Slashdot Mirror
Laptops May Be Hazardous to Your Fertility
Spy der Mann writes "Researchers find that men who place portable computers on their laps are inadvertently raising the temperature of their scrotums -- and possibly damaging their sperm. Guess laptops should get a namechange soon... before our fertility does."
We're slashdotters after all. The only way to get sex is either paying for it or we take matters into our own hands. In either case fertility doesn't matter.
Ahhh...the great dumpster continuum. Many a free computer will be found there. -- sowth (748135)
I like having a good ball-warmer on those cold winter nights. It's just not usually my computer.
Is it just my observation, or are there way too many stupid people in the world?
is this really such a surprise???
- tristan
I talk about stuff.
I'm not sure that fertility matters to most of the guys here.
living in centrally heated houses, wearing tight fitting underwear and trousers, etc, exactly how?
as they all raise the temperature of your nuts.
http://slashdot.org/~GuyFawkes/journal
Too many humans, not enough Laptops!
Genomics was the study of genomes, or all the DNA of an organism. Proteomics was the study of the proteome, or all the proteins produced by an organism. After this study, can we expect to see scroteomics?
I think laptops should be distributed free of charge to all male participants in day-time talk shows, reality shows, "dating" shows, and all MTV reality based programming.
Trolls: The high-tech version of those morons that scrawl obscenities in public bathrooms.
IIRC, that's the first time the word "scrotum" has appeared in the front-page headlines. Congratulations, Slashdot, on a new milestone!
There's a Mercedes gap too. I want one and can't afford one, but it's not government's job to do anything about it.
The only thing this article didn't discuss was it good for a woman to use a laptop? Should I encourage my wife to strap a powerbook to her punany?
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
With two kids already, I'm done anyway thankyouverymuch.
"I'd like to trade in this 15" powerbook for a 17" please? My urologist says some of my sperm are still alive."
-- There is no sig line, only Zuul.
for some slash-dotters to evolve to something their gene-pool to a higher form of life!
just like you do with your meal when on the sofa watching bay watch.
moo
1. Destroy Fertility 2. You know... 3. Profit
http://slashdot.su/
I guess you'll have to take out Hot tubs and warm showers and tight fitting jeans as well... This is by far the dumbest thread of the week.
||| I still can't believe Parkay's not butter.
Cock and penis would get a -1 troll/offtopic attached to it. For those too lazy to RTFA, the reason why it may be hazardous is cause the optimal "sperm" production temperature is below 37 degrees. It's also the reason why the ball-sacks will change in size, to try to achieve the correct temperature. Hanging loser if it's too warm, and tightening to your body if it's too cold. Having it too warm (laptop heat) will cause a reduction in sperm quality since the body wont be able to make your ball-sacks to escape down to the floor.
The "official"/preferred name is now "notebook computer".
This heat problem always seemed very obvious to me and I avoided placing a notebook computer on my lap. My current preferred model (a Vaio) generates much less laptop heat (but more side vent heat) then my old Dell sub-notebook.
"If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid." - Epictetus
I find it uncomfortable to hold a laptop in my lap and try to type. The angle is all wrong. Is this really an issue since most laptops are used as stationary workstations?
:)
I think it's probably just some graduate student trying to get a PHD. I didn't read the article, of course.
Hey, here's some news, taking long, hot baths also kills the "little guys," as does sitting in a hot tub. There's a reason they are on the outside of the body, and it has nothing to do with being able to rub them.
Why read the article when I can just make up a snap judgement?
in a DELL training class. In 2000 I attended a training seminar for the campus wide rollout of a wireless network. Tech support training for DELL was part of the seminar and DELL sent some people.
:)
They were very adament about us calling the DELL machines given to faculty and students "portables", and never to call them "laptops". They said that the portables got so hot that extended stay on one's lap could cause injury. They didn't want the potential liability due to negligence. You could after all consider the name "laptop" to indicate positioning the machine on one's lap.
Putting a laptop on one's lap. Imagine that!
p.s.: Naturally the University still referred to this part of the "wireless initiative" as the laptop pilot program. Guess they didn't care about sperm count and liabilities
The new IBM ThinkPad... now with NadShield(TM)!
Remember, we're IT guys. Most people think we're weird anyway and should not procreate.
That's what I first read ... Then I re-read it again and noticed the powerbook along with the 15" :)
Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
I'm assuming that the problem with laptops is that becuase people keep there legs together while they have the laptop on there lap, their boys have no place to go, so they just get warmed up. So spreading the legs a bit so that they can get further away from the body, and maybe not resting the laptop right ontop of your boys might help.
Then again, I didn't read the article, and I rarely use a laptop.
Just my $0.02.
-Derek
Treat me like a marketing stat, and I'll treat your movie like a series of ones and zeros
"Guess laptops should get a namechange soon... before our fertility does."
I have always called them labtops, but I am slightly dyslexic.
OH SHIT
On another front, I wonder if we'll see the new Trojan line of laptops soon? I'll take a pass on a lubricated one, though. :)
"I'd rather be a lightning rod than a seismometer." -Ken Kesey
That'll do generally, but for the really frigid ones - you'll need a good old AMD :)
Sorry, but it was just asking for itBefore some geek wires their nutsack with a liquid cooling system!
Laptops go on sperm killing rampage
Before some of you conclude on your own that this is dangerous, read this.
On this site a few months back ("few" = [3..12]) I read a story about some swedish dudes who found a way to cheaply and without prescription make themselves sterile. Their way? To dunk their testes in water that is over 105F for an hour a day.
this killed their sperm, but the effect IS NOT PERMANENT! You will not permanetly damage anything by doing this. The effect lasts weeks but is not permanent.
If you're into painful male birth control, perhaps this is an option for you.
Guys, putting a laptop on your lap for extended periods of time will only make you temporarily less likely to conceive. It will not prevent you from generating sperm, and it will not last forever.
I normally use those foldable tables -- the type you use to serve breakfast in bed -- to use my laptop when in bed or in the couch... And sometimes I serve breakfast in bed to my wife, with good results! YMMV :-)
It's better to be the foot on the boot than the face on the pavement. ~~ tkx Kadin2048
I wonder about all those teenagers holding those EF generators next to their brains several thousand hours a year. Older studies were inconclusive, but much of the world's population uses these now.
Thank you, HP for keeping me child-free! I enjoy a nearly stress-free lifestyle and have a ton of disposable income thanks to you!
You see? You see? Your stupid minds! Stupid! Stupid!
With four children, I've been on the lookout for a backup contraception method and this definitely fits the bill. Now I just have to run heavy number crunching in the background on my PowerBook so as to raise the heat level. Say goodbye, little swimmers!
(Hey, using a kickass laptop beats getting a vasectomy anyday!)
"Why would God give us a waist if we wasn't supposed to rest our pants on it?" - Rev. Roy McDaniels
This must be the reason behind china buying IBM computer division ..birth control! :)
Pretty soon they will hand out free thinkpads to all Chinese men, you will see..
It's hard to surf left handed with a laptop on your lap. That's 50% of internet users OK then.
...The State of Mississippi has approved the Laptops for the Less Fortunate program, which is effective immediately.
It would be cool if it didn't suck.
