that are out on the market today are dual band (such as the Qualcomm 2760 and the Nokia 6185) and from that list there are only 3 (Audiovox PCX1100XL, Nokia 5180, Sanyo SCP-4000) that use analog only (which is what a 'Cell phone' is: analog).
oh and with the CDMA phones, it only transmits at peak power when you scream into the thing as loud as you can (which I've seen people do
The Motorola StarTAC 7867 series is towards the top of the list, with a SAR level of 1.38.
The Motorola StarTAC 7860 has the least radiation level of any phone on the chart, with a SAR level of 0.24.
The 7868 is the same phone as the 7860, but has a built-in microbrowser. What gives?
Is there really that much of a difference between the two models (I've owned both, and the only differences I've seen--including reception, etc.--was with the feature set)? Or...are the tests perhaps screwed?
b&
All but God can prove this sentence true.
So does this mean, we can sue cell phone manufacturers for selling potentially harmful devices to us to use? After all, studies have shown that radiation exposure causes cancer, so in xx years, we can sue the manufacturers (assuming they're still around).
Hey, it worked for tobacco....
This is not a troll, it is a poor attempt at humor, and a comment on the sad state of affairs here in the United States of the Offended....
I am dyslexia of borg - your ass will be laminated.
--I assume full responsibility for my actions, except the ones that are someone else's fault.
> And nobody's mentioning the most important factor, the inverse square law.
Incorrect. In reports I've seen it is often explicitly noted that the reason phone A got a lower rating than phone B was due to the antenna of phone A happened to be of a different configuration/positon than phone B. The phones were "tested in the standard phone-to-the-ear configuration", so I don't think these tests 'overlooked' this factor.
anyway I use a simple hands-free earpiece thingy, there are all the rage over here in the UK, do you have/use them in the states?
It's just a walkman earpiece thing with a microphone just down the wire.. works well. I think the quality of the sound is better too, and you can put the phone in your pocket and carry on driving or typing or cooking or whatever with both hands *g*
They are a convenience when you need them, like, say your car breaks down or you get lost looking for someone's house. My solution is usually: buy one, don't give out the number, don't have it on unless you are making a call. So your boss doesn't know you can be reached all the time or at least your phone is probably going to be off for a while.
Planning to be moderated ± 1: Bad Pun.
I was going to post something similar, but I figured someone else had said it before me. Anyone have any reference material on the radiation of (looks around) my monitor, my mouse (which I can hear on AM radio), my headphones (which are directly on my head 8+ hours a day), the fluorescent lights in the cube, a 900 mhz cordless phone, or the sun? 1.49 gigawatzits sounds like a lot more than .79 but is it really worth worrying about?
OT, a SAR in my TLA dictionary maps to "Submit and Report," an official bug report process at my old job. How did they get that abbreviation from W/kg?
Planning to be moderated ± 1: Bad Pun.
Given that my phone is an Ericcson KF-788.... that's really assuring....
Time to buy a new phone, methinks. (Although, this might explain why I've been having these strange powers appearing... laser eyes, telekinesis, the whole nine yards!)
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
Spoken like a true non-believer.
I can think of many reasons to have a Cell phone, and the only people who "bother" me are the so-called "cellemarketers". I haven't been called by one of them since the first time when I told them I was in Italy paying $20/minute for connection and expected recompense.
If you believe everything you read, you'd better not read. - Japanese proverb
I rarely use my cell phone. But you've got to wonder about the people who are constantly on those things. To think by now, after a few years of cell phone use, that some people might have some sort of damage from it. Has anyone heard about that?
/*drunk.. fix later*/
Read post 47
They've also found Him in tortillas. Cool.
----
Deepthroat my submarine, swallow my seamen.
The truth is clear... cell phones are obviously a government creation designed to test the effects of microwave radiation on humans! So far though, all they've found is that it heats up the side of your head...
End of lesson. You may press the button.
Plus mine is really high in analog mode and the provider for mine has almost no digital service.
So.. in 30 years, my wife and I can spend our time in the hospital together dying from brain cancer.
I love our world.
Shameless Plug! If you like trance, tell me what you think!!
I'm actually surprised that my Samsung SCH-3500 had a higher rating than my friend's Motorola i1000plus. My phone never seems to interfere with anything, but his will trip GFI's, screw up big screen TVs, and make you think your monitor is about to explode.
My Nokia is on the list of "brain fryers." Yikes! click-thru
Be sure to visit Joystick101.org for in-depth gaming news.
This just came out today, as seen in ScienceDaily:
Electromagnetic Fields Affect Human Cells
"Electromagnetic fields, similar to those found in overhead power lines, can have a biological effect on human cells, an effect that could contribute to the complex cellular process that leads to cancer, research at Michigan State University shows."
So this may actually be something to worry about.
... Motorola StarTAC. I researched radiation levels and features of the phones before I bought my phone and Motorola StarTAC 7797 came out as the winner in my book. It's very small (fits better in a pocket than any other phone out there), digital, supports all advanced stuff (except WAP but who needs that anyway?!).
It's nice to see it 5th on the lowest radiation chart with SAR level of only 0.39 which is a fraction of what someo of the other phones emit.
Twas written...
"The claim that microwaves can't do anything because they are not ionizing radiation is at best doubtful. How do we know that there isn't a chemical substance in the brain which resonates at the frequencies of these transmitters and which will selectively absorb energy from them causing a breakdown of the chemical from selective heating? "
Errr, water?
Microwaves are commonly used in chemical spectroscopy as they represent the changes in (pure) rotational energy levels of molecules.
Personally I am highly sceptical about claims that the radiation is particularly harmful - just isn't enough evidence yet.
Elgon
If you make a search in cnet wireless section, there IS a nokia 918 cell phone.. but that page dont tell anything about radiations. Well whatever
Bilange
Dont make misteaks.
