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BBC Rules That Wi-Fi Radiation Findings Were Wrong

Stony Stevenson writes "A Panorama programme claiming that Wi-Fi creates three times as much radiation as mobile phone masts was 'misleading', an official BBC complaints ruling has found. The team involved in the research came under fire from the school where the 'investigations' were held for scaremongering, but now the BBC has come out with an official ruling. 'The programme included only one contributor (Professor Repacholi) who disagreed with Sir William, compared with three scientists and a number of other speakers (one of whom was introduced as a former cancer specialist) who seconded his concerns.'"

210 comments

  1. News program found guilty of scaremongering by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This, and the shocking secret that most parents don't realize will kill their child! Up at 11. Tune in!

  2. Benefits Costs by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    The benefits outweigh the costs whether it's true or not. I am also partial to Diet Coke.

  3. Re:England is so quaint by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Cue aggravated Scots, Welsh and Northern Irish in 4,3,2,1...

  4. I have a dream! by explosivejared · · Score: 1

    So this article in tandem with this one, has given me hope. For I have a dream that one day all of our children will be able to sit down at the radioactive table of brotherhood. They will be able to enjoy the pleasures of uranium chip flavored ice cream and sleep on beds made of the finest plutonium. I welcome the day when all of our children will have the opportunity to be exposed to the now safer than ever blessing of radiation. I have a dream that one day the alarmist fear mongering about radiation poisoning and nuclear fallout will be over and out children can reap the benefits.

    --
    I got a catholic block.
    1. Re:I have a dream! by nekozid · · Score: 5, Funny

      A bed made from plutonium would be awesome infact.
      Nice warm bed to get into every night? Yes please!

    2. Re:I have a dream! by Hatta · · Score: 5, Informative

      You do know that ionizing radiation (e.g. alpha particles, beta particles, gamma rays from nuclear decay) has absolutely nothing to do with non-ionizing (e.g. radio, microwave, etc) EM radiation. Confusing the two, even in jest, doesn't help the situation.

      --
      Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
    3. Re:I have a dream! by SL+Baur · · Score: 4, Funny

      A bed made from plutonium would be awesome infact.
      Nice warm bed to get into every night? Yes please! I'd rather have the warm body of my wife next to me ... oh wait, I must be new here. Never mind.
    4. Re:I have a dream! by audubon · · Score: 5, Funny

      Glory be to the Bomb, and to the Holy Fallout. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be. World without end. Amen. May the Blessings of the Bomb Almighty, and the Fellowship of the Holy Fallout, descend upon us all. This day and forever more. Amen!

    5. Re:I have a dream! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      "warm body of my wife next to me"

      Your wife so big, she next to you on the right AND the left! Now that's warm!

      Sorry, I read that page with the 100 mama jokes yesterday and it corrupted me.

    6. Re:I have a dream! by psmears · · Score: 2, Insightful

      You do know that ionizing radiation (e.g. alpha particles, beta particles, gamma rays from nuclear decay) has absolutely nothing to do with non-ionizing (e.g. radio, microwave, etc) EM radiation.

      Gamma rays are a form of EM radiation... so they are related (though given that they have a much higher energy I agree that it's not that helpful to compare them in this instance).

    7. Re:I have a dream! by drinkypoo · · Score: 3, Funny

      I'd rather have the warm body of my wife next to me

      They don't stay warm for long...

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    8. Re:I have a dream! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Are you seriously too retarded to know the myriad differences between microwave radiation and plutonium?

      That's the 99th percentile of stupid, right there.

    9. Re:I have a dream! by ATMD · · Score: 2, Informative

      Actually, any electromagnetic radiation has the potential to be ionising, depending on the material it hits.

      This is due to the photoelectric effect which, simply put, means that if an incoming photon has an energy higher than a specific value, (called the material's work function), it will give an electron in that material enough energy to break free and disappear off elsewhere. The material then gains a small positive charge - in other words, it becomes ionised.

      Of course EM radiation in the sort of bands that WiFi uses has nowhere near enough energy to do that to most materials. So yes, it's nothing to worry about and yes, I guess I'm just being pedantic. Oh well :)

      --
      Nobody else has this sig.
    10. Re:I have a dream! by Shotgun · · Score: 0, Offtopic

      I'd rather have the warm body of my wife next to me

      ME TOO!

      Could you give her my address please?

      --
      Aah, change is good. -- Rafiki
      Yeah, but it ain't easy. -- Simba
    11. Re:I have a dream! by ballpoint · · Score: 1

      Guess that's like carbon dioxine scaremongering.

      --
      Flourescent (adj): smelling like ground wheat.
    12. Re:I have a dream! by Carpe+PM · · Score: 0

      Extra points for the "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" reference.

    13. Re:I have a dream! by eihab · · Score: 1

      I'd rather have the warm body of my wife next to me ... oh wait, I must be new here. Never mind. Actually you must be a newlywed!

      I have a theory that the distance between married people in bed grows exponentially with the number of years they were married.
      So right around 10 years you're actually sleeping in different rooms!

      You mileage may vary :P
      --
      If you can't mod them join them.
    14. Re:I have a dream! by mpe · · Score: 1

      Gamma rays are a form of EM radiation... so they are related (though given that they have a much higher energy I agree that it's not that helpful to compare them in this instance).

      They share properties with other forms of EM radiation. This is highly relevent if you want to use gamma rays to kill a cancer with minimal harm to surrounding tissues.

    15. Re:I have a dream! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Gamma rays are a form of EM radiation... so they are related (though given that they have a much higher energy I agree that it's not that helpful to compare them in this instance). I'd say the difference all depends on your frame of reference, really. (Sorry, can't resist a little special relativity humor...)
  5. The BBC you say... by da3dAlus · · Score: 5, Funny

    The programme included only one contributor (Professor Repacholi) who disagreed with Sir William

    Peter Griffin: We'll move to England, huh? Worst they got there is, you know, drive-by... arguments...
    [Meanwhile, in England]
    Englishman: I say, Jeremy, isn't that Reginald B. Stifworth, the young upstart chap who's been touting the merits of a united European commonwealth?
    Jeremy: Why yes, I daresay it is.
    Englishman: Oh, let's get him.
    [They drive up]
    Englishman: Oh Reginald... I disagree.
    [drives off]

    --

    Sometimes I doubt your commitment to Sparkle Motion.
  6. Can't these people do maths?! by ericferris · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I am sick and tired of hearing voodoo science scaremongers. So here we go.

    As far as possible interactions with the human body go, the 900 MHz to 1900 MHz spectrum is roughly the same. Both WiFi and cell phones use bursts of transmissions with approximately the same spectral characteristics. So we can simplify the problem and focus only on intensity.

    A cell phone that is far from the nearest tower can transmit up to one watt. A typical home router transmits 100 mW (one tenth of a cell phone). A very powerful cell tower transmits 1000 W. However, signal intensity per surface unit decreases as the square of the distance. So if you are 100 meters (300 feet, one-half furlong for our US friends) from a 1-kW cell tower, you get the same exposure as if you are one metter (0.005 furlong, 3 ft) from a wifi router. And of course, all of this is dwarfed by the intensity of signal you get a few centimeters away from a 1-W cell phone.