We'll just all become infertile via laptop use. Better alternative than surgery, probably cheaper too.
More recently they are being called "Notebook PCs" or "Portables" ... It's generally used for programming in bed or reading slashdot in the loo (or *other* activities *narf*).
I remember seeing a print ad for a series of laptops which essentially had a guy sitting with a laptop bag on his side and a HOT chick in half-thigh skirt sitting on his lap . The caption just read "Laptops" in big letters and the company logo at the bottom.Quidquid latine dictum sit, altum videtur
yet another form of birth control but seriously, who comes up with this stuff? "Hey I have an idea! Lets have a bunch of guys type up some big report and then take a sperm sample!" Pretty soon we'll be testing heated car seats.
And yes, I'm married.
Phil
contraceptive?
Hey, this is a news for nerds site! Discussions of sperm count and fertility and "getting the girl" have no place here.
I mean, it's not like anyone here will ever have to worry about their sperm count. Warm 'em up, boys! Warm 'em up!
+1 Insightful, -1 Troll. What can I say, I'm an Insightful Troll.
Imagine: Despite the AIDS epidemic, the African population is still growing astronomically and is predicted to be one-fourth of the world's in 5 decades.
As an African myself, I think this has something to do with the temperature on one's body "down there", where the tool is left to dangle in the air. Men on that continent remain sexually active well into their 80's. My grandfather married again at 82, and Uganda's former president (Binaisa) who is 86 recently married a Japanese - http://pages.globetrotter.net/mleblank/msd/nv-moon -12-09-2004.html May be it's the genes or the food the people eat. It has been said that food on that continent is less contaminated with additives since most farmers are too poor to afford things like that.
If the above theory is correct, it might explain why the population of Africans in general, despite all the hardships continues to grow.
Now, the above are facts so do not mod me down. In my home country, these is [almost] no market for Viagra and the like.
Which is a better contraceptive, a Dell or a can of Mountain Dew?
The extra heat that gets trapped when you have a notebook PC on your laptop - bad for you, and bad for the PC. It's ergonomically bad aswell (esp. your neck), so just put it on a table already.
You just need to get a liquid-cooled jock strap with external radiator for scrotal overclocking.
Problem solved.
Laptop == contraceptive
Most of us here are banging fat chicks (if having sex at all) and it would really suck if we got them pregnant.
#!/
See? See? Technology is evil, because we all know only evil electronics could cause this sort of thing...
** slips back into his hottub sipping a margarita **
I for one welcome our new scrotum temperature-raising overlords.
I have a laptop!
Do you have balls cooler? ... No, not ball bearing.
" Guess laptops should get a namechange soon... before our fertility does." yeah they are called notebooks
105'F is only 41'C. That's probably not any more painful than a warm shower.
I'd also heard this was a traditional birth control method in parts of Africa. Like many of these things, you'd have to wonder how anyone came up with the idea in a pre-scientific society, but you never know. Contraception is a highly desired thing in many societies, in part because it assists with engaging in undetected "extra-pair copulations" ie. having affairs.
Freedom: "I won't!"
A couple of searches:= &q=%22Moshe+ Wald%22+Iowa&btnG=Searche arch?hl=en&lr=&q=%22Moshe+ Wald%22+fertility&btnG=Searchc om/search?hl=en&lr=&q=Yefim+She nykin&btnG=Searchd irsearch.cgi?first= &last=Shenykin&status=Any
f ertilit y/Yefim_R_Sheynkin.html
a ct /deh616v1?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT= 1&author1=Sheynkin&andorexacttitle=and&andorexactt itleabs=and&andorexactfulltext=and&searchid=110260 1583827_3870&stored_search=&FIRSTINDEX=0&sortspec= relevance&journalcode=humrep
No hits on the following:
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&lr
http://www.google.com/s
http://www.google.
http://adam.cc.sunysb.edu/acc/
However, if you take the fact that his name may have been mispelled, you've got this site:
http://www.uhmc.sunysb.edu/urology/male_in
Now I realize spelling someone's name might not be important, but thats at least one fact that must be checked.
And once you spell his name correctly, you can link to the abstract at
http://humrep.oupjournals.org/cgi/content/abstr
1. finish cloning myself tomorrow
2. build a giant death ray
3. send the death ray to space
4. Rule the world.
Pinky: hey brain, look, I can pull my lip over my head.
They might not have been the first to report the story, but they were the first ones to use the headline: Chestnuts roasting on an open FireWire
Hey, I have one kid and another on the way. I use desktops. Maybe I should switch, especially since I just set up wireless in my home. To top it off, I ride bike a lot (2000+ miles a year). It has been long known that if you aren't careful with you position and the type of seat you use, you can damage the same thing on a guy. So, I should change my position, get a really old racing seat and put bring a laptop along on all my rides to keep the old "third leg" too warm for its own good. Who knew!
He uses a laptop.
Main difference between the BSD license and the GPL license: one is from California and the other is from Massachusetts
This is Not A Problem.
I wonder if I can spend my $15 co-pay for a new Powerbook instead of a vasectomy. Good deal.
Status set to "Away (Getting a paternity test done.. bbl)"
Your body produces millions of sperm a day. Even if the amount of sperm you produce today is lowered by using a laptop tomorrow (assuming you dont use the laptop then) your sperm production will be back up.
I've been using a Mac Portable for about 15 years now and not only am I sterile... I've just noticed that I have a third testical and my pecker is bending to the left! Not just a little bend, but more of a right angle bend!
...and you thought I didn't care...
The designation 'laptop' didn't happen until they had reached the point where if you placed them on your lap, they wouldn't cut off all circulation to your legs, and require medical attention.
The original Mac Portable was almost 16 lbs. It wasn't even a full pound lighter than the same era Mac Plus. (almost all of the weight savings from the CRT was taken by the battery). The PowerBook 100 was about 5lbs, or 1/3 the weight. Even the ultra-light (for the time), PowerBook Duo line weighed in over 4lbs.
Weights crept up through the PowerBook G3 nearing 8lbs (some versions weighed near 6, though). The original TiBook was still over 5lbs. [it was thin, but dense]. The current generation G4 powerbook is still almost 5 lbs, as is the current iBook.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Mrs Palmer and her 5 daughters are going to be very mad!
I got tested twice before I got the okay for glove free love.
It seems to have worked, lots of nookie in the last three years, no more kids. And this was before I got a laptop.
Too late, I've already changed the name from "our fertility" to "our studliness"
echo -e 'global _start\n _start:\n mov eax, 2\n int 80h\n jmp _start' > a.asm; nasm a.asm -f elf; ld a.o -o a;
The subject of heat doing this has been know for a while now but the effect doesn't seem to be long lasting. Do we need to lobby for a cooler running chip or for hotter women?
Now where is my Cloak of Invisibility
"Researchers find that men who place portable computers on their laps are inadvertently raising the temperature of their scrotums....
I wondered what that sizzling was....
"All great things are simple & expressed in a single word: freedom, justice, honor, duty, mercy, hope." --Churchill
Frog
Maybe I just pay attention more than most, but doesn't everyone know this by now?
20 years ago they told us the kind of underwear you choose (and we can include going commando here as a choice) determines sperm count.