"...a generation of kids has grown up thinking Trance is the shittiest music since country and western." - Paul van Dyk
Another scare the public report by CNET. The fact is that cell phones emit no "radiation", they radiate electromagnatic RF. There is big difference since radiation would require a nuclear particules and RF is just electromagnatic energy. If your cell phone has a nuclear power supply then I would worry about the amount of nuclear radiation that is emitted!
Will the last company to abandon Linux please turn off the lights??!
Hmm. Intresting. But do we really have to worry, is that much radiation really gonna kill us? I would be more afraid of standing next to a microwave for too long.
snowulf.com
As an owner of the model listed as number 2 on the "highest radiation" list, I can only say this: I'm not sure at all whether science will show direct cancer risk, but throughout the (industry-sponsored) studies linked to the chart page, one phrase mentioned time and again was "non-thermal" damage. I'm not seeing what anyone thinks about the damage due to heating of subdermal tissues. My 'lil Nokia gets so hot during use that I had the first phone sent back - I was sure it was defective! The sensation can be compared to a pressure against the side of my skull... maybe the tissues expanding due to the heat. Personally, I'm pretty concerned about this. The body has an impressive thermal regulation system, but maybe these little microwave generators (remember, we "nuke" something in the microwave oven) are messing with something best left alone. Until I personally have a better handle on what the deal is, I think I'll go buy an earpiece, and nuke some part of my body other than my brain.
political_news.c: warning: comparison is always true due to limited range of data type
They say that "The SAR level listed in our chart represents the maximum SAR level with the phone next to the ear--obtained through required FCC tests." However most phones and cellular systems use an automatic power control to minimize interference between users. This means that when you are close to a base station that the transmit power on the phone is turned down. The maximum transmit power is rarely achieved unless you are in an area with base stations spaced far apart (rural areas).
As a personal side note, media outlets posting information such as this, accomplishes nothing more than confusing the general public. Even though they put their nice disclaimer:
"It's also important to note that in publishing this list are we in no way implying that cell-phone use is or isn't harmful to your health. The jury is still out, research is ongoing, and we will continue to monitor its results."
the general public does not have enough education to draw the correct conclusion (That phone X puts out more radiation than phone Y, and that is it). Posting this information in a scientific journal would have been more appropriate (and more credable).
Karma: Abstruse (Mostly as a result of using words nobody understands)
> changes its power depending on how much is necessary to reach the cell base
It changes for more than that too. CDMA, the digital technology that over-advertised Sprint PCS and others use, change power levels based on activity. When you talk, you broadcast at a higher power level then when you are just listening. This is done basically for power saving reasons, but there are also other reasons related to CDMA specifically (Ec/Io signal to noise levels). There isn't a constant power level.
something clever
I agree that it's weak to worthless, but it's still *something*. It's not non-existant.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
It's possible that the mechanism for cancer formation isn't fully understood. Nor all the mechanisms and functions of various brain tissue.
So since we don't know of a mechanism for cell-phone emissions for causing cancer, neither can we explain the results of some of the studies, like the impact on reaction time, and memories that cell-phone emissions have been observed to produce.
Never let your model of the universe surpass or supplant your observations. When you do that, you are essentially a religious fanatic.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Flouride in the water reduces IQ.
Deisel fuel particles increase allergies.
Magnetic fields from power lines cause cancer.
Oat Bran reduces cholesterol.
Video Games cause violence.
Napster causes musicians to stop making music.
The economy responds more to liberal economic policy than to cheap oil.
Unregulated soft money causes corruption in the US political system.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Who are you talking to?
Are they stressing you out? Tell them to fuck off. Go on. Do it! It's good for you!
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
Can you give me a source?
e r/moulder.html
the source was an article from this bloke in a newspaper article. After a quick search I could not find this particlar claim so I'll have to retract it. But I did find on his site a lot of very interesting related cell-phone related info.
http://www.electric-words.com/cell/sindex.html
http://www.electric-words.com/cell/industry/mould
thanks for the reply.
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
is that an analog or digital phone?
figures I've seen, indicate digital cell phones can output up to 4X times the range (4watts).
it would be good if you expanded this idea on prolonged exposure and the heat effects on a specific area of the brain (say just where the tip of the phone is located). Is it possible that repeated heating/cooling can have some biological effect at cellular level on the immediate surrounding area? I wonder how brain tissue behaves with such exposure?
peterrenshaw ~ Another Scrappy Startup
One of these was also posted in Wired Magazine last month (the one with the US flag done in text on the cover)
It talked about the different frequencies as well as differences between the left and right side of your head.
In Vino Veritas
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Let's consider effective radiated power, which is a combination of antenna gain (or loss) and transmitter power delivered to the antenna. It should be about the same from phone to phone, it's actually supposed to meet a standard. At 800 MHz one can assume that the phone antenna is within a half-wavelength of the head no matter what the configuration of the phone, although this might not be true for 1900 and 2100 MHz. If the antenna is perpendicular to your head, I.E. horizontal, it's not going to be very efficient at reaching the cell site compared to a vertical antenna. The cell site will probably get less signal and will command the phone to increase power!
I think the variations we are seeing here have more to do with how it was measured than anything else. If the phones were actually measured in the same rig instead of individually, we'd probably see very different values.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Just a tip...
When you type a message on Slashdot, your spelling and capitalization will be better if you're not also talking on your cellphone at the same time
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
The main problem with this is not so much the health concerns (which there's no evidence for, as I understand it; I doubt it heats up your head more than a little exercise does). Rather, it's the 50% wasted power output by the cell phone.
In any case, before long this might be a moot point; there are various companies working on ways to tune the emission pattern so that most of the power is directed away from your head. (e.g. by using a phased antenna array, or by putting some sort of non-absorbing mirror like a photonic crystal on one side.)
If a thing is not diminished by being shared, it is not rightly owned if it is only owned & not shared. S. Augustine
They've been noticing more instances of brain cancer in the area where a cell phone's antena is next to the head, often times in the general shape of the antena.
Who is "they"? What study are you refering to? As far as I know, no statistically valid study has ever shown a link between cell phone usage and tumors. There has been plenty of anecdotal evidence - but hell, there is plenty of anecdotal evidence that the 'Psychic Friends Network' can really tell you if you significant other is cheating on you.