    So test cell phones. If they don't fry your brain, forget about wifi routers and towers, their effect is negligeable next to a cell phone's signal flux. And cell phones were innocented by several studies.

    Attention journalists: When you cover technology, either learn the basics of what you're talking about or go back to freelancing for people rags.

    --
    Fantasy: http://ferrisfantasy.blogspot.com/
    1. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Great! So what about the 2.4 GHz spectrum that is used by WiFi? That's outside the range of .9 GHz to 1.9 GHz that you mentioned, so I wonder if it is fine too?

    2. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by lorenzino · · Score: 1

      Thank you!

    3. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by JesterXXV · · Score: 1

      one-half furlong for our US friends
      Could you please convert that to kilobushels per microacre for those of us in the Midwestern U.S.?
      --
      Yo mama so fake, she failed the Turing Test.
    4. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by SigILL · · Score: 3, Interesting

      So what about the 2.4 GHz spectrum that is used by WiFi?

      Generally speaking, the higher the frequency the more is absorbed by air. So higher frequencies are actually _less_ dangerous.

      Note that that's also why so many businesses are interested in the 700 MHz spectrum licenses for sale over at your side of the great pond. Less absorption means less base stations, repeaters and transmission power needed.
      --
      Error: password can't contain reverse spelling of ancient Chinese emperor
    5. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by ObsessiveMathsFreak · · Score: 1

      I'll see your facts and figures and raise you an anecdote.

      Many moons ago, in an old programming job, I was chatting with the boss. I'd been working there three weeks, and this was the first time I'd ever seen him; the place was a small tech support company. Anyway, he talked for a while and then eventually pointed to a sizable scar just above his right temple and said "You're probably wondering what this is".

      Turns out he was six weeks out of a brain surgery operation to remove a tumour the size of a golf ball from his head. This guy was an onsite type of engineer who had been using mobiles since very early days, and in many poor reception areas, so the mobile seemed the most likely suspect in my mind. He was actually fine, still running the company, but had apparently been disbarred from driving for a year because of the operation. Apparently it counted as brain damage. Go figure.

      Anyway, around this time I bought my first mobile. I got it with a wired headset.

      --
      May the Maths Be with you!
    6. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by TheRaven64 · · Score: 3, Informative
      Microwave ovens run at a frequency of 2450MHz (2.45GHz) and interact quite well with water, of which the majority of the human body is composed. The lowest power microwave I have seen, however, is 600W, which is a good two orders of magnitude more than the average WiFi adaptor. The energy from a microwave is also much more focussed[1] than a WiFi antenna, which radiates in all directions unless it's being used for point-to-point fixed-topology communication.


      [1] For a good demo of this, put a lump of refrigerated butter in the microwave for 30 seconds without the plate spinning. When you take it out, it will be melted (and possibly under quite high pressure) in the middle, but still cold on the outside. Note that this will only work with microwaves where the food is rotated, not those where the magnetron moves.

      --
      I am TheRaven on Soylent News
    7. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Jarjarthejedi · · Score: 3, Interesting

      I see your anecdote and raise you another anecdote. My family and I have been huge tech users for a while now, we've all had cell phones for 10 years, our landline phones use the 2.4 GHz spectrum to tranmit to each other wirelessly, and we have a powerful G router, and have had a wireless router for 5+ years now. None of us have ever been diagnosed with any cancer, nor any ailments worse than some bone issues due to running. In fact, the only person in my family who has even been affected by cancer was a bit of an oldtimer, having neither a cellphone nor a wireless router and living far from any sort of tower (didn't get any bars at his house).

      So that's 5 anecdotes to your one, take it as you will. Brain tumors have been around for far longer than wireless transmissions, as has almost all types of cancer. Perhaps there is a statistical significance, but anecdotes can't prove that.

      --
      There are two kinds of fool One says 'This is old therefore good' Another says 'This is new therefore better'- Dean Ing
    8. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by operagost · · Score: 1

      So instead, you'll get cancer in your bojangles. Brilliant!

      --

      Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
    9. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 2, Insightful

      My microwave melts butter at 10s, and that's the outside. I've cut through it and it isn't melted on the inside, though it is soft all the way through.

      I used to be scared microwaves were poisoning the food. Then I learned in chemistry what was actually going on (it was causing water molecules to vibrate, which generates friction with other molecules, which turns into heat.)

      Laugh? I heard a guy on the radio not a year ago doing scare mongering as to what microwaves were doing to your food (and why you should therefore buy this product.)

      If there is a god, he'd be much better off filtering out soulless bastards than filtering out those who refuse to kow-tow to him.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    10. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      So you were scared until years later, when studies came out showing no statistical anomalies in brain cancer in groups with cellphone exposure and those without? (Or big electrical transmission tower exposure, or not?)

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    11. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by shadowrat · · Score: 1

      That anecdote makes me long for the good old days when people NEVER got tumors.

    12. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      A cell phone that is far from the nearest tower can transmit up to one watt.

      Hmmm. I remember reading, while non-typical, max output from a cell phone (model dependent, more so on select GSM phones) can be up to 3 watts. Typical usage is far less than one watt.

    13. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by acaila_edhel · · Score: 1

      Very nice post. I wish more people would go through the math before spouting off.

      However, as one who lives in the US, I have never used a furlong. You can use feet for us as well. Or better yet, call 300 feet a football field, unless you are a Baltimore Ravens fan, then you would wish it was 294 feet.

    14. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      and interact quite well with water, of which the majority of the human body is composed.

      During WWII, both British and American radar operators would get warm by standing in front of their radar beams. They didn't realize they were frying their future kids.

    15. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Vancorps · · Score: 1

      You are correct however older analog cell phones did put out a lot more radiation than modern cell phones. Enough to cause cancer even in the earliest models. I'll agree everything we use now is perfectly harmless though.

    16. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Dan+Ost · · Score: 1

      I would be surprised to find out that the radar operators were made sterile by the radar beams. Radar frequencies are below that of ionizing radiation.

      --

      *sigh* back to work...
    17. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Ironsides · · Score: 1

      You mean when 99.999% of the population died before they turned 60?

      --
      Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
    18. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Bearhouse · · Score: 1

      Thanks for the post - good summary. For what it's worth, you're not the only one sick of nutjobs.

      One could add that all of the radiation you mention is non-ionising, so not to be confused with nastier stuff.
      The most harm non-ionising radiation has been proven to do, is cook seagulls in front of high-power radar.

      Also, as you point out, the most intense signal you are likely to receive is from holding a cell phone close to your ear.
      I suggest a headset, or a tinfoil hat...

    19. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Informative

      Just remember, kids: "The plural of anecdote is not data"

    20. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by coolGuyZak · · Score: 1

      Sperm are quite sensitive to temperature fluctuation.

    21. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by lobosrul · · Score: 1

      Actually a furlong is 220 yds, 660 ft, or ~201m. It's really not that hard people 3 ft to the yard, 5.5 yards to the rod, 40 yards to the furlong, 8 furlongs to the mile... I thought everyone knew that.

    22. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Dan+Ost · · Score: 1

      Sure, his sperm may be damaged, but he cranks out a new batch of sperm every 36 hours or so. It's only an issue if his ability to produce sperm is compromised.