Tight underwear = lower count; loose = higher. They even told us it was because of the heat retention, which adversely affects the count and motility (how "peppy" the little fellas are).
Now, exactly which normal cognitive person needs a study to tell you s hot machine (or a heat lamp for that matter) on your upper legs might do the same thing?
I got it. Lets do a combo study to cross-correlate exactly which kind of underwear and which type of laptop is the absolute worst . Yeah, that's it.
Or maybe we could just figure it out for ourselves. Nah, let's submit it anyway; there's no research grant in using common sense, is there?
Old news. 3 years ago Freeverse Software released the Save the Boys laptop insulator. It was a suggestion from their president's wife, who wanted to get pregnant.
My cheapo Compaq runs much too hot, so I got a laptop desk. No more burning.... Simple huh! This is what I got: www.lapinator.com
Well at least laptops wont give you testicular cancer like radar guns did for police officers...
I know what's on your hard dr
Let's just hope it's done using one of those non-invasive laser thermometers.
notebooks
JADBP
This is another great reason to invest in an iLdap:
http://www.raindesigninc.com/ilap.html
The fact that they measured both right and left scrotal temps...HAHAHAHA! This article has got me cracking up :)
because they can be used for birth control?
I have read that engineers tend to have more daughters, and I can confirm this with the small sample size around me (3 guys with all daughters). I wondered if this if from sitting all day and overheating down nether, that preferentially damages male sperm? Also, would there be a selective advantage to having girls if you're someone who sits all day? I would imagine in prehistory, this would equate to being unable to move (paralized or otherwise crippled).
Do what I using my cheapo Compaq: use a laptop desk. I have been using the Lapinator, but others might work too. KISS: Keep it simple, s***head
cock-blocker.
Just imagine with christmas arriving: "Oh thanks honey, just what I wanted for chirstmas. A brand new cock-blocker!! Thanks!"
Old old old old old news. People have been saying that about as long as there have been laptops and I've yet to see any substantiative proof. Like how people keep saying cellphones put off brain-killing radiation. Dear god, you'd think slashdot of all places you could get away from this crap.
I'm married...
If we can get about 24 more in this chain we can prove all slashdotters are married with a 95% confidence.
Connect the dots. They freeze sperm for storage. Sperm is all protein (& delicate proteins @ that), heat denatures proteins = dead lil' soldiers. As my wife & I were trying to conceive, I made an effort to keep the laptop off of my lap for @ least the 2 months leading up to when we started trying. It sure didn't hurt; she concieved in the 1st 30 days.
This could have a positive effect on natural selection. Killing the weak in an early stage guarantees even less spilled resources and greater environmental sustainability that the strong amongst us can enjoy.
Isn't 'scrota' the plural of 'scrotum'?
I never thought I'd see the day when the word scrotum appears in a slashdot article summary.
Temporarily raising the temperature of your balls could cause damage to the living sperm if a sufficient temperature is reached over a given amount of time. This however isn't something that us men should all be panicking about. Even if you do happen to lower your sperm count because you spent three days playing the latest greatest game with your laptop operating at maximum power consumption positioned appropriately on your lap, your sperm count will return to normal. Fluctuations in sperm count due to environmental conditions shouldn't be all that surprising. However, it takes a lot of thermal abuse to begin to cause a permanent sperm count reduction. As far as occupations and from what I remember, certain types of wielders may have the highest risks.
I once stumbled upon a natural birth control method, where a guy would where special underwear to keep the testicles at an elevated temperature. This was accomplished by ensuring the testicles always received the maximum amount of natural body heat. If after a certain amount of time the man wanted to return back to normal sperm reproduction, he simply switched to his everyday flavor of underwear.
The other thing to keep in mind is that your sperm count of the day doesn't really make much difference unless you are actively trying to conceive. There is no causal effect between having low sperm count and having a low libido or testosterone count. However, there is a causal effect between having a low testosterone count and having low libido and sperm count.
There have been laboratory tests on rats/mice and testing to see what temperature and time would induce castration. I can't find it googling again, but I recall that it took something like 118F for 2 minutes to cause permanent damage. This is so hot that you would suffer 3rd degree burns before you ever reached that internal temperature!
I don't know about everyone else, but I'm not going to be that concerned about this. If I ever decide to have kids, I'll keep it in the back of my mind.
Yes, yes. We all know that enough heat renders the little guys just too languid to do much but sip beer and hang out in the sauna.
Is it any surprise though, that constantly sitting around with a laptop on your lap might have an effect similar to "birth control glasses" -- those thick black rimmed glasses with tape in the middle?
One further note: This may be a POSITIVE aspect of laptops if used right. What we need to do, is distribute P4 Hyperthreading notebooks with Doom3 to all the sales and marketing staff as soon as possible!
-- AP
The problem with quotes on the internet, is that nobody bothers to check their veracity. -- Abraham Lincoln
I though anticonceptives were considered a good thing...I mean, what's wrong with not being able to have children? I'd rather have a powerbook than a children!
Researchers find that men who place portable computers on their laps are inadvertently raising the temperature of their scrotums
"Inadvertently"? Laptops have been, for too long, so hot that you could burn your hand on some parts on the bottom near the CPU, I wonder who is that dolt that did not NOTICE that his laptop is a source of heat.
so if we admit that high temperature damages the sperms. this concerns the sperms currently alive, right? so sperms generated in the future should be alright? if so what's the big flipping deal? Anybody with a better understanding of biology care to educate/correct me?
who is the numbnut that came up with/conducted this research. well so shit when you have a nice toasty laptop sitting there, they'are gonna get warm. thats been already proved that temperature affects sperm production. how it happens is another story. no need to 'research' it to find that one out.
Lizard "Never let them set limits on your mind!"
Aren't they supposed to be called "notebooks" now, pretty much for this same general reason - that they get too hot to risk advocating one can safely use it on a lap?
Let's not get TESTE over this issue. At first GLANS, this might be a very scary prospect, but there's a VAS DEFERENS between damage and infertility. I believe the Finnish andrologist, Dr. Skro Tümm, did the SEMINAL work on this area of study.
I'm sorry. I couldn't help myself.
(reminds me of a New Yorker cartoon when Satan tells his associates, "Put the punster in with the mime...")
I might know what I'm talkin' about, but then again, this is Slashdot...
Aw poo... And I already wanted to give a couple of people laptops for Christmas. Guess now I'll have to find another (more permanent) please-get-out-of-the-gene-pool gift.
A polar bear is a cartesian bear after a coordinate transform.
Well, I'm sort of counting on that. Saves a lot of money on birth control.
That's why I went for one of those 12" Powerbooks. Extra nice and warm. Talk about salty balls...
To those of you who have actually managed to reproduce:
By the time you are getting around to worrying about hot laptops, the damage may already be done. Disposable nappies have been shown to increase scrotum temperature to 1 degree above body temp - and a scrotum should be BELOW body temp. This article in the Australian ABC news site from the same wire story references the problem. I know it's a small scall study, but think about it: a few hours a week with a hot laptop on your lap, compared to two to three YEARS locked inside a plastic bag, during a vital developmental stage. On report I saw pointed out that the decline in male sperm counts coincides with the introduction of disposable nappies.