-josh
There is absolutely no conclusive evidence and not even an convincing proposed mechanism by which such low energy EM radiation could possibly harm living tissue, other than by warming it up a bit.
Radio waves are far far below the energies required to ionize atoms and thus cause harm to DNA, so I can't possibly see how even the worst phone could cause cancer or any other disease for that matter.
If you can postulate a mechanism by which a slight warming (I think a few tenths of a degree C) of the brain can cause cancer or disease let me know...
-josh
It seems to me that there's a big question in the air as to whether or not this radiation is doing anything. It also seems to be at such a low level that there doesn't seem to be much risk anyhow.
In an unrelated article, I saw radiation levels of different household products. A Television puts out nearly three times as much as my Mobile Phone (Nokia 5190 -- I'm assuming the numbers of the 5160 are close, if not the same). A microwave puts off nearly 5 times as much. The best part? The measurements for the TV were taken at a distance of 10 feet.
Paranoia is rampant in the technology world.
Second, I read an article in IEEE last month and they looked at the various studies about cell phones and their usage and if it causes 'brain cancer' and what kind of side effects using cell phones may have on us. The article had went over several studies. Each study did showed that different phones had different levels of radiation. However when trying to link to brain cancer they ALL were inconclusive. However they did mention that the amount of radiation that they produce does affect your brain. Cell phone radiation heats the brain much like certain types of thinking does. One of the studies showed that people who used a cell phone were given a quiz before using the phone and they tested their score and time. After using the phone they were given a similar quiz, only this time there responses were faster. (They didn't say weather they were right or wrong just faster or slower). Apparently using a cell phone will pre heat your brain.
No I don't think it would make you smarter.
I don't want a lot, I just want it all!
Flame away, I have a hose!
Only 'flamers' flame!
Motorola's timeport and talkabout have the same configuration as the StarTAC, with the antenna pointed away from the head extending from the lower half of the flip. (in fact, they seem to be the same phone in a shiny new case) But those phones (along with another starTAC model) fared significantly worse (they made the 10 worst chart) than the StarTAC. Anybody know why?
Here's the numbers from the chart (digital only):
StarTAC 7860: 0.24
StarTAC 7867: 1.38
Talkabout T8167: 1.38
Timeport P8167: 1.38
This rating system is meaningless. It merely gives manufacturers another thing to advertise such a "new and improved", recyclable, and "less fat". Most people won't have a clue what the numbers mean.
.004 lower than the other. We should buy it. I don't want cancer !"
"Gee, look honey. This phone is
"Why certainly, dear ! I'll take the Radio Shaft XL-800 cell phone, please"
If you want to know how dangerous cell phones are (RF wise), you need to look at the population of ham radio operators and various professionals who use UHF radios on a regaular basis. These groups are exposed to 10 to 5000 more times the power that cell phone users are. (Hint: They're not -- and this is coming from a ham radio operator who's an environmentalist)
Tired of being "punished" by the Slashdot $rtbl since 2002. I'm now over at http://soylentnews.org/ .
If you're an optics geek, you could crunch the numbers and give yourself a better idea of the nature of the source at close distances... Of course the "real" answer is going to be something between squared and linear.
In any field, find the strangest thing and then explore it. -John Archibald Wheeler
why my samsung SCH-3500 ALWAYS gives me a severe headache after about a 5 minute phone call? It's down near the bottom of the radiation range for digital mode (which is all I use it in) at .6 W/kg.
What's up? Where are the bio-tech geeks?
-- IANAEG - I am not an elder god.
Absolutely. That's exactly what the "Adelaide study" did. I think by now we can be pretty sure heating is not the mechanism, but there does appear to be some mechanism that does indeed produce change. Even DNA changes have been observed in some laboratory tests. The exact mechanism for these and other changes may not be known for some time to come.
See post #207 for some links to sites that have more info on this. There is indeed a lot we don't know yet, but then hubris has always been a problem, hasn't it?
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
Radiation does not have to be ionizing to be dangerous!
I don't think anyone this side of Ted Kaczynski is arguing that all "radiation" is bad. But the people who maintain that RF "can't possibly be harmful because at these levels it doesn't have the energy to break molecular bonds" are taking a position even more ridiuculous than Ted's.
The only safe thing to say is that there is a lot we don't know, and that there is at least some evidence that even low-power RF can cause health problems. (That high-power RF can cause health problems is easily validated by defeating the safety interlock on your microwave oven. I don't recommend that you try that, as you'll probably need new corneas afterwards, if you're lucky..)
A couple of sites not mentioned yet that have a good set of reasonable links about possible risks:
Australian Journalist Stewart Fist's collection of General Cellphone Health risk links
Fist's list of links to scientific data and papers on the issue
I had another really good one or two bookmarked, but apparently they've moved. If I find out where they went, I'll post the info.
There are links in the above to the many studies that show a linkage between wireless phone usage (especially the GSM and other TDMA CancerPhones (my term, not his)) and non-trivial biological effects. We clearly don't understand this complex issue yet, but to say there's nothing there is simply to be ignorant of the facts, or take a blind position based on a wish.
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
Electric or magnetic fields. Instead of the quantum picture of individual photons, consider the classical picture of an electromagnetic wave. A time-varying magnetic field will induce electric currents in a conductive medium.
:-) (and your brain isn't an ideal gas, either, but whatever).
Buddy, I've got news for you. The classical model is wrong. Albert Einstein won his Nobel Prize for his work on the photoelectric effect. In a nutshell, the photoelectric effect says that the photons striking a metal must have sufficiently high individual energy (read frequency) for there to be any electric current. For some metals, a bright red light will have absolutely no effect, while an extremely dim blue light will produce a current. The threshold frequency depends on the metal. For the record, the frequency (and energy) of visible light is several orders of magnitude higher than that of microwave radiation. I saw a demonstration of the photoelectric effect in my physics class just the other day...