      --

      *sigh* back to work...
    23. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by businessnerd · · Score: 1

      My grandfather was a pilot during WWII. In in those days, the radar unit in the plane was often between the pilot's legs. He went on to father 5 kids and died of cancer in the early seventies (pretty sure it was testicular cancer). Yes the radiation from radar can be very damaging, but sterility is not necessarily the end result.

      --
      "It's not whether you win or lose, it's how drunk you get." -- H. J. Simpson
    24. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by GooberToo · · Score: 1

      I didn't mean to make it sound like an absolute. But along this line, it turns out the military did a study and radar guys had a much higher sterility rate than other soldiers.

    25. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Mr_Perl · · Score: 2, Informative

      So higher frequencies are actually _less_ dangerous. Quite wrong!

      As a ham radio operator I have to point out that RF radiation exposure limits are a function of frequency and time, and the higher the frequency you deal with the less time you should be exposed to it!

      Some helpful stuff on that for the concerned:

      http://www.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Engineering_Technology/Documents/bulletins/oet65/oet65b.pdf
      http://n5xu.ece.utexas.edu/rfsafety/
      --

      My poetry site welcomes the unusual.
    26. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by ortholattice · · Score: 1

      So if you are 100 meters (300a feet, one-half furlong for our US friends) from a 1-kW cell tower...

      That should be "...1-kW (1.34 horsepower for our US friends) cell tower..."

    27. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by zippthorne · · Score: 1

      Your boss, where was his mobile the majority of the time? clipped to his belt? If so, why didn't he get a tumor there?

      --
      Can you be Even More Awesome?!
    28. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by dracae · · Score: 1

      You gave up a perfectly good "You insensitive clod!" joke?

    29. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by BubFranklin · · Score: 1

      How much power does it take to cook the inside of any single part of a single skin cell? A better question, how much power does it take to mutate a single skin cell's DNA? (the obvious result being cancer) Or kill a single skin cell. This is critical to know considering the arguments you, and many others here, are making. Simply put, if this can't be answered because of lack of knowledge or simply the inability to know how to determine this, then it's not known how 1W from a cell phone, wifi, or any other low power radiation source affects the body. I am sure the answer is just some simple biology study, which makes assumed evidence look childish to those that really care to know.

    30. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by afxgrin · · Score: 1

      yeah. it's just a box where the microwaves stay inside.

      but even then, let's say we remove the magnetron from a microwave oven, and couple a wireless router's antenna to a waveguide for the oven, i don't think you'll be able to melt butter, let alone heat up a glass of water 0.5 degrees. the light bulb in the oven would warm up the water more than the microwave transmitter.

      I have some recent experience using high power magnetrons in open air, and even then, you need to be awfully close to the source to notice any serious change. Pesky inverse square law ....

      Now I think we should take a closer look at all those CRT screens still being used. Something about electron beams striking metal surfaces and producing soft X-rays concern me more.

      A co-worker of mine who has recently passed away, used to always have his face really close to the computer screen because he had poor vision. He wore rather thick glasses, and I think his issue was with the contrast on the screen... but I can't help but wonder what kind of dosage he received. I should probably do the maths for that.... there's another co-worker who has a similar vision problem. I am making no claim that his death is related to his exposure, I honestly have yet to find out what happened.

    31. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by grogling · · Score: 3, Informative

      "A cell phone that is far from the nearest tower can transmit up to one watt. A typical home router transmits 100 mW (one tenth of a cell phone). A very powerful cell tower transmits 1000 W." ...

      Um, not anywhere on planet earth. Typical output power from the final amplifier stage of an 800MHz cell amplifier is nowhere above 25-30w at the very most. 1900MHz CDMA cells average between 4w and 15w max output at those frequencies. If you can provide data on any cell tower with final amplifier output in even the 100W range let-alone 1000W, I'd love to see it. ...

      "However, signal intensity per surface unit decreases as the square of the distance. So if you are 100 meters (300 feet, one-half furlong for our US friends) from a 1-kW cell tower, you get the same exposure as if you are one metter (0.005 furlong, 3 ft) from a wifi router. And of course, all of this is dwarfed by the intensity of signal you get a few centimeters away from a 1-W cell phone." ...

      There haven't been any 1w cell phones manufactured in the US for many years. 600mW and lower has been the standard for quite some time.

    32. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by zippthorne · · Score: 1

      Heat is very bad for sperm, which is why they're kept in a sack, outside your body. Even a little bit of heat is enough to reduce your count, but it should be a temporary depression. Remove the heating and a couple of days later you should be back up to full strength. I don't think anyone could bear to stand in the same spot long enough to permanently sterilize themselves, though.

      --
      Can you be Even More Awesome?!
    33. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      So if you are 100 meters (300 feet, one-half furlong for our US friends)

      100 metres for our non-US friends.

    34. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Moofie · · Score: 1

      Um, in other words, the scenario described is much worse than the worst case scenario and is, therefore, equipped with a substantial safety margin. In this context, that seems pretty reasonable.

      --
      Why yes, I AM a rocket scientist!
    35. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by w.timmeh · · Score: 1

      If I remember my physchem correctly, microwave ovens are also tuned to an overtone vibration of water (wavelength ~11cm?). The specific frequency vibrationally excites water molecules, which lose the energy as heat.

    36. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by ericferris · · Score: 1

      Thank you for your precisions. I didn't know that the effective RF output of a cell phone tower was so low. However, as explained by Moofie's post, this drives the nail even further in the alarmist stories' coffin, since the RF intensity values I describe are much greater than the real life ones. Even at 600 mW as opposed to 1 W, a cell phone still creates a much higher intensity for the user than the towers and wifi APs. So the conclusions are unchnanged.

      --
      Fantasy: http://ferrisfantasy.blogspot.com/
    37. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Elbarfo · · Score: 1

      Well, let's see...

      I have two friends that worked on radar vessels in the Navy, and both lost their nads to Cancer. The subsequent payments they recieve do nothing to reverse the loss of thier nads, but they do very well nonetheless.

      I can't count the number of cops that contracted cancer in the days of the (2.4GHz) radar gun, as well. They used to lay it on their laps, the fools....

      Me, I fully expect to see many cases of cancer on the side of the head for all the fools that wear a goddamned earpiece on their friggin heads 24/7. It may take years, but I expect to see it nonetheless. The human body reacts badly to microwave energy. It has been proven time and time again. Sure the average Wi-fi or Bluetooth device is small and weak, but long term exposure (we haven't seen that...yet) I guarantee will bring up cancer rates. And when you have to have a portion of your skull removed (like the cops who lost large chunks of their legs and pelvis to radar guns) you probably won't be able to hear me say "I told you so".

      Fearmongering? Maybe. Reality? Very likely. Weather I care if your ignorance give you a better chance of getting cancer? Not even a little bit. The difference between 2.4Ghz and 700-900MHz is very significant, and you obviously don't have a clue what you're talking about.

      But what do I know? I've only had my Doctorate in Electronic Engineering for 10 years now....

      Let me think....what reason would a multi-billion dollar industry have to deny such accusations like that? Damn if I can figure it out....

    38. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by ericferris · · Score: 1

      I am an EE too, you know... You claim to have a PhD yet you write like a 14-yaer old. You must be very precocious. As for cops and gonad cancer... I think the donuts are the obvious cause. Now, if you stop insulting people and expose your arguments. I am interested.