My 6 month old boy is kept almost entirely in washable nappies, of the type made by Happy Hienys, Fuzzi Bunz, etc. They are as convenient as disposables to put on, much neater than the terry squares you would traditionally associate with washable nappies, and they just work.
Now the shameless plug: We have been so impressed with these nappies that my wife is setting up to sell them at babyaloo.com. The site isn't up yet, but it will be in a couple of days.
Thank god I'm female. Though I'm not sure I really *want* potential mates to be losing their fertility. And not only nerds use laptops- laptops are threatening the perpetuation of mankind! Survival of the fittest, I guess. We get this far, polluting and exterminating all species who piss us off, and we give it all up for nifty electronics.
Alternatively, we can do a lead codpiece thing in the tradition of scifi...
erm... How about "Notebook"?
Does anyone remember the early days of Luggables?
http://www.obsoletecomputermuseum.org/compaq/
Researchers find that men who place portable computers on their laps are inadvertently raising the temperature of their scrotums
Scrotal Warming is a problem now. Laptop makers should be given a total heat flux quota. If they exceed it, they must buy scrotal heating credits from other more scrotum friendly makers. Lets call it the Scroto Treaty! America, get on board! Stop going it alone. Stop scrotal warming before it is too late!
an ill wind that blows no good
I have been using laptops on my lap since 1998. Yet my wife and I have 2 little boys and a third on the way.
I read this only a few minutes ago at Fark, however the article (at least the one I saw) said that the study done does show scrotal temperature increases, however there hasn't been a study on if the higher temperatures (which are temporary) cause long-term infertility. My guess is that it will not.
Besides, all you need is a decent heatsink.
It'll be hard to resist the urge to place my balls on the backs of laptops.
So.. if you put something hot on your nuts, your nuts get hot. Did we really need a scientist for this?
Crushing my karma one post at a time.
Dr. Christian Troy of Nip/Tuck mentions this in the show, but I think it was 150F, not 105F. It it was 105, then you get a high fever, you won't have kids! LOL. Best way to kill sperm, put your scrotum in a microwave, melts in your scrotum, not on your boxers.
I've found out that if I put my laptop on my lap, my balls will start to hurt a little after only a few minuts.
Nothing intolerable, but they definitly don't like it. At least it rings an alarm when I forget that I should avoid putting the laptop there...
I find it uncomfortable to hold a laptop in my lap and try to type. The angle is all wrong.
This might not be applicable, but could it be that you're just too short? I have a problem using my laptop if it's squished right up next to my beanbag, but if it's further down - at or just hanging over my knees - then typing isn't too bad. I'm just under 2 meters tall, so that helps a bit, too.
I'd have to agree that most laptops are really just portables, at least around here. Probably half of the people with laptops have a docking station @home for them as well as one here @work, and the rest just leave the laptops docked all the time.
slashdot easter egg:
HEAD slashdot.org | grep X-[B,F]
Try wget -qsO- slashdot.org | grep X-[B,F] instead... that'll fetch w/ headers and grep all at once. Now I just need to find mod_Futurama for my Apache!
Wow, how many years has it been since hearing a Natalie Portman/hot grits post that's actually funny?
:)
Good job!
Didn't the industry change the name to Notebook PC's several years ago? Mainly because you're not supposed to put them in your laps because it doesn't help with the heat dissapation.
*DrugCheese rants*
when I'm viewing porn.
printf($randomline(sigs.txt) \n "-- "$randomline(authors.txt));
-- myself
I've read somewhere about taxi drivers having the same problem of low fertility due the same reason. Not laptops but have their scrotum kept warm for long periods of time.
Scientia est Potentia
This would not only make you sterile, it can also be the cause of other genetic deformities. Perhaps something like Anaencephalia, or Down Syndrome (not good examples but you get the idea).
Regards.
UgaBuga!
The phenomenon can also be experienced in a hot tub... Regular hot tub use can severely limit the fertility of a male. But a good couple of months without use should get things back up to normal.
I can't wait till IBM hands me my award for outstanding achievements in the field of excellence.
No, really?
Why do you think they hang down? If they were body temp, they couldn't produce it very effectively.
I guess next its going to be found that laying in the sun for too long will cause cancer.
Job? I don't have time to get a job! Who will sit around and bitch about being broke and unemployed then?
Have these researchers ever put a Powerbook on their laps before? You'd get 2nd degree burns if it's there any longer than 5 minutes! I'd think avoiding skin grafts would be the biggest priority to sperm conservation.
"Apparently so, but suppose you throw a coin enough times. Suppose one day, it lands on its edge."
I really, truly wonder, if we needed to do research on that particular subject? I.e. The botton of the laptop is warm, even hot sometimes, I need to do research and figure out if the heat is transfered to whatever surface a "laptop" is placed on. And most importantly, does the human body get warmer with contact - And I'll throw in "scrutum" and "fertility" in my hypothesis and get an extra couple of thousands dollars for a couple of more study subjects.
Next reasearch item: What date was it, on July 4th, 2004? More specifically, what date was it?
I'm all for research, but, perhaps the money can be spent somewhere else. Just my 0.000002 cents.
BTW, it's not called a laptop - It's called a "notebook computer."
Esta es una firma en Espanol.
Actually, I'd expect a laptop to have much weaker electromagnetic fields than a television (at least, a TV with a picture-tube). Laptops run at low voltage, with weak magnets. TVs run transformers producing high voltage, plus the main power transformer, plus static on the tube, plus the deflection coils on the CRT bouncing the electron-beam around. A speaker or two, a power-cord. So don't store your archival videtapes on the top!
Nice troll, though.
I can honestly say this doesn't bother me. I have never wanted kids, nor should I have kids. I would make the worst father in the world, and I am okay with that.
So, everytime someone warns me about damaging my ability to reproduce, I go ahead and do it. Tight pants, warm undies, gratuitous and long term use of hottubs at every oppurtunity. Now, I am going back to using my lap as a laptop rest. My Inspiron is one heck of a space heater. My boys will shoot out in coffins dag nabbit!
And invariably, I end up offending someone with my little "I don't want kids" rants. Tell me, why does the world care if I have kids? My doc said no on a vasectomy for a few years, as I am "still young (I'm almost 26), and will likely change my mind." and the possibility of a lawsuite is too great when it turns out to be irreversable.
leave it to this nations great Lawyer population to force me to own many items which can be construed as "Ball Warmers."
--Nuintari
slashdot : where an opinion can be wrong.
damm you people surprise me...
this is, after all, high school biology
When the scrotum is kept at a temperature to high (think 37 degrees celsius, or 98,6 degrees fahrenheit, yes, your sperm will die. That is common knowledge, or at least it should be.
But since the complete amount of sperm one man can contain (which is still very little, 'bout one percent of the total 'fluid', the rest is sugar and water) can be replaced in 3 days, there's no need to worry.
Just be warned: after a vacation trip of a week, you are fertile as hell :)
Don't get me wrong, I understand the stereotypes, but the 80's are over.
Not to me they're not! I'm not saying I have a problem with nerds such as myself getting dates, it's just that I really like the 80s.