What this means is that microwaves don't have sufficient energy to ionize any molecules you'll find in your brain.
So, you might ask, how do microwaves cook food? The food absorbs the photons, and gains energy, in the form of heat. (The photons are of sufficient energy to excite certain vibrational states of water molecules).
So why is it a bad idea to put your head in a microwave, but OK to use a cellphone? Look at the power output on each. Your microwave is probably about 750 watts, most of which is absorbed by the food. By comparison, your cell phone puts out 0.5 - 1 watt, most of which is not absorbed by your head. Having your head heated at a rate of some small fraction of a watt just isn't significant--the heat will easily be dissipated faster than it can accumulate (exercising probably does a hell of a lot more to heat your brain). Having your head heated at a rate of 750 watts means heat is going into your brain faster than it can leave. There's the difference. I could go into the physics of what happens to pressure when you hold volume constant and increase temperature, but I don't think that's necessary
This is why I like physics better than biology. Biologists can spend millions of dollars on research trying to figure out whether cell phones cause cancer, and not know the answer. A physicist can sit down for 5 minutes, and give you a more definite answer than you'll ever get from the biologist.
the classical model is not simply "wrong", retard, it is only less precise than quantum mechanics.
In some circumstances (i.e., the photoelectric effect) the classical model makes predictions that are completely wrong. The classical model predicts that any frequency of "light" should be able to liberate electrons from atoms, and that the frequency should only affect the rate at which electrons are liberated. In contrast, the standard model (i.e. quantum mechanics) predicts that a certain minimum frequency is required to liberate electrons. The classical model also fails completely to explain things like the two-slit interference pattern with single photons...
hmm well this is amusingly moronic. the photoelectric effect says no such thing about current. if it did, radios would not work. the photoelectric effect states photons striking a metal must have sufficiently high individual energy to EJECT AN ELECTRON FROM THE METAL ATOM.
You're partially right here. I should have been more specific--I meant current due to the photoelectric effect. However, radios work by causing already free electrons to move, not by ionizing atoms.
"So, you might ask, how do microwaves cook food?"
no he didnt ask you stupid twat, and he clearly has an understanding of the process if you even bothered to read the whole post.
I know he didn't ask, and yes, I read his post. I said that because I'd seen many other people make the point about microwave ovens, and I wanted to address that.
You appear to have some knowledge of physics, but absolutely none of manners or social skills. Guess that's to be expected from an AC...
So is that why my 'nads feel funny after having my Thinkpad in my lap for an hour or two looking at pr0n?
It's only scientific if you have a control group sleeping on laptops that aren't running. And I'd wager that whether it's running or not, using a laptop as a pillow is gonna make you feel funny.
We often think that we've removed ourselves from the evolutionary chain.
Radiation emitting phones are a good example of how this is not true. If you think about it, we've introduced a new variable into our environment that can adversely affect us. Those with genetics making them less likely to be affected by radiation beamed into their brain will go on without batting an eye (or getting brain cancer so to speak). Those who are more susceptible to the effects of low-level radiation will begin to be removed from the gene pool.
We haven't removed ourselves from evolution. We're just changing the path we are taking by introducing new variables into our environment.
EMUSE.NET
"We're sorry, but the website you're trying to reach has been disconnected."
> when you're actually wondering, "Could this EMF emitter next to my brain get my ass killed?"
I'm using the scientific method. It's a pretty damn good tool for determining the validity of falsifiable hypotheses.
If you'd care to describe your tool, and why it's better, please go ahead. As of right now, the only "tool" I see you using is FUD.
> since we don't know much about the brain, then the probability is correspondingly higher
> that [Substance X might exist and create localized heating in response to low-level EMF] and lead to
> brain damage.
In what way does our lack of knowledge about the brain increase the probability that a substance exists whose properties are determined only by someone's need to support a theory whose implications are unsupported by the existing data?
And I'd say that we do know enough about the brain to know what brains are made of, and whether or not such a substance exists?
I'm not saying "why has nobody (on your side) done the experiment", I'm asking "why has nobody (on your side) even posited a possible chemical structure for this mystical substance"?
As long as we're engaging in ad-hominem attacks, I'd bet $1000 that if we did fund such an experiment, and it proved conclusively that no such substance existed in brains, the proponents of your side of the argument would posit that phlogiston, or aether, or some substance undetectable by experiment, existed.
(Don't believe me? Look at all the people who fall for therapeutic touch, creation science, or other bunk - yes, bunk - and who come up with increasingly-Rube-Goldberg contraptions to explain their results in the face of scientific evidence to the contrary.)
Science doesn't work that way. Sorry if you don't get it. If you want to believe things in the face of the evidence, go ahead. But until you can come up with the evidence, please don't try to call the basis for your belief "scientific".
>conclusion is present. Otherwise, the "simplest explanation" of why volcanoes erupt would still
> be "because God is mad at us."
The reason that's not a "simple" explanation is that it presupposes the existence of an omnipotent (or at least volcanopotent :) being.
The reason I believe the doomsayers of cellphone radiation do not posess the "simpler" explanation (in Occam's sense) is because they also seem to presuppose the existence of mechanisms solely to support a theory - whereas the data do not yet support said theory.
> I think the poster was more supporting caution until more results are in than Chicken-Littling.
Where one draws the line between caution and Chicken-Littling is a matter of personal preference. I use data to determine where I draw the line. Others, apparently, do not.
All that said, risk assessment is one of those things where the rules of probability tend to be thrown out the window.
(Canonical examples - some people feel safer behind the wheel of a car than on an airplane. Still others will refuse to board an airplane altogether, but laugh off the asteroid threat as pie-in-the-sky doomsaying. People won't play a 50/50 game where you put down $1.00 to win $2.00, but will spend buckets on lottery tickets. Go fig.)
> what empirical evidence has shown to be true, especially if it flies in the face of known principles
> of biology, physics, etc
Abso-friggin-lutely.
I agree that the studies on cellphone radiation are useful - and if the weight of the evidence changes in favor of the hypothesis that it's harmful, then I'll change my opinion.