      --
      Fantasy: http://ferrisfantasy.blogspot.com/
    39. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by grogling · · Score: 1

      Agreed on the portable end of things. I've seen a barrage of outlandish explanations by people who think they know and end up making the situation worse.

      Now if we could just make some progress on the concept of RF "radiation" not being the same as isotopic "radiation", we might get somewhere past the foil hats of the alarmists.

      -g-

    40. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by vnaughtdeltat · · Score: 1

      What the hell is a furlong?

    41. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Elbarfo · · Score: 1

      Google "Dr. George Carlo", you may learn something.

      Much like Dr. Carlo's situation, there are far more "studies" proclaiming how *safe* it all is than his one meager voice. But then, look who's paying for the bulk of them. I really don't believe that short term exposure will do much damage. Nor do I think that long distance exposure to low powered sources has as much effect. But I do believe that the true long term effect of microwave exposure hasn't even begun to be discovered.

      More and more people are running around with microwave-emitting blobs on the side of their head every day, for over 12+ hours a day, and to me that is the height of stupidity. But by all means, keep believing what you're told. Far be it from me to stop you or anyone from slowly killing themselves.

      Like I said, why would they lie?

      "We can't solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them." - Albert Einstein
    42. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Detritus · · Score: 1

      Very high exposure levels, like being in the wrong place near a high-power radar, can produce cataracts.

      --
      Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
    43. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by CrossChris · · Score: 1

      As a ham radio operator I have to point out that RF radiation exposure limits are a function of frequency and time,

      Wrong!

      Much of the "data" presented in those two papers are entirely wrong. The only parameter that matters is field strength. Frequency has little or nothing to do with it.

      You get more irradiated if you go outside on a sunny day wearing dark clothes!

    44. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Innocented?

      Verbing weirds language.

    45. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by mpe · · Score: 1

      Um, not anywhere on planet earth. Typical output power from the final amplifier stage of an 800MHz cell amplifier is nowhere above 25-30w at the very most. 1900MHz CDMA cells average between 4w and 15w max output at those frequencies. If you can provide data on any cell tower with final amplifier output in even the 100W range let-alone 1000W, I'd love to see it. ...

      Maybe someone got confused between the power consumption and the level of RF power emitted. (Or between cell sites and broadcast stations, which are not uncommon to find located together.)

    46. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by mpe · · Score: 1

      I have two friends that worked on radar vessels in the Navy, and both lost their nads to Cancer.

      A warship radar is several orders of magnitude more powerful than any cell phone or wi-fi system. Any comparison just isn't that meaningful.

    47. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by mpe · · Score: 1

      During WWII, both British and American radar operators would get warm by standing in front of their radar beams.

      IIRC this was where the idea of using microwaves to cook food.

    48. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by totally+bogus+dude · · Score: 1

      He did! What an insensitive clod!

    49. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

      Of course it isn't. It's anecdoti!

    50. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by ericferris · · Score: 1

      One eight of a mile, or 201 m in Système International units.

      What the hell is V0 delta t? Gove me the answer before I go ballistic.

      --
      Fantasy: http://ferrisfantasy.blogspot.com/
    51. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by tehcyder · · Score: 1

      And cell phones were innocented by several studies.
      And you're guilted of crimes against the language.
      --
      To have a right to do a thing is not at all the same as to be right in doing it
    52. Re:Can't these people do maths?! by ericferris · · Score: 1

      Yeah, I shouldn't verb my nouns, it weirds the language (as Calvin would say).

      --
      Fantasy: http://ferrisfantasy.blogspot.com/
  7. dumbed down by owlnation · · Score: 1, Insightful

    Who in the UK can be surprised by this?

    It's been obvious that the BBC's standards have been gradually eroding for about 20 years. It probably hasn't reached bottom yet. Biased tabloid journalism, and product placement to get round the no advertising rules, are the daily norm, not the exception nowadays.

    Focus groups lead to mediocrity and bias. A similar thing is happening to the UK in many other areas too. If you have an IQ over 95 you're a statistical outlier, and are no longer catered to by corportations, government or the media in the UK.

    1. Re:dumbed down by coastwalker · · Score: 1

      I am and I'm not. I totally agree with your assessment.

      The fear of being sued has reduced the content of news stories to soundbites so that all of the sensible conjecture based on facts collected by journalists at the scene is no longer reported - and the resulting inquiry / court case / academic study never gets reported unless it is either a possible cause / cure for CANCER. In addition to which the population is assumed to be so dumb that advertising works (i.e. thick as pigshit). So the only role left for news is entertainment!!! and its content is mainly about whether the players are in danger of becoming celebrities or losing celebrity status. (even football news is only about whether the team manager should be sacked - not a word about how well the game is played). In addition to which the people actually putting the news together are ideally less than thirteen years old because anyone else is seriously out of touch with what is happening and now.

      So its no surprise that WiFi is only of interest as a potential competitor to Bird Flu or Aids rather than a component of a social revolution slightly more important than the inventing of the printing press.

      But what the heck, its been obvious for decades that western civilization for the common person has been on a hand cart to hell since the naivety and optimism of the 60's was exploded. Thats probably why so many people are attracted to the healthy debates on this site where the application of science and engineering to problems is still regarded with some respect by those who have some understanding of it - that it can still do good things for the world and be fun and artistic all at the same time.

      All engineering projects carry some risks, at this moment in time though the relative risk of WiFi is quite well understood as being substantially less than using a mobile phone. So this BBC report comes over as sensationalist unjustifiable speculative rubbish. Its pretty sad that this will not be causing resignations and any action to prevent similarly poor journalism in the future - unlike the mass furore over a children's tv show naming their pet cat something other than what the viewers voted for.

      Bad BBC, don't do it again! your credibility is rapidly heading south.

      --
      Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
  8. Re:I can't wait! by njfuzzy · · Score: 1

    What is it with the climate change trolls on tech boards lately? I've been seeing a comment, totally off topic, trying to make the case that human-caused climate change (global warming) is bas science, will be proven wrong, makes no sense, and so forth. Is this some sort of bizarre astroturfing campaign, some joke that I missed, or what?

    --
    My Photography - http://ian-x.com
    The Deathlings (comic) - http://thedeathlings.com
  9. Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by digitig · · Score: 4, Insightful

    If the BBC shows a rerun of Sesame Street that claims that 1 + 1 = 2, do they have to give equal time to mathematicians who claim that it isn't? (Where would they find them?)

    If the program was wrong, it wasn't wrong because they had the wrong number of scientists on each side.

    --
    Quidnam Latine loqui modo coepi?
    1. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Head counts are important. The issue is that the head counts didn't represent the community. Are you claiming there's a significant portion of people who believe 1 + 1 != 2?

    2. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by hardburn · · Score: 1

      Math is funny. Those mathematicians will tell you that you actually can make a system where 2 + 2 = 5, as long as it's internally consistent.

      A better example might be some easily measurable fact, like "the air we breathe is about 78% nitrogen".

      --
      Not a typewriter
    3. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by itsdapead · · Score: 1

      If the BBC shows a rerun of Sesame Street that claims that 1 + 1 = 2, do they have to give equal time to mathematicians who claim that it isn't? (Where would they find them?)

      Well, as the slashdot sig goes, There are 10 types of mathematician - those that understand binary and those that don't.