Sperm count loss to temperature is only temporary. The real threat comes from the unavoidable presence of synthetic hormones all around us. "Our Stolen Future"
As the father of 4, this is the best news I've heard all season. I'll be sticking my laptop down my pants every night now until my wife hits menopause. This is like a poor mans Vasectomy. Great Stuff. Thanks Slashdot!!
... this is only if they are wearing "tighty-whities" and 1980'2 Jordache jeans.
+1: Obvious joke?
my password really is 'stinkypants'
Warm temperatures reduce the motility of sperm carrying the X chromosome first, so more male babies are produced. Even higher temperatures are needed to produce infertility. Some primitive cultures have used this effect (soaking in hot water) to produce more male offspring.
> There is nothing wrong with being fat.
Except diabetes, heart disease, stroke, high blood pressure, and other risks of dying young. Or how about general difficulties of everyday motion, the strain on joints and muscles, and the resulting fatigue? Oh, and did I mention that fat makes you ugly, sweaty, and totally undate-able to most normal people?
Guess laptops should get a namechange soon
I work for a major computer manufacturer, in technical support. We have never called them laptops for the 2 years I've been here. They're not to be used on your lap, your bed, or anything that isn't a flat surface.
All of our current models have vents in the bottom and feet that keep the unit raised up enough for airflow under it. So aside from burning a user or damaging his sperm, the notebook itself will suffer more heat than it should if used improperly.
Not a crotchtop. Sort of a thigh to knee sort of thing, not a ball warmer.
Make your next notebook a Centrino, or better yet a Crusoe. Not much heat from either (barely detectable from the latter)
that IBM named their portable computers "Notebooks" and others soon followed suit.
Seriously if you are fat weird comicbook store guy and you flop in the LayZBoy all night with a computer in your lap then it doesn't matter how fecund ye gonads be. The first thing you need to have in your lap is woman who's willing to be impregnated.
Having worked for a company that supported notebook computers I can tell you that the companies have been telling people not to put these things on their laps for years. I mean in some cases these "laptop" computers are so hot hey will actually burn you, not to mention that the new media center notebooks are huge. The standard line for customers that complained about the temperature of these things on their crotch was "Sir, its a notebook computer, not a laptop." Also guess what, if you didn't know that heating up your balls was a bad thing before this study then by all means continue to do it, and dont reproduce.
Didn't laptops already get a name change... to notebooks?
========
77 77 77 2e 6d 65 6c 76 69 6e 73 2e 63 6f 6d
Ok, just how is this news worthy? Christ, I learned in health class in 6th grade all about the human repoductive system and that was 20 years ago.
"When the scrotum gets cold it retracts closer to the body and when it gets warm it moves away. The testicles need 92 degree temp to produce sperm......"
So it stands to reason if you put something that's blowing out air that can be as hot as a hair dryer, it's going to make problems for your balls to make sperm.
That's not including the electromagnatism that's released that could cause your sperm to be either dead or deformed.
How is this relevant to /. readers? They're not going to use that fertility for anything anyway... ;)
It's been known for years that sitting in an too-hot hot tub for a while or wearing overly-restrictive underwear can cause a short-term decrease in sperm count. It is any real stretch of the imagination to determine that putting a different heat source near the crotch and sitting in a way that confines the testicles in that heat would have the very same effect?
Your balls need to be somewhat cool to function properly... why the hell else do you think they have to dangle outside of the body in their own little storage pouch-- for ornamental purposes?
~Philly
...I beg to differ. My wife and I just had our first kid with the odds stacked against us (agewise). I use laptops at home 24x7x365. It took us one month to conceive. Now either am am Mr. Stud Man (YOWZA! ;) ), or there really is little effect on a healthy individual.
-"...bad old ideas look confusingly fresh when they are packaged as technology" - Jaron Lanier (Digital Maoism on Edge.o
I have yet to determine whether this is social or medical in origin.
. . .BALLTOP computer, personally.
Only if you try to FSCK them!
Most people I know refered to the 'All-in-One' macs as 'Luggable'. They didn't have batteries (well, other than for the clock), and they had a seperate keyboard and mouse. You could move them, but it wasn't very small. (I still have an SE/30 w/ carrying case in my basement ... I think I have a zero-footprint 45meg SCSI drive down there, with carrying case, too).
The official Apple designation is 'Classic Macs, but that gets confusing, as there was a Mac Classic
I'd classify the iMacs and eMacs in a luggable category, as well. Along with any of the monitor-included Performas, the TAM, and all of the iMac and eMac lines.
Build it, and they will come^Hplain.
Oh, I have been committed for years.... but those nice young men in the white shirts say I can still read slashdot. (And they wonder why I'm so insane >:-D)
If you can't say something nice, make sure you have something heavy to throw.
> Most normal people? Man, I can't wait till you life goes south.
> In fact, why don't you do us all a favor and put that gun in your mouth NOW.
One of the desirable traits of normal people is our tendency to avoid homicidal thoughts and other similar desires that include wishing everyone who disagrees with our opinions dead.
"Portable computer" refers to any computer that is designed to be portable. The original portable computers were known as "lunch box" computers. They were about the size of a small to medium size cooler, and the keyboard attached to the face of the computer, covering the screen. (usually.) A "laptop" is a small portable computer. The term laptop stems from the fact that they can be used by setting the computer on your lap and typing. Some came with batteries and some required that you plug them in where ever you got to your desitination. Some computers that claimed to be laptops got to be so big that many questioned whether they could really be called laptops. Laptops tend to be characterized by having hinged screens (LCD, Gas-Plasma, ...)
A "notebook" is a very small laptop that is approximately the size of a notebook.
Notebooks are Laptops, but not all laptops are notebooks. The Primary factor is
size (though many do not consider anything over 7-8 lbs to be a notebook, no matter
what the size). I have as of yet to see a notebook that did not run on batteries,
but by no means is battery power a defining feature.
Guess laptops should get a namechange soon.
Somehow I don't think they'll be able to slip "Dell Infertilator D360" or "Compaq Scrotumheater 5100" past the marketing people.
"especially among laptop users who may be trying to conceive a child. " D'OH! I mean.. its been a fun couple of months, but when I read this I realized the hour or 2 I spend in front of the TV(with my laptop) may be the culprit.
a quick slice, pull out a vas, snip, fold, cauterize, repeat for the other vas, stitch up.
Fifteen minutes work, and we talked about wireless Palm VII during it.
Well, who uses a laptop without some sort of tray? Mine's just a piece of 12x1 oak cut to size. I slapped on some dark oak stain and polyurethaned it. Wood is a poor conductor of heat, so it works great. Doubles as a lap tray for eating dinner.
--- Ban humanity.
Oh, man... it's such an obvious setup my brain glitched from humor overload, and now I can't think of anything!
--- Ban humanity.
there is nothing wrong with abstinence when you can't get what you want.
Nothing wrong... Except perhaps the not-getting-what-you-want part.
Every sperm is scared! H@MmER T!Me!!!!! --; --;
Shoulda bought a Mac! ;-)
-Don.
Cwm, fjord-bank glyphs vext quiz
In other parts of the world and other cultures or in the west in past a couple needed to get as many kids as possible in the hope that at least some survived so that the kids could then take care of the parents AND make kids of their own insuring survival of the species. Since childbirth was also extremely dangerous to the mother it was basically a race to get as many kids out before the mother croaked and then hope that at least some kids survived.