Your comment on "especially" if the evidence flies in the face of established knowledge also rings true. It's been said that "the only way to see a revolutionary advance in physics has been to wait for all the old physicists to die".
Einstein spent the latter part of his life refusing to accept quantum physics. Scientists are people too.
Yes, it is truly a piece of crap when it comes to a cell, but it isn't even listed on the chart. Does this mean that it doesn't emmit radiation, but nobody cares? Or maybe it's that the dam thing is too big and heavy to fit in the testing machine ;)
.. I'd just sit on my front steps, and zap anybody who is driving and talking on the phone at the same time!
;)
Personally, I'm hoping for the radiation one. There's nothing I'd like better then to wake up one morning, and being able to shoot lazers out of my eyes. In fact, if I did, I wouldn't go to school
Now, if you'll excuse me, my phone just rang.. it is my chiropractor. (Apparently the phone is too heavy for me to cradle on my shoulder.
------------
CitizenC
Just because you get headaches doesn't mean that the transmission to and from the base station is causing that headache. It could very well be from the electrical field of the phone interfering with your body's electrical field. Normally this isn't a good thing, but because your brain uses a fair amount of low level electricity, putting any active circuit near it is a Bad Thing(tm). I'd bet that your cell phone uses a sizable amount of electricity.
Another option is that you're in a high population zone where more cell phones are in use. This means each phone needs to "shout louder" to be heard over the others, which means both more transmissions and more battery usage. Also, some places (such as Taiwan) have regulations for how often Base Stations need to keep in contact with cell phones. In Taiwan, your battery life will be much lower than in other areas, which will definitly contribute to the total amount of stray electricity interfering with your brain.
-Ted
What if it's not cellphone radiation that causes brain cancer but rather cell phone radiation scattering off the magnetic strip on your credit cards? Has anyone thought of that?
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
Take ultraviolet radiation as an obvious example; it clearly causes cancer.
Even simple, low power magnetic fields have biological effects. Higher powered magnetic fields can do even more to sensitive tissues like the brain.
So, as you said, don't believe the hype, believe the physics, but you must also ALWAYS believe what empirical evidence has shown to be true, especially if it flies in the face of known principles of biology, physics, etc. It is specifically because we find these "rule breakers" that we discover important new phenomena, and are able to refine/correct our existing equations.
Note that I am not saying that cell phone radiation is harmful; however, there isn't enough evidence to say it is clearly NOT harmful.
Personally, I'd shop for a model with a higher rf output. Presumably, it'll send a stronger signal. The biggest gripe I have with my cellphone is that it cuts out when I go into large department stores, so I can't wander around while I'm asking the s.o. what to buy.
Oh, and yes, I use the hands-free kit, so in the unlikely event that rfi turns out to be harmful to brain cells, the only ones I have to worry about are the ones in my hips. ;->
The Web is like Usenet, but
the elephants are untrained.
While there are some interesting bone therapies that use low frequency, I just don't see the problem with microwaves. I knew someone with a degenerative hip. Part of his therapy was to wear a pair of magnets strong enough to make a phone reciever hum. It was not a good thing to put on the head! But don't listen to me, trust some of these folks intead:
Here, for those who have asked, are some more specific links about cell phones. http://www.mcw.edu/gc rc/ cop/cell-phone-health-FAQ/toc.html http://www.foxnews.com/sci enc e/junkscience/000721.sml http://www.microwavenews.com/makesense.html
How much money has to be spent before this issue dies? I don't know, there's money in it.
Poster worries about the health of people who use cell phone while driving, mountian climbing, skakeboarding, bike riding, you get the picture. Poster does not own a cellphone, because it cost too much.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
A scientist would reject the claim as being unsupported by the evidence. Until your side of the debate can come up with the evidence, your claim is invalid.
One could make the argument that by marketing cell phones, the manufacturers are making an implicit claim that they ARE safe, and thus they have the burden of proof.
I worry at the way this "scientific" argument is being applied. "Are cell phones safe?" is not a theoretical scientific question to be examined objectively for as long as we want and hold the answer agnosticly positive till proof otherwise. It's a public safety issue and should (IMHO) be approaced like a new pharmacutical or food additive - riggorous testing before release, provisional acceptance and monitoring after release.
Kahuna Burger
...will work for Chick tracts...
The rats+cancer study is very often quoted by people afraid of radio waves, but unfortunately while very shocking, the study's results couldn't be repeated. It's possible there was something wrong with the experimentation process or that it was just a fluke. People believing that this proves anything either way have too much faith in scientists.
icqqm [ICQ:11952102]
Hmm.... notice all the ads at the bottom of the page for some of the most-offending phones?
Perhaps we need to put "low-radiation" stickers on cell phones to get them to shut the hell up. ;^)
--
Wooden armaments to battle your imaginary foes!
This just in: trampolines are dangerous -- story at 11.
Just another example of how the media is dumbing down the public by leading them to believe in bad science.
--
Wooden armaments to battle your imaginary foes!
Did anyone read the article in IEEE Spectrum a few months ago?
For every study that points to this kind of radiation causing cancer, there is another that proves it to be a wash and cancer rates are unaffected by this kind of radiation exposure. The UW paper/study was recreated and found to be a wash.
Each human being has different sensitivities to radiation. There might be a genetic trait to susceptibility to cancer. Maybe not. Sure, at some point we all get cancer, but at what frequency (ionizing radiation) and what power level? Radio waves pass through us all day.
It comes down to this: your choice. If you don't need a cell/PCS phone, don't use it. If you do, use a headset. What causes most deaths? People not paying attention when they're driving and talking. Not the radiation. That's where the first laws need to be established.
The other question that concerns me is the validity of the actual numbers. From what I was led to understand from an IEEE spectrum article a couple months back is that the SAR numbers are very dependent on head shape, location of the phone in relation to the head, etc.
From that article, it sounded like SAR numbers for any phone were typically just a WAG.