      Meanwhile, you're not really suggesting that the media can't make any sort of judgement distinguish between genuine areas of scientific disagreement and fringe quackery, are you? Gosh, that's almost like suggesting that managers and politicians with an Arts/Classics/Legal/Business background who know squat about science can't make informed decisions about scientific and technical issues... and that can't be true!

      Anyway, the BBC have a remit to cater for a diverse audience, and portraying people who actually know what they are talking about and can back it up with evidence amounts to unfair discrimination against stupid people - and where would TV be if it alienated stupid people?

      --
      In a survey of 100 programmers, 111111 thought that duck-typing was a good idea.
    4. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by Sockatume · · Score: 1

      The headcount was wrong. It should've had a few hundred to a thousand scientists elaborating on the theme of "this is bullshit" for every quack who appeared onscreen saying "please buy my expensive anti-EMF hat, from myself, a douchebag who managed to get the idiots at Panorama to give me free advertising".

      --
      No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
    5. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

      To sum up: Scary headline on page 1, two weeks later a retraction in the far corner of page 37.

      Retraction isn't as profitable as scary headline, so don't give them equal weight, you quality, fair, honest journalists, you!

      Nothing new here, folks. Move along, move along.

      --
      (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
    6. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by blind+biker · · Score: 2, Interesting

      This reminds me of when a reporter of BBC World covered a story about copy-protected "CD"s. On one side there was a Big Label (Universal I think) rep that lied through his teeth saying that the silvery disk is a CD, while on the other side there was a techy guy who explained how these disks don't adhere to the CD standards and have (most of) the loss-correcction rendundant bits removed.

      And the BBC journalist, in the conclusion remarks said "as always, the truth is somewhre in between". WTF? Truth is usually NOT somewhere in between, but at one or the other side - like in that story, when it was squarely in the techy guy's hands.

      I HATE this sort of journalistic bullshit. Probably spouted because they have no clue about what they're writing about. My father worked as a journalist for 20 years, and he told me the "Journalists are the most ignorant people in the world". His words.

      --
      "The agriculture ministry is not in charge of Gundam" - Japanese ministry official.
    7. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      If I were looking for Mathematicians who didn't agree with 1+1=2, I'd start in America, shitty education system, and unlike the few developing/war-torn countries that rank below it they don't beat students for the wrong answers.

    8. Re:Is a headcount the best way to decide balance? by Oktober+Sunset · · Score: 0, Flamebait

      well, I just inverted a language system where, 'you fuck little kids' means 'I make no libellous statements about you at all'.

      Hence I'd like to say 'hardburn fucks little kids'.

  10. Good, I can finally take all this foil off by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    my skin can finally breathe.

  11. OT: Panarama is getting pretty bad by QX-Mat · · Score: 2, Informative

    I've noticed a slow decline in panorama's technological and socio-political programs (pretty much everything). Dispatches, and that program on unreported news on More4 (the name of which escapes me) are farbetter and less "pimped". It's not just mistakes I have a problem with, it's the tabloid attitude the show's taken to; frighteningly reminiscent of Fox News.

    I love my BBC but when I have to step back and become objective, not because of the topic, but because of the way information is inappropriately portrayed, I'm a little sad inside.

    Matt

    1. Re:OT: Panarama is getting pretty bad by LordSnooty · · Score: 1

      Absolutely - what those unfamiliar with the programme should know is that recently it moved from a graveyard Sunday slot (where it featured thoughtful and straightforward films) to a prime-time Monday evening slot against one of the big soaps on ITV. This was heralded as a great victory for serious current affairs but it turns the show has turned into, from what I can gather via Daily Show skits, an American-style tabloid, sensationalist programme with pop-video production values.

    2. Re:OT: Panarama is getting pretty bad by turgid · · Score: 1

      File on 4 (BBC Radio 4) is so bad nowadays it makes me cringe. I've long since stopped watching BBC TV documentaries too, because the single monosyllabic sentence every two minutes interspersed with gratuitous irrelevant special effects does not a documentary make.

  12. Speaking of scaremongering by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Speaking of scaremongering, have a look at this MS ad that was on Slashdot.

  13. Inverse square by Cracked+Pottery · · Score: 0

    My WiFi antennas aren't an inch from my head. I don't think there is any doubt that hand held analogue cell phones, when they used often, are associated with tumors. I don't know if this finding is also true for digital phones. In any city people are awash with RF energy from a multitude of sources. Most of the sources are not a couple of inches from the person's brain.

    1. Re:Inverse square by hardburn · · Score: 1

      I don't think there is any doubt that hand held analogue cell phones, when they used often, are associated with tumors. I don't know if this finding is also true for digital phones.

      What's the mechanism that makes them dangerous? Why would digital phones be different from analog phones at similar frequencies?

      --
      Not a typewriter
    2. Re:Inverse square by Cracked+Pottery · · Score: 0

      Because they require less energy, thus the smaller batteries and the longer life between charges. The mechanism that makes cell phones harmful is that they inject comparatively high amounts of RF energy into cells, which damages the DNA. There are too many cases of tumors on the side of the head where sufferers hold their phone to deny a correspondence.

    3. Re:Inverse square by agingell · · Score: 1

      The analogue cell network had much greater separation between towers which required considerably higher power output from both the phone (several watts) and the tower.
      Also with digital you can improve the SNR dramatically therefore reducing the power required.
      These 2 factors are what led to digital networks requiring a lower power output from the phone combined with the greatly improved tower technology for ultra low power signal reception which used to require cooling with liquid nitrogen to get a low thermal background noise.
      It should be noted that the towers for digital have to be closer together as they tend to use higher frequencies which require line of sight whereas the older 900MHz networks would go through things much better, this is one of the advantages of the 700MHz network that Google is bidding for.

    4. Re:Inverse square by ILongForDarkness · · Score: 1

      Actually it depends how close you are to the antenna. Inverse square only applies for point charge/currents. For an infinite wire (which an attenna is approximately if you are close enough to it), the field strength actually goes as 1/r not 1/r^2. Still as you say wifi isn't that close to your head usually, and is about 1/10th the output anyways.

    5. Re:Inverse square by Firethorn · · Score: 1

      Signal to Noise Ratio.

      The better the SNR is on analogue, the better the sound, the easier it is to understand somebody. The old analogue phones freqently transmitted on maximum power all the time, for best quality(and cheaper construction cost).

      On digital, the SNR only has to be sufficient to be able to reconstruct the signal*, so you have much more in the way of reducing transmission power when the SNR is good. Most modern digital phones, for example, transmit at a quarter or less of what the old analogue ones did.

      *Most digital transmissions have lots of recovery possibilities.

      --
      I don't read AC A human right
    6. Re:Inverse square by Cracked+Pottery · · Score: 1

      When you get far enough away from the source, then it is inverse square. If you have a short antenna, then close to it, it is not inverse square, but if the antenna is a couple of inches from your head, then you have a strong field.

    7. Re:Inverse square by hardburn · · Score: 1

      The mechanism that makes cell phones harmful is that they inject comparatively high amounts of RF energy into cells, which damages the DNA.

      Ionizing radiation damages DNA. Non-ionizing radiation (which is what cell phones and wifi networks use) can only damage cells by adding heat. Cell phones don't put out enough energy to raise the temperature by even 1o C.