However slowly living conditions and medical care became better (in the west) were child birth related deaths are now pretty rare (it was once the leading cause of death for women) and child death itself is also rare. If a couple gets two kids chances are they will have two kids grow up to adulthood.
There still are some couples in the west who crank out the kids but they end up with a dozen kids easily wich is to much for the western live style. Meantime the same couple in a place like africa will be lucky if 1 or 2 survives.
But now a problem is starting to occur. The culture in africa is to get as many kids as possible in the hope that some survive. A couple that would limit themselves to 1-2 kids as in the west will (if they are lucky enough to live to an old age) end up childless. A childless couple has noone to take care of them in old age.
Western medicine is however screwing things up in the short term. With western medicine in a limited resource enviroment (no food) you would at the same time have reduce the number of childeren being born as you introduce medicine to keep the childeren alive. If you keep the high birth rates AND keep the childeren alive you set yourselve up for a massive famine. Worse medicine costs money wich can only be gained by exporting food and you get the huge mess of african nations exporting money to pay for medicine then getting a famine end needing food brought back in. Reading up on the constant cycle of death and hope in africa is depressing reading.
Add AIDS and you got a truly messed up system. Lets assume for a moment that no aids cure can be found. Then at the moment every aids child alive is just a drain. Humanity forbids us to just put them to rest but keeping them alive creates a nasty cycle of death. Human culture is based on three stages, childhood where you learn for later stages, adulthood where you take care of the other stages AND create the first stage and finally old age were your experience helps the first two stages. Western culture has moved away from this a bit but for a long time families consisted of childern, adults and grandparents ALL doing their bid to keep the family alive. Grandparents are one of the things that sets us apart from animals. Teenage wolfs often help out their parents with their raising of the next litter but humans have a whole extra set of hands with super experience to help them out.
Aids disrupts this. A child born with aids is not going to survive for long and will only cost resources without ever growing old enough to "repay". Worse if they live long enough to bear childeren those kids will have aids as well and no parents let alone grandparents to raise them. The whole social structure that makes humans human collapses.
Oh and africa is not africa. Not all of africa is hunger and AIDS and misery. Some bits do alright until sooner or later something goes wrong. At the moment there is another locust plague destroying food on a gigantic scale. Huge areas were people had made a good living are now heading to famine and all the other problems like war and AIDS are sure to follow.
As for the sexual fitness. Survival of the fittest. Someone who lives to the age of 82 got to be amazingly fit. In the west we can afford to not be fit. Males can remain sexually reproductive even after death. This is nothing weird. Just that in the west most have other luxury problems that make it all not work. We also got a slight culture problem with 80yr men marrying reproductive females.
MMO Quests are like orgasms:
You may solo them, I prefer them in a group.
Laptops for the Thrid World!
My new Toshiba doesn't call itself a "laptop" anywhere in the documentation, just a "portable personal computer". In fact, the documentation strictly warns against placing it on your lap for any extended period as it can result in "skin irritation".
What's his name? :-D
You mean I didn't have to have a Doc pulling and cutting on my business and then go through 3 months without sex to be sterile? Damn...could have used this information a few months ago.
Richolson Law.
Between Dell XPS/Area 51 gaming laptops and gallons of Mountain Dew, the gamer generation will never procreate. :)
Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, START
This has been known. The Japanese used to use hot tubs as a (granted, not totally effective) method of birth control. And it's not permanent either - it just kills the already-present sperm.
>>of their scrotums Who are these guys with more than one scrotum?
This is why manufacturers started calling them "notebooks" 6 years ago. Because people were burning themselves in uncomfortable places. So in order to avoid lawsuits, they stopped calling them laptops.
What, whacking? Only if you have a turkey baster.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
A warm planet? buy refrigerated underwear?
SLASHDOT: news for people who can't concentrate on work or have no life at all and got tired of yelling back at the TV.
all "laptops" (we should just start calling them mobile computers) come with warnings in the manuals that say you should never use it on your lap, ANYWAY. This is because modern laptops get extremely hot, but heat up fairly slowly, so you are much less likely to notice the 3rd degree burns forming on your legs for a while.
So, "don't put your laptop on your lap, it might cause infertility" is like "don't spill boiling hot coffee on your lap, we've found it might cause cancer"
In the abscence of a good sperm/scrotum joke, one thing I wonder about (as I'm in the midst of trying for child #2) is the how WiFi affects the little wigglers? I remember reading about motorcycle cops who placed their radar gun between their legs or on their laps while working speed traps and experiencing fertility problems. (I don't recall if it was permanent.) WiFi isn't radar, but does anyone know which is worse hot or irradiated ?
the future is here, it is just not evenly distributed - w. gibson
"The above are facts so do not mod me down."???
You said that African males' penises are "really big for their age compared to western societies". That doesn't sound like fact to me -- it sounds like conjecture at best, racial stereotype at worst.
Perhaps there are some clinical studies of penis size that I'm not aware of, but the ones that I have seen effectively debunk the "blacks are bigger" myth -- the median length for men of African descent was slightly higher than that for men of European descent, but the difference in mean was negligible.
Besides, I don't see the correlation between sperm count and erectile virility that you seem to be making.
My first response to this is- go buy a Mac. They don't get as hot. Though I've heard that the G4s get a lot hotter- is this true? The only Mac laptop I've had is an iBook G3/500, which never got very warm at all. But then again, nor did my old Dell P75. But this "newer" 400 MHz Micron sure does- sucks in the summer. Sweaty legs. Nasty.
Working toward a usable PDA environment in the spirit of Newton OS: Dynapad
I wear boxers, so my boys get plenty of air while I walk around. The few minutes I spend with the lapwarmer is actually welcome.
WTF? Over?
Ig Nobel, that is... looks like a shoe-in.
As a consequence, laptops will be banned from all schools as a form of contraception. "Abstenence" for our young is still the best solution," said a Republican fundamentalist government spokesman, "and it has been that way since God created the universe 8,000 years ago," he added.
You mean, right this second, I'm KILLIN' MY LITTLE FISHIES RIGHT NOW!?!?!?
My lovely wife would be SO UPSET to find that our 5 kids is ALL WE'LL EVER HAVE. I mean, dead fishies... What's the point of that?
Of course, there was this little operation I had a few years ago, so my wife wouldn't have to remember those stupid little green pills....
I have no problem with your religion until you decide it's reason to deprive others of the truth.
Elucidating your magnanimous confabulation on the propensity to propagate contingent to the approximate proximity and congeniality of personage in the milieu, one can acquiesce to the premise of conjointment by discourse prior to concatenation through intercourse.
Fried nuts anyone?
and we aint talking Pistachios here!
I think I've got the hottest laptop ever.
Well as it's christmas who fancies a song - "Chestnuts roasting on an open fire"
I'm not Catholic, and I'm not up on their rules, but isn't anything that prevents or inhibits those little spermies from reaching the egg Frowned Upon by the Catholic church as "birth control"? Wouldn't a Pentium-powered testacle-toaster qualify?