You seem to want to win some sort of argument. Arguments are intellectual fights. As I have said in other posts - because I am a certified expert in fighting I understand that winning a fight has nothing to do with being right or wrong - the winner of a fight is the winner of the fight and nothing else. A point which many intelligent people fail to understand.
Fights are destructive to both parties involved - I seek to avoid them wherever possible. The idea of arriving at something as fragile beautiful, precise and delicate as the truth by means of something as crude and destructive as a fight is ludicrous.
For many years the intellectually strong have wielded the power of science as though it were a weapon to bludgeon lesser minds into submission. I won't put up with that sort of behavior - the scientific method is an intellectual tool - not a weapon to be used to establish some ego gratifying pseudo superiority with.
As i said - I don't want to fight. But fighting is what I do for recreation - and I am really good at it. If you want a fight - I'll give you a fight you will never forget. It won't be some namby pamby debate - with rules and a referee. It will be an all out street fight where you don't get to whine about ad hominem or anything else forbidden under the dainty Marquis of Queensberry rules of using logic for intellectual sparring.
In your post you behave as though you believe that winning a fight is proof that you are right - it is not.
If you wish to have a civil discussion of the proper use of the scientific method I would be happy to join in; there is a good chance I could learn something important in such a discussion.
If on the other hand you want to establish your dominance - score points, count coup, and ring buzzers of humiliation in my face, then I will do my best to rip your know-it-all head off of your shoulders and shove it up your arrogant ass - the choice is yours.
Just because there aren't any valid studies doesn't mean that something isn't true. A point which 'cynics' often conveniently ignore.
As I have pointed out before the key word in the phrase 'anecdotal evidence' is 'evidence', 'anecdotal' is a modifier which tells what type of evidence it is. A wise person understands this and judges how much weight to give the evidence. It is just as bad a mistake to always assign a value of zero to anecdotal evidence as it is to always assign a value of 100% to it. Sometimes anecdotal evidence is the only evidence there is. If the early people in the nuclear radiation field hadn't paid attention to the anecdotal stories of health problems of people dealing with radioactive materials why would anyone have ever done any studies on the subject?
We have never subjected large quantities of people to close up microwave transmitters. Any time you do new things you discover things you didn't know before.
The claim that microwaves can't do anything because they are not ionizing radiation is at best doubtful. How do we know that there isn't a chemical substance in the brain which resonates at the frequencies of these transmitters and which will selectively absorb energy from them causing a breakdown of the chemical from selective heating?
To say "Its safe because I don't see any way it could be dangerous" is pretty arrogant.
The skull will absorb more than the brain though, for what its worth
This will be the next great fraternity prank. New recruits will be required to spend their pledge time on the cell phone. At their initiation party, they'll shut off the lights and watch their heads glow. For added effect, they'll fix the antennae to be in the shape of the frat's greek symbols.
1) Yes RF may be non-ionizing, but it does get absorbed by the human body, and it must be converted into something (usually heat). I have heard that exposure to strong RF energy will cause cataracts (the eyes are apparently the most sensitive to RF energy). See this WHO page. Note we talking about power levels in the hundreds of watts. Kinda like your microwave oven, but not enough for you head to explode like an egg or any other immediate effects. The strongest handheld transmitter I have used is 5 watts.
2) Even with the same power level different antennas radiate different amounts of energy towards the human head. Energy that is absorbed by the head is lost and is useless for communication, in addition to possible health hazards. The EE department at my University was doing research in the area. I saw 3D models of the human head and the power absorbed by the different tissues due to particular cell phones. They were working on antennas that radiated less power towards the head, and more away.
5a. Motorola ST7797 -- 0.39
They may or may not cause brain damage, but those people who drive with them probably already have all the brain damage they can handle.
--
Chief Frog Inspector
A feeling of having made the same mistake before: Deja Foobar
You're tellin' me.
Ever since I got this Nokia 6185, I just can't sp0rt the m@dd w00d like I used to.
Richard
----
Deepthroat my submarine, swallow my seamen.
I tried napping with my head on laptop, and now my
ear is sore and I drooled in the dvd slot...
Remain calm! All is well!
I've seen TV shows on this topic (like all of us have), and one factor that nobody here seems to be mentioning is that you can make a BIG difference in the amount of radiation that your head absorbs by the way you hold your phone. If you hold it so that the antenna is touching your head, (not as the designers intended, the mouthpiece needs to be infront of your mouth), then the difference of an inch or two is HUGE because of the inverse square law. If you hold the phone at an angle, allowing the antenna to point AWAY from your head (those tiny flip-phones do that already), it holds that antenna of death an inch or two further away, which really does make a huge difference in the amount of power - and supposedly this is what is responsible for the huge differences in reported radiation absorbtion some testers have seen - and claimed that the industry was underreporting their measurements, when really, it had to do with the position of the phone. It may also be the reason why some people are getting cancer and others are not, maybe they hold their phones differently.
Anyway, if I was forced to carry one of these damn things, I'd use a headset. I'd much rather have hip cancer than brain cancer.
These are my friends, See how they glisten. See this one shine, how he smiles in the light.
I just read an article in Time about this.. the sidebar had a study back in 1997 about how mice were exposed to a 30 minute dose of cell-phone radiation for 18 months.
They developed tumors at twice the rate of non-exposed mice.
Draw your own conclusions.. reportedly objections were raised about the study, but the sidebar didn't go into too much detail, so that's all the info I have.
BilldaCat
Of course, the question that no one bothers to ask is this--how much of this radiation is reflected by the skull? Any physics grad students out there who have had to answer this question in class, and can share results with us? I know of a prof here at The University of Texas at Austin who sometimes requires reports on this in grad electro-dynamics (w/Jackson, of course). Can't give any numbers, but it turns out that most of the stuff never makes it to your brain anyway....
..is that they rate the Ericsson T-28 world the top phone in their "world phones" article as well as the top emitter in the cell phone emissions article!
just my blog and pix
What's really great about this report is that the list has links to the page on C|Net about the phone. So if you're happy with seeing the phone on a top ten radiation list, click it and go ahead and buy it. That's worse than Deja.