      It's possible that a yet-unknown mechanism exists for non-ionizing radiation to cause cancer. However, we've been dealing with energy in these frequencies for a long time, many of them in far more powerful amounts than cell phones (radar, microwave communication towers, etc.). Additionally, many of those sources are staffed by union workers, which are notorious for looking for any minor safety factor to justify a wage increase. If you want to prove a new mechanism in a mature area of physics, you're going to need very good proof.

      Anecdotal evidence of "many brain tumors on that side of the head" is no replacement for a good scientific study; after all, 50% of brain tumors would happen on that side of the head, anyway. Actual studies on this matter have more than adaquately disproven. Studies in support of a link are often shown to have problems.

      --
      Not a typewriter
    8. Re:Inverse square by VeriTea · · Score: 1

      Correct, however if you are close enough to an antenna that the relationship is 1/r then the antenna length (or aperture) usually becomes non-negligible. On a wifi router with a 5" antenna it isn't a big deal, but on a cell tower with 6' to 8' antennas the antenna size means that the peak power density is lower then you would otherwise expect as the power is distributed over the antenna length.

      --
      --- There are two kinds of people, those who accept dogmas and know it, and those who accept dogmas and don't know it
  14. Re:attention UK by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Spoken like a true half-wit.

  15. Only two people complained? by Curmudgeonlyoldbloke · · Score: 3, Interesting

    According to the BBC complaints ruling "two viewers complained". Assuming that one of them was Prof. Repacholi, I must be the other. But then again, I'm probably Spartacus as well.

    Since this report was published Panorama was broadcast as usual on Monday night. There was no trailing "we got the wifi program badly wrong" apology, so I've complained again about that - we'll see what happens.

    It's worth mentioning that the BBC is going through a sustained period of navel-gazing at the moment, ever since the Hutton Report. Among the items for consideration have been such earth-shattering topics such as the name of the Blue Peter cat http://blogs.guardian.co.uk/organgrinder/2007/09/it_fair_knocks_your_socks.html and whether two pieces of film about an unelected German woman had been reversed between the programme and the trail http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/entertainment/7079070.stm. In among this, ensuring basic scientific accuracy in a flagship current-affairs program clearly isn't very important.

    1. Re:Only two people complained? by gigne · · Score: 1

      In that case I don't know where my complaint went. I suspect that their complaints stats are plain wrong or their customer service department is just >/dev/null. Two complaints my arse.

      --
      Signature v3.0, now with 42% less memory usage.
    2. Re:Only two people complained? by SuiteSisterMary · · Score: 1

      I'm Spartacus!

      --
      Vintage computer games and RPG books available. Email me if you're interested.
    3. Re:Only two people complained? by hairykrishna · · Score: 1

      I complained too. That makes three of us just in this thread.

      --
      "Physics is to math as sex is to masturbation." -R. Feynman
    4. Re:Only two people complained? by coastwalker · · Score: 1

      I saw a lot of complaints on the "have your say" thread on the program on the BBC news website - including my own. But they wouldnt read those of course.

      --
      Facts are history now plebs have politics for religion on social media.
  16. Reminds of an episode of Yes Minister. by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

    They where trying to build a chemical factory and some people where scared of it.
    Both the MP and his civil servent had no idea if it was safe of not because they didn't know any science.
    "Minister I have a classical eduction. I don't know any science."

    --
    See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
    1. Re:Reminds of an episode of Yes Minister. by Diamonddavej · · Score: 1

      That is exactly why the British media has taken a nose dive in its ability to intelligently discuss science and technology - todays journalists have an Arts and Humanities education in journalism, they have no critical thinking or science education. That abominable Panorama program was an example of just that phenomina, it was made by people who should be producing daytime cooking programs. When TV was young, in the 50-60's, it employed an army of engineers that created TV technology, later on they changed carers and many of them helped produce the unsurpassed science/technology documentaries of the 70s and 80s.

    2. Re:Reminds of an episode of Yes Minister. by LWATCDR · · Score: 1

      I would say it has more to do with political leaders lack of science knowledge. I do expect more from the BBC. I am happy to say I have seen very little bad science on PBS's Nova.
      So it makes me wonder when did Rupert Murdoch buy the BBC :)

      --
      See my blog http://ilovecookes.blogspot.com/ for light hearted technical information.
  17. Re:Of course they were wrong. by Bozzio · · Score: 2, Informative

    The target page tried to infect me with a virus.

    Don't follow parent's links.

    --
    I just pooped your party.
  18. Scaremongering? by bizitch · · Score: 1

    Scaremongering? - You mean researchers are capable of this?

    Lemme guess - there was an "overwhelming consensus" that WIFI was gonna cook all of our children's brains

    That never happens - right?

    Scientist and researchers never exaggerate or manipulate results in order to further a hidden agenda - right?

    I'm so disillusioned right now ....

    --
    ---- "Logoff! That cookie shit makes me nervous!" - A. Soprano
    1. Re:Scaremongering? by meringuoid · · Score: 1
      Lemme guess - there was an "overwhelming consensus" that WIFI was gonna cook all of our children's brains

      Actually, no. Quite the contrary; there's about a half-dozen cranks who say that, yet who get a quite astonishing amount of media attention for their pains. Analogies to other fields of research are left to the reader.

      --
      Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
    2. Re:Scaremongering? by geekoid · · Score: 1

      There is a difference between a few 'scientists' making claims and scientific consensus.

      Please tell am of ANY scientific consensus that with was wrong, or didn't change in the wake of scientific evidence to the contrary.

      "Scientist and researchers never exaggerate or manipulate results in order to further a hidden agenda - right?"
      Some do, but guess what? if it is science it can be duplicated, results verified, falsifiability can be confirmed.

      "
      I'm so disillusioned right now ...."

      funny statement, considering good since is solid regardless of you illusions.

      --
      The Kruger Dunning explains most post on /. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dunning%E2%80%93Kruger_effect
    3. Re:Scaremongering? by mpe · · Score: 1

      Actually, no. Quite the contrary; there's about a half-dozen cranks who say that, yet who get a quite astonishing amount of media attention for their pains.

      It's also likely that these "cranks" go out of their way to get such media attention. When actual scientists don't, because they are either too busy doing science or no that they can't explain things in a way that journalists with understand/consider for broadcast.

  19. Damnit! by Vexor · · Score: 1

    How am I supposed to get mutant powers from radioactive wifi if it's harmless! I'd rant more but I have to go swim in the Hudson River's toxic waste.

    --
    ~Vexed and loving it!
  20. Re:I can't wait! by PHAEDRU5 · · Score: 1, Troll

    It's just the world's last rational people mounting a vanguard action against enviro-collectivists. Don't trouble yourself about it.

    --
    668: Neighbour of the Beast
  21. "Radiation" by Bazman · · Score: 5, Insightful

    Notice how they refer to it as 'radiation', because radiation is clearly a *bad thing*. It killed all those people in Hiroshima didn't it? Nasty.

    Well, never mind that 1W of radiation coming out of your phone or Wifi router. There's maybe 100W coming out of your light bulbs (or less if you have Al Gore-compliant lightbulbs). And what's more, that radiation doesn't pass straight through you, a lot of it is intercepted by the body! I think we need a campaign to stop radiation in the 400nm to 700nm wavelength range from infecting our children! Ban it now! That, and Dihydrogen Monoxide...