The Russians have won. They have made the world a cesspool of distrust, greed, fear and hate.
How about:
I wonder if this act would qualify for a true Darwin Award?
That extra 3-4 degreess is the closest thing I have to a relationship right now.
Laptops are shown to raise the temperature of the scrotum. Lapdances also raise the temperature. Is the latter of these two also harmful?
Why bother.
Sounds to me like the greater hazard would be RF leakage in the microwave range.
This is known in many cases to cause not just temporary infertility, but permanent sterility!
what about us females? i had a disturbing thought. if the heat is what supposedly makes guys sterile, and girls put those heating pads down in that general area for cramps during period, or halfway between periods (ovulation).... could that damage any of our insides? er... maybe someone should look into this?
"if only i had known i would have been a locksmith." -albert einstein
This is so utterly dumb. Sperm are not egg cells, they are not a fixed, limited quantity. They are not in limited supply. In other words any such effect is temporary and will not affect a man's fertility. Who writes this stuff ...
And I wasted all that money on a vasectomy!
In other news, lap DANCES increase sperm mobility.
calling them laptops is a misnomer, they are portables. True most of slashdot can't even see their laps let alone balance something on them. This is so a non-issue. And those who's fertility suffer for it is a plus to the rest of us.
Sorry about the writing. Robot fingers, you know? Cliff Steele in DOOM PATROL #23
I think you just used up your sesquipedalian quota for today, pal.
They've been called 'notebooks' for several years, exactly because the heat can be prohibitive for laptop use, and the manufacturers don't want to invite more lawsuits.
If you're not living on the edge, you're just taking up space!
The troubles of infertility are pointless when nerds have problems getting "some" in the first place. ;)
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere." - Martin Luther King, Jr.
I wonder when we will see this busted on myth busters :)
Being fat is unhealthy. There is something wrong with being unhealthy. ... Either they have a genetic problem, which means they need to take more extreme measures to be fit, or they are addicted to food
It seems you beleave in self controlled darwinism. Making decisions on what you think is the survival of the fittest. How fat a person is a combination of their genetics and their environment. Some enviroments are easier to controll you weight. Others are much more dificult. Why are Rich People usually thinner then Poor people it is because they have exta cash that they can spend to go to the gym. While poor people who work 6-5 barly have enough free time and daylight to exersize. Joggin in the middle of the night in some locations is not safe. But if you want to think about it in more of an evelutionary standpoint. If our curent grouth of population we will soon outpase the speed that we can produce food thus having a global famin. Now the people who are geneticly fat will have a better chance of surviving because there slower motabilism is more effective converting food to energy. While the thin people will probably starve first. Let nature decide who is fit for survival, and let yourself choose who you want to have children with, based on who you are attracted to.
If something is so important that you feel the need to post it on the internet... It probably isn't that important.
Now, the above are facts so do not mod me down. In my home country, these is [almost] no market for Viagra and the like.
This Article says Viagra costs about $10 per pill. I'm sure that has more to do with a poor viagra market then any natural virility on some continents. Escpecially since the AIDS epidemic would make living to be old enough to need Viagra something of a problem.
This also seems a bit of an immature poster. Pen*s? Tool? "down there"? Please just say what you are talking about. If you can't say penis, scrotum, dick, balls or whatever then you probably don't have anything interesting to say on the subject.
Im a geek, thats hazzardous to my fertility, not the fact that Im using a laptop!
Why UNIX?
If you are drinking enough Mountain Dew to affect your fertility, I might suggest going to a detox clinic. According to Snopes, it's not confirmed that even above-normal consumption levels of Yellow 5 affect sterility.
"No beer until you finish your tequila!" -Leela's Dad
A new study also suggests that keeping your Jedi light sabre in your pocket while searching for your keys may also be hazardous to your fertility.
Me and Duran Duran says the 80's will *never* be over! Billy Jean! Is not my lover! My angel is a centerfold!
"Guess laptops should get a namechange soon... before our fertility does." Before our fertility gets a name change? Is this a Babelfish translation?
"Don't waste your time or time will waste you" -MUSE
Unless we're talking about ancient laptops here, the RF leakage from most models will be in the Gigahertz range.
In other words, you are slowly microwaving your testicles. Even extremely low levels can cause permanent sterility over time.
Most microwave ovens operate at around 2.1 Gigahertz, by the way...
Like anyone with a laptop needs more than read only access to the world.
:-D
Face it... if your geeking it up long enough for your CPU to kill your sperm... most likely because you don't need the sperm.
I prefer to just consider it birth control.... Look at pr0n in Mp4 format before having sex. Your CPU spikes a bit, causing more heat, killing sperm. Your sperm dies, your "in the mood"...
life is good.
"Laptop" is a perfectly good name and shouldn't be changed. However, if these things were originally called "sacktops", then we'd definitely want a name change to shift behavior.
Maybe this explains the recent /. article about functionally illiterate emailers.
I've been using my laptop, an overheating Thinkpad T23 (its melted the black rubber from the bottom of my laptop 3 times, thank you IBM extended warrantee!) for 4-5 years now, every day, for about 20 hours a day... on my lap. It has onboard wireless, and I also keep a Bluetooth CF card in the pcmcia slot. I have 3 Linksys WRTs, all overclocked in power sitting about 15' away from me (one floor down).
We just had our first daughter 5 months ago, healthy, happy, and with all limbs, fingers, and toes intact.
This article is completly farsical... unless it takes 20 years of laptop-on-lap power to really do any damage.
Given the amount of extra RF going on around here (5.8Ghz phones, wireless headphones, 3x2.4Ghz WRTs, overheating laptop), I'm surprised I haven't grown a third arm.
Im a geek, like it gets used that much anyway
Hear that, Kerri? I'm not your baby's daddy!
ive been after an excuse to get a laptop for ages and here it is
It was:
No, I DON'T want a laptop powered by a Farnsworth Fusor.
Fortunately, mere heat is temporary, unless it's very excessive.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
So, um, do you come around here often? I like to, but then I like lots of things... changing myself, commitment, you name it. What do you say we take this discussion offline?
natural selection at its "best."
I find laptops pretty useless, you're not even supposed to use it on your lap because it gets too hot anyway and jogging the harddrive isnt a great idea. As a portable desktop they are ok, except track-pads are the most unusable peice of shit i've ever seen - i can master accurate shooting on a PS2 controller, but ive yet to actually use a track pad without going insane. So you need a mouse. I consider keyboards as consumables, i buy a cheap one every few months and abuse it and my cheap keyboards always feel fine. Laptop keyboards are cramped and shitty. Changing them isnt easy or cheap, nore is tipping out the usual crap that gets in it, and you're afraid to bash it too much because the whole thing seems to delicate. Which brings me to my last point - you can't actually naturally use something unless you feel you can be careless and abusive. I need to be able to atleast have a cup of coffee next to something without having to worry about it falling over and destroying something expensive. My phone on the other hand has been dropped and cracked so many times its like a wallet, im not scared of breaking it, same with my old pocket PC, so i can use these things without some insane degree of safety - everytime i use my laptop (its from work) i feel i need to be extra careful and make sure all cups are outside a 4 foot radius and if i move it there must be total concentration as i carefully check every step i take. Its not something you can use unless you can abuse it. And just to make this on topic - its not something you can use unless you can put it on your lap without worrying about your tackle.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
I mean, how did they collect this data? Weirdos.