Where's the review on which helmets best protect the head from this awful radiation? I may be getting a cell phone soon and I don't know which helmet to buy. Standard motorcycle? Fencing mask? Steel Colander? People must be crazy to use one of these things without proper protection. At least I'll know when I'm walking down the street with my full size helmet that I won't be mistaken for one of those weird people putting all that radiation in their head. I feel sorry for them. They must be so embarassed.
Your right, there is no evidence yet. But the theory is not that the cell phone will deposit charge, it is that cell phones may potentially cause localized heating that would have an adverse affects on cells (i.e. cancer). At this point, no one knows the truth and you are right that some people are blowing it out of proportion. In fact, this article is a big waste of space, but there is a small potential that cell phones can cause problems.
My bigger concern is all the freaking nuts who use their cell phone all the time. They are very dangerous, especially behind the wheel of a motor vehicle. I suggest we worry about that before we worry about the potential for cancer if someone uses their cell phone for 10 hours a day.
So dammit, I'm in violent agreement.
Well, my cell phone, the Nokia 5160, is only the second highest radiation emitter, but I'm hoping my personal score is off the charts.
Why?
Simple, I live in Fremont, Center of the Universe, in the midst of Seattle. Not only do I have cool towers pumping out HDTV up on Queen Anne to deal with, I like to brunch on Capitol Hill, where we have even more. And I work blocks from KOMO/4 and KING/5 and take the bus past KCPQ/13, so I'm hoping I get my recommended daily dose of mutation-inducing raditation.
Hey, someone's got to spawn the next race of Net-optimized super beings, and I think I'm up for the job.
--- Will in Seattle - What are you doing to fight the War?
OK, here's one to ponder - _IF_ there are health effects from cellular phones, is there any difference between the "GSM" ones and the "CDMA" ones? Here's why I ask:
1. Cel phones do not emit what is traditionally called "ionizing radiation" (UV, X-ray, gamma ray) - photons with enough energy to knock electrons out of atoms and break chemical bonds. Yes, this type of radiation causes cancer. No, cel phones do not emit it. Period.
2. My cel phone does, however, emit some radiation at a frequency that is capable of effecting electrochemical changes in biological molecules. Specifically, the power LED and LCD backlight emit photons of visible light that interact with my retina. The energy per photon of this radiation is roughly 1/2 of that of the UV at the low end of the "ionizing radiation" spectrum. Let's say a wavelength of 500 nm for "visible", 250 nm for "ionizing". (energy per photon is proportional to 1/wavelength)
3. The "interesting" radiation from the phone is at a frequency of approx. 3 GHz. This gives a wavelength of 10 cm, or 100,000,000 nm. In other words, the energy per photon is 200,000 times less than that of visible light and 400,000 times less than that of "ionizing" radiation.
4. I know that microwave ovens cook food. A cel phone uses a lot less power than a microwave oven. Consider this - it would hurt to stick your hand in a toaster for 5 minutes. That's infrared / visible radiation, with a higher energy per photon than your microwave. Does that mean that all infrared and visible radiation is harmful? Does it mean you will burn your brain if you sit next to a candle? Our bodies contain a lot of water, which has a high heat capacity. We also have circulating blood and an evaporative cooling system which allows us to regulate our temperature. Thermal radiation is only a problem at intensity levels which overload our body's regulating systems.
5. So the question now is, what's left in cel-phone radiation that could cause cancer or other biological effects? This is where I would be interested to hear the opinions of people who know more about these areas:
- Biological systems are quite sensitive to the shape of molecules. Microwave ovens heat food by exciting certain rotational/vibrational modes of water molecules. Is it possible that some interesting biological molecules are tuned so that microwave photons can distort their shape or alter the rate of some chemical reaction?
- Electric or magnetic fields. Instead of the quantum picture of individual photons, consider the classical picture of an electromagnetic wave. A time-varying magnetic field will induce electric currents in a conductive medium. The magnetic field itself will exert a force on moving electrons (Hall effect). Cel phones are easily capable of interfering with nearby electronic devices - some phones make the picture on computer monitors jump around, or produce audible pops and buzzing from cheap radios. The human brain is a rather delicate electrical system. Is it totally unaffected by the same levels of EM fields which interfere with electronic appliances? [I don't know the answer here]
6. If there are any actual interactions according to this last point (which to me seems to be the most likely, _IF_ there's anything there at all), shouldn't the effects be more pronounced with GSM phones than with CDMA ones? As you can see from technical references such as this one, GSM phones use "Time Division Multiple Access" where each one transmits pulses of radiation in a narrow frequency band. Conversely, CDMA phones transmit over a wide frequency range. Given the same total amount of energy being transmitted, a narrower bandwidth means a higher peak intensity of electric and magnetic fields. Therefore, wouldn't the GSM ones be more likely to cause adverse non-thermal effects in surrounding devices?
I'd agree that the ratings as written are silly, but the report missed some key facts that affect the biological impacts that each phone can have.
In particular, they ignored the extremely important factor of modulation method. Comparing raw "power output" figures for CDMA and TDMA is more like comparing apples and rocks than even apples and oranges. TDMA (and TDMA-based systems like GSM and its ilk) use a wideband, high-power transmission rigidly slotted in time. This by necessity produces a train of extremely sharp rise-time/fall-time RF power spikes that appear, at least in some studies, to have potential harmful effects on nearby biological systems. Every study that has shown a correlation between RF and potential health problems has been with either analog (which has higher radiated power in general) or TDMA/GSM digital systems. Even analog systems seem to be safer than TDMA because thier continuous modulation lacks the sharp spikiness that seems to be part of the health problem.