    Bad Science has lots of info on this and other science quackery.

    1. Re:"Radiation" by PitaBred · · Score: 1

      Notice how they refer to it as 'radiation', because radiation is clearly a *bad thing*. It killed all those people in Hiroshima didn't it? Nasty. It didn't even necessarily kill all those people. Radiation was just set up as a boogeyman because it's invisible and really easy to be scared of. I'm not saying it's not dangerous, I'm saying that policy makers and other people that communicate to the public don't have the requisite experience or knowledge to adequately judge it.
    2. Re:"Radiation" by Grrreat · · Score: 1

      I use "Dihydrogen Monoxide" in my coffee, tea and its in my water too. That mean ole sun is causing us a lot of grief too with its powerful radiation bombarding our planet.

    3. Re:"Radiation" by thegameiam · · Score: 1

      You are the wind beneath my wings.

      --
      Need Geek Rock? Try The Franchise!
    4. Re:"Radiation" by Fantastic+Lad · · Score: 1
      Your entire nervous system is electrochemical in nature and thus affected by the EM energy spectrum even at low power levels.

      A simple example. . .

      60 htz wall socket power in conjunction with the Earth's magnetic field resonates with the Lithium ion, exciting it and causing it to move on a vector. This is based on the principle of cyclotronic resonance. Your blood stream has a natural lithium content and it plays a role in the balancing of your brain activities. When artificially excited, lithium ions cross the blood brain barrier more readily and brain chemistry is altered. Many anti-depressant drugs use lithium as their active ingredient, the logic being that increasing the amount of lithium in the blood raises the number of blood brain barrier crossing instances under normal conditions. When specifically energized, however, the natural quantity can have a medicinal effect.

      And that's just one example of how a low power EM signal can affect cognition.

      I'm always careful with 'Bad Science'-type websites. You can quickly determine from their tone that they operate only partly on rationalism. There is also a lot of fear-based elitism to be found there. Best to watch your step.


      -FL

    5. Re:"Radiation" by styrotech · · Score: 1

      Phew - I'm so glad I live in a country with 50Hz power! I sure dodged that cyclotronic resonance bullet.

    6. Re:"Radiation" by BubFranklin · · Score: 1

      How much power does it take to cook the inside of any single part of a single skin cell?

      A better question, how much power does it take to mutate a single skin cell's DNA? (the obvious result being cancer)

      Or kill a single skin cell?

      This is critical to know considering the arguments you, and many others here, are making. Simply put, if this can't be answered because of lack of knowledge or simply the inability to know how to determine the answer, then it's not known how 1W from a cell phone, wifi, or any other low power radiation source affects the body.

      I am sure the answer is just some simple biology study, which makes assumed evidence look childish to those that really care to know.

    7. Re:"Radiation" by Fantastic+Lad · · Score: 1
      Phew - I'm so glad I live in a country with 50Hz power! I sure dodged that cyclotronic resonance bullet.

      Yeah. I've always found that curious. I wonder if there's any connection to the fact that most of Europe, with the exception of England, isn't also leading the charge into disaster these days. Also, the magnetic properties of the Earth fluctuate somewhat.

      The point I was trying to make was to illustrate how mechanisms above and beyond ionizing EM radiation are something to be aware of. Many people seem to believe that because EM radiation doesn't burn tissue that it is above criticism.


      -FL

    8. Re:"Radiation" by Detritus · · Score: 1

      You are asking the wrong question. The relevant parameter isn't power, it's the energy of the photons. Photon energy is inversely proportional to wavelength. That's why short-wavelength radiation like gamma rays and x-rays are a hazard.

      --
      Mea navis aericumbens anguillis abundat
    9. Re:"Radiation" by mpe · · Score: 1

      Radiation was just set up as a boogeyman because it's invisible and really easy to be scared of.

      A sizable part of the output of an incandescent lamp is both "radiation" and invisible too. Which was the original poster's point. That many people don't understand that the term "radiation" applies to a lot of things...

  22. Programme? by butterwise · · Score: 0

    A Panorama programme...
    Maybe we ought to see what the Panorama program has to say...
    --
    If a baby duck is a "duckling," why would anyone want to eat "dumplings?"
    1. Re:Programme? by Tony+Hoyle · · Score: 2, Informative

      No it's a programme.

      You get a program on a computer, a programme on TV.. english is funny like that.

  23. Re:I can't wait! by BlueParrot · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I like to group them all together into one cathegory I refer to as "morons". It doesn't matter if you are dealing with neo-cons, green peace, ID promoters... It is all the same and it goes:

    1)I think A
    2)People with better qualifications say A is a bad idea
    3)People with better qualifications have been wrong before
    4)Therefore they are wrong now.
    5)Thus A is a good idea.
    6)People who don't want A are opposed to good ideas, so they must be evil.
    7)It is all a conspiracy to tax/ruin our morals/benefit coorporations/steal your freedom/eat babies...

    Really, from Homeopaths to Inteligent Designers, it is always the same. "Qualified people are sometimes wrong, so you should listen to my wacky idea instead." It is usually commbined with some conspiracy theory or general criticism of the scientific method interspersed with emotional or irrelevant arguments "Al gore is wasteful and just want to STEAL your tax dollars, hence GW isn't real." etc...

  24. Re:Of course they were wrong. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I'm on Linux, bitch.

  25. Re: Unscientific bunk by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Insightful

    No, there is NO statistically significant evidence suggesting a correlation between cell phones and tumors. There has been NO scientific study to suggest that, only idiotic scaremongering, which is what this article is about. Not only is there no empirical evidence, but there is no known basis for it in physics/biology/chemistry since microwaves are NON IONIZING RADIATION. That means that they have NO EFFECT on matter other than to heat it up if you bombard it with enough. It's no different than standing in front of a fireplace and absorbing the longer wavelength infra red spectrum.

  26. Re:attention UK by Impy+the+Impiuos+Imp · · Score: 1

    "Wit" has two t's.

    --
    (-1: Post disagrees with my already-settled worldview) is not a valid mod option.
  27. Re:attention UK by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    This latest post of yours fits in quite well with your deplorably idiotic posting history.

  28. Microwave by courteaudotbiz · · Score: 1

    I'm sure that, in a not-so-distant future, it will be as dangerous to walk in the streets of a wireless city than it is to put yourself in the microwave for 30 minutes. There will be corpses all over the sidewalks, and homes will be built with a lead insulating layer to protect us from the OH-SO-DANGEROUS WI-FI radiations.

    But oh, anyway, isn't lead toxic too? Think I heard about that...

    In french, we call them "Peurologues", or "Fear-o-logists" in english...

    1. Re:Microwave by microtubules · · Score: 1

      a microwave uses the same frequency as wifi. also, what about the nanotubes in your brain?

      --
      I thought Schrodinger's cat was in Pandora's box !? Apparently the cat escaped by pushing the lid open.
    2. Re:Microwave by courteaudotbiz · · Score: 1

      They're doing pretty well...

    3. Re:Microwave by microtubules · · Score: 1

      Nice to meet you, paranoia is a hobby of mine. I just got an idea for a role playing game where you invent new technology and try to rule the world. cool huh?