Who were these researchers who had the brilliant idea to start sticking thermometers *down there*?
I've been using various laptops on my lap for a long time. My wife and I were planning on having kids in a year or two, but last December she got an infection and was told to stop her birth control pills. We only had unprotected sex once during the time she was off her pills.
:-O
I know have a 3-month old daughter.
A little earlier than we were planning, but I wouldn't trade her for anything.
Another non-functioning site was "uncertainty.microsoft.com."
The purpose of that site was not known.
Heat? That's it? Too bad we can't stack two or three on there. No more birth control or rubbers! Who uses a laptop on their lap, anyway? I use knees, or 95% of the time tables. I don't see how the scrotum would react to this any different than temprature changes in the climate. If it's 120 outside, they just receed into your body to reach the right temprature. You know, Pool syndrome. If your laptop's is the variable that influences temprature, why would anything different happen?
I was just reading this article when Shep on FNC showed a story about a police dog biting off this bad guys balls. I'll take a laptop computer down there any day!
Our problem is that the smart and educated people aren't having enough children.
No No No, you have it all wrong. The problem is, smart and educated people aren't eating enough poor, dumb babies.
HA! I just wasted some of your bandwidth with a frivolous sig!
It's been a while since I studied this at university, but as I understand heat changes of this magnatude (also caused by variations in clothing like boxers or breifs) can damage sperm production, but there is no permanent damage. This sounds like som awfully sensational reporting.
There problem solved,
;~)
My TC1100 has the cpu vent on the screen itself, so the keyboard dosen't generate any heat and merly reflects it back.
Plus all the new Intel ULV chips, some of them don't even use active cooling anymore, but its nothing worse than taking a warm bath?
So is that the new health hazard, Hot water Baths has shown to reduce fetility, both too much and too Little
eh, I say they have these nifty little things you can put under your laptop that can help with the heating issues... also i dont recomend newer high powered laptops, leave that to us ladies :P
"But i loveded you PIGGY I LOVEDED YOU!!!!!" *Gir*
yer won't be needin it.
If my call is important, why am I talking to a recording?
Laptop Desk
Wait, that's worse. Never mind.
Maybe I should go back to *nix.
Engineering is the art of compromise.
Mine is now the "forearmtop."
I have gas, but my car uses petrol.
1) If geek can get a girl in the first place is a +
2) If your getting some also a +
3) Do you really want to have a kid? If not then use your laptop as much as you can with a condumn and your set!
Body mass is an extremely complex problem which is frequently equated in the mass media with moral failure (lazy & gluttonous).
Acceptable community standards for body mass have declined while the average body mass ratio has increased. Many of the 'diseases' associated with being overweight are now being attributed to serial dieting.
Weight is not the problem, fitness is the problem. Fit fat people still have a better life expectancy than thin unfit people; and don't kid yourself that you can't be fat and fit. Western cultures are living increasingly sedentary lives, we give our children Playstations rather than let them play in the streets, we drive instead of walk. We need to collectively get up from our desks and lounge chairs and start moving around. Turn off the TV or your computer and take the dog for a walk.
Incidental exercise is steadily being eliminated from our lives, but few of us are able to find the time to explicitly exercise.
Fat people (especially fat chicks) are often publically discriminated against and derided - why would you go to the gym when you are treated like you might be contagious?
As for 'fat chicks' getting pregnant; current studies suggest that dieting during pregnancy increases the possibility that your children will be fat as it triggers the starvation gene in the womb. Carrying extra weight during pregnancy certainly increases the chances of maternal diabetes, but personally at a BMI of around 32 (clinically obese) my doctor is more worried about the fact that I need to increase my folate and iron intake than lose weight.
Sara
Designer, Gamer, Macgrrl in an XP World
Two unidentified brands of Pentium 4 laptops were used at random in the study.
Would the temperature have risen less with a less power hungry processor than a P4? Given that a P4 laptop can double as a toasted sandwich maker, I think it would be a possibility.
meh
Why no-one seems to worry about leaky and exploding batteries?
I doubt that we will ever figure out - and I suspect that even if we did figure out we couldn't do much about it
In Soviet Russia, Fertility is hazardous to you!
- In Soviet Korea, only old people loose all their bases to Natalie Portman's petrified hot grits overlords.
On the other hand, TVs typically aren't strapped to one's crotch... unless you're into that sort of thing?
Never mind, I don't want to know.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
At home at the desk or just lounging around I prefer thin, loose shorts or pants made of satin or nylon. Infringing on feminine territory, and maybe that's part of the fun, but mostly it is just really comfortable.
other functionality suggests the ability to get and maintain an erection, or the ability to achieve orgasm. I have always assumed that there was no relationship between these issues and low sperm count due to sitting in chairs. Maybe they correlate on hormone levels, or red blood cell count, and people get confused? Some cyclists claim long rides make their genitals numb and unresponsive, but chairs?
if you're 18 and look at this as a good thing, think about where you want to be in 10 years, if you can truly think that far ahead - if children are on the agenda, be smart and take care.
I can agree with taking care in the sense of don't fall off you bicycle/skateboard/skis and injure your genitals, and don't get the clap, but again, sitting all day when you are 21 and single should not result in any permanent loss of potency even after ten years. Am I wrong?
Gary Dunn
Open Slate Project
When you use a laptop on your "lap", you put it on your THIGHS, NOT on your crotch! Bloody hell, hasn't anyone realized this?
You put it on your thighs because trying to use a laptop on your crotch is very awkward and would give you a sore neck. So you slide it forward onto your thighs, closer to your knees.
No-one uses a laptop on their crotch, so this whole article is irrelevant!
i used a notebook on my lap till the point it burned my dick (well, almost, it got mighty toasty) and only just recently stopped (that's another story)
anyhow, my daughter is due march 29, so the dick-roasting hot dell craptop didn't kill enough of my sperm to matter apparently
With undescended testicles there is no reason to fear laptops - body heat does the trick just fine:-).
I wonder, is there is any possibility that radiation from wireless networking could cause a health problem?
.. from The Register
Laptops go on sperm killing rampage
Screw you all! I'm off to the pub
Lap dances for geeks hurts fertility!
... accidents :)
Because of eehhm
So now laptop and lapdance is bad for you, damn this cruel world!
-- Make software not war
Nope, not too short. Using a laptop on my lap for more than 10 minutes gives me back and wrist pain because I'm hunched over it so much.
I think most laptops can be replaced with a decent vpn client and something like vnc. If your job thinks you should have a $1800 laptop, they could probably spring to give you a home workstation with internet and vpn access. That would probably save a few bucks everytime someone drops a laptop. It doesn't even have to be a good workstation. It could even be an old win98 decommissioned workstation. The licenses and hardware are probably just sitting around in a warehouse somewhere collecting dust (depreciating).
The wget statement is pretty much the same as HEAD. Mine requires perl and some perl modules though. I just like the name of the command line utility. huh..huh....heh...he said....head...
Why read the article when I can just make up a snap judgement?