CDMA is fundamentally different in its physics because the RF signal is both much lower power and *continuously* spread across the entire frequency band, thus, no spikes. (CDMA is a direct sequence, not frequency-hopping, spread spectrum system.) This is just what Claude Shannon said would happen: if you spread the information out over the frequency domain, the power required to propagate the signal falls dramatically. In fact, CDMA signals are very much like background noise, which is why they were first used for secure and stealthy military communcations syustems. (The direct sequence "spreading sequence" in CDMA is evan called a PN, for "pseudo noise" code. There are a set of these codes called "gold codes" that are all orthogonal to one another, and obviously, the ones you want to use to maximize cell capacity.)
Finally, not all systems are power agile, as Bruce suggests - CDMA is, and developing the ability for the handset to be able to adjust and coordinate its power output in real time with the base station was probably the most difficult part of the engineering that went into making CDMA a commercial reality. (It was certainly responsible for CDMA's rocky and slower start in the market than the brute-force TDMA approach. Power agility is a nice-to-have for battery life in a TDMA system, but it's a gotta-have in a CDMA system of any significant density.)
It's obvious there's quite a lot we don't know about the effects of RF exposure on living things, but there's more than a little evidence to suggest that high power analog and sharp, very fast high-power spikes *may* be hazardous, so why not opt for an alternative that is likely much safer?
This is my frustration with Handspring over their (finally) perfect implementation of a phone for integration with a PDA - it's only available in GSM CancerPhone form. I'd buy one in heartbeat if I could get it with a CDMA radio.
And no, for the record, I do not work for Qualcomm or any other CDMA company - it's just better technology, and a couple of years ago, I bothered to do the research to find out the facts, as best we know them today. I also have decided, unlike some notables like Richard Branson, that carrying and using a wireless phone is worth the risks - but I made sure I understood the nature of the risk I was taking on before I accepted it.
(As an aside, I personally think all the people, even here on slashdot, decrying the "danger" of phone use while driving are luddites - there was a similar argument about the "obvious" dangers of car radios back inthe 1920's. Fortunately cooler heads prevailed...)
"The future's good and the present is nothing to sneeze at." - Roblimo's last
For starters, I spent the last two years working in Motorola's Cell Phone division, working with Cell Phones and Base Stations. Cell phones really do work like that. There is a base station determined time window at which base stations are required to check registration for new phones in the coverage area. If this window is small, the base stations have to check up the mobile phones more often which involves far more frequent Base Station and Mobile communication, even for phones that are powered on but not in use! The plus side to a smaller window is that the mobiles power up (and down) much faster.
:)
As for the body's electrical field and the impact of other electrical fields on it... The theoretical answer is that equipment exists that measures the strength and homogeneousness of a person's electrical field. Cancer patients and other people in poor physical health have much weaker fields, and the fields tend to be distorted and patchy. In contrast, pregnant women have much larger, "fuller" fields. There was an art exhibit done on this, actually, contrasting the outputted electrical field pictures of people based on their health in life. You could probably find information on this online with a google search.
Anyway, the point is that putting any strong electrical field inside of the body's electrical field causes distortions, and this is a "bad" thing. I don't know if it's bad enough to cause cancer, but it's bad enough to cause a headache.
If you want an empyrical test, try this. Plug in a laptop computer, turn it on, and make sure the power saving mode is OFF, so it should stay on for a while. Start up some CPU intensive program like PoV. Find a quite place for it and take a nap with your head on the laptop. See how you feel in an hour or two. High power usage laptops should illustrate better, of course. Hopefully that will be scientific enough to satisfy your own curiosity. (You did want a real scientific experiment, right? You're not closed minded...
-Ted
Pass it on.
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I would also like to see the following charts, which are just as valuable as this chart:
The relative levels of the magnetic fields from major credit cards.
The amount of electromagnetic radiation ("Oh no! Radiation!") given off from popular brands of flashlights.
The level of "cooties" my wife's purse gives off.
--
Sometimes it's best to just let stupid people be stupid.
Cells phones adjust their output power DYNAMICALLY.
The closer to cell tower, the LOWER the power.
A true model the actual output power, in the field, is well beyond
the scope of a simplistic measurement based on FCC filings.
What is listed is based on peak power and has little or NO correlation to
actual radiated power while the cell phone is in use.
The important part about this is not the radiation moniker, but the EMF label. There are many enzymes in your body (this includes, for most people, their brain) that contain transition metals in their active sites. Moreover, these transition metals have magnetic moments which can be affected by a magnetic field. Therefore, important catalytic activities can be hindered by magnetic activation (or deactivation) of this metal.
Also, most of the molecules in your body that are biochemically interesting are chiral. This means that they have a configuration that for all intents and purposes reacts anisotropically to EM things like polarized light and magnetic fields. A quick search through the ACS publications will show you results of chiral molecules reacting preferentially in magnetic fields.
Mind you, this post doesn't endorse the notion that EMF fields cause cancer, but merely suggests possible mechanisms to the condition. Because, on the other hand, we live in a huge magnetic field everyday...the one produced by the planet we live on. (of course the local strength is probably smaller than the one made by the phone next to your head-or nads if you use the ear/mic attachment and keep it in your pocket)
Also, your phone changes its power depending on how much is necessary to reach the cell base. If you are close to the cell and in line-of-sight, your phone will emit less RF.
And nobody's mentioning the most important factor, the inverse square law. Exposure decreases as the square of distance - which means don't hold it up to your head if you're worried, use a headset or a roof antenna on your car.
Bruce
Bruce Perens.
Oh wait... what exactly is the difference between a rat in a lab and working in a cubicle under flourescent lights surrounded by monitors, phones, power lines, and CPU's?
-m
As for the suggestion that the phone be housed in a Faraday cage, uh, wouldn't that kinda defeat the purpose of a cell phone?
Bottom line. Not everything with the word "radiation" is bad for you. Don't believe the hype, believe the physics.
(For that matter, not everything with the word "nuclear" is bad for you either. But that's another story.)
I've seen a study like that too. The rats were arrayed in tubes around a transmitter. Some more rats were arrayed without a transmitter, and still more rats were allowed to run free in their cages. The conclusion was that restraining rats in tubes causes all sorts of health problems.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Just a thought.
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