      --
      I thought Schrodinger's cat was in Pandora's box !? Apparently the cat escaped by pushing the lid open.
  29. 3 x 0 = 0 by thethibs · · Score: 1

    It remains that three times negligible remains negligible.

    "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" applies to all claims, including those that handily advance socialist causes.

    --
    I'm a Programmer. That's one level above Software Engineer and one level below Engineer.
    1. Re:3 x 0 = 0 by mpe · · Score: 1

      "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" applies to all claims, including those that handily advance socialist causes.

      At least this should be the case. In practice where the claims in question are politically correct this frequently isn't the case. (Though often is expected of politcially incorrect skeptics, even when they are simply pointing out the lack of extraordinary evidence, even a lack of much evidence at all.)

  30. Crackpot by spun · · Score: 1

    Idiot. What makes you think scientists were behind this? Reporters were behind this. They have monetary reasons for scaremongering. What hidden agendas can you even think up that might prompt scientists to falsify results?

    One sure sign of a crackpot is that he takes every chance he can get to insult and demean the scientific establishment. That shit won't fly here. It does not make you seem smart or wise in anyone's eyes. It just points out to all the smart folks here that you are an anti-intellectual dolt.

    --
    - None can love freedom heartily, but good men; the rest love not freedom, but license. -- John Milton
  31. Re:England is so quaint by PitaBred · · Score: 1

    FREEDOM!!!!!!

  32. Re:attention UK by Sockatume · · Score: 1

    I'm not sure what your problem is, although I suspect you're probably just some dweeb who has a grudge against us for seducing your women with our oh-so-sexy accents. Anyway, as I was going to say, the UK has a mechanism for reporting programming like this, which frequently results in broadcasters having to make public apologies (see the global warming denialism show C4 showed earlier this year). The last time I checked North America wasn't so lucky.

    --
    No kidding!!! What do you say at this point?
  33. Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by stickystyle · · Score: 1

    Being an American the only news I ever hear from across the pond is from the BBC, is that all you folks have over there? I know the notion seems kind of silly, but why is that the only 'network' I hear about? From reading wikipedia the network sounds like PBS/NPR we have over here. Could someone please clarify my American ignorance?

    --
    Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate
    1. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by Stevecrox · · Score: 3, Informative

      There are around 49 freely availiable digital channels and 5 analog channels in the uk, all of which can be seen if you buy a £20 digibox (or freeview box whatever itsa called) if you get sky theres probably somewhere in the region 200-300 channels. The analog channels are BBC1, BBC2, ITV, Channel 4 and Channel 5. ITV pretty much has GMTV news a painfully dumbed down breakfast news with bad reporting, Pop Idol (or whatever), trisha, and correnation street a soap. Channel 4 tends to have more varied programming but concentrates on stuff like Big Brother (tv reality shows) and american shows (friends, scrubs etc...) The freeview channels don't tend to have much to offer although Dave has recently burst onto the seen and seems to be popular with blokes. We have a Sci-Fi channel which sucks, Sky One which gets all the american tv series first and has done some interesting stuff (brainics for instance) along with UK living, discovery, etc...

      The problem is the BBC used to offer alot of quality shows and things like Panorama and Eqinox (channel 4) used to be great for those intereting in technical things. Unfortunatly the BBC seems to be slowly deciding to cater to the lowest common denominator, so shows like Panarama have turned into complete rubbish and it seems every new BBC documentary has to repeat itself every ten minutes with flashy graphics. Its not that people want this. Heck recently the BBC editors blog asked what things he should think about when he went off to meet other TV producers at some conference. The 600/700 replies all asked for the BBC to go back to producing challenging and inteligent shows and to get rid of stupid reality tv shows.

      The BBC isn't the only channel we get in the UK but it tends to be the best with the most varied tv and inteligent, when you've got the BBC producing the Planet Earth documentary compared to Channel 4's chantelle's throwing a tantrum in the recent big brother, or some old woman killing someone in corrie on ITV what do you think is going to get reported.

      BTW the TV channels over here keep being hit by various scandals (From the Blue Peter people choosing anouther rabbits name and not the one people voted for, to various phone in competitions being rigged.)

    2. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by Curmudgeonlyoldbloke · · Score: 2, Informative

      Taking non-satellite, non-cable first, the basic list's here:
      http://www.digitalspy.co.uk/terrestrial/epg/

      The first five of those are available analogue (which is currently being phased out); everything is available on a series of digital multiplexes which may or may not be available depending on where you live. If you follow the website links from the Digitalspy page you should be able to get to "who owns what", but in brief the BBC is publicly owned and licence-fee supported, ITV is a standalone company, ad-supported, Channel 4 is publicly owned, ad-supported and Five is owned by RTL.

      The largest satellite operator is Sky TV:
      http://www.sky.com/portal/site/skycom/tvguide
      (mostly owned by News Corp)

      The largest cable operator is Virgin Media
      http://allyours.virginmedia.com/websales/service.do?id=1
      (standalone company)

    3. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      Either because you're not paying attention or because frankly, the other TV news stations aren't worth talking about.

      If you're really interested, terrestrial analogue TV has five channels: BBC1, BBC2, ITV (An affiliate network), Channel 4 & Channel 5. That's being phased out, and terrestrial digital (Freeview) has something like 50 channels. My digital cable has something like 140 channels, many of which are also broadcast on digital satellite (BSkyB) which has something like 200+ channels.

      Off the top of my head, there are three main TV news organisations. The BBC, ITN (Who provide news for other channels such as ITV and Channel4) and Sky (Who are part of BSkyB). Then there are also channels such as Bloomberg, CNN Europe etc. who tend to be US news networks in disguise.

    4. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      From the Blue Peter people choosing anouther rabbits name and not the one people voted for The trend towards sloppy journalism continues, even on /.!

      (it was a cat, not a rabbit)
    5. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by Ironsides · · Score: 2, Informative

      I'm an American, here's what I know about it. So, I may be a bit wrong for a few things.

      When TV got started in the UK, there was the BBC and only the BBC and it was good. This is also the source of the TV tax in the UK. Where as in the US, we had CBS, NBC and ABC. PBS in the US was not established until 1969. In the UK, it was THE station at the beginning. Another difference, the BBC gets most (all?) of it's funding from the TV tax. The PBS stations get over 85% of it's funding from donations. There are other networks now, but the BBC is equivalent to combining ABC/NBC/CBS all into one.

      Any other questions?

      --
      Fly me to the moon Let me sing among those stars Let me see what spring is like On jupiter and mars
    6. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by stickystyle · · Score: 1

      Sweet.
      Thanks for all the information, I now have a better grasp on it all.

      --
      Pluralitas non est ponenda sine neccesitate
    7. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by @madeus · · Score: 1

      It's also worth noting that UK TV has quite different standards to US TV.

      I don't mean so much in terms of quality in terms of shows (many of the best shows are US, which obviously have much better production values) but in so far as regulations such as "how much advertising is allowed" (i.e. none on the BBC, only X minutes in every hour on other stations, with no more than Y breaks in an hour) also there rules about product placement (which is not legal in the UK, on any channel - though sponsorship is fine) and slightly different laws about portrayal of sex / bad language / violence, etc.

      All analog channels (at least as so far as I am aware) have regulations about having a certain remit e.g. including quotas for certain types of programs, such as "educational" shows. I seem to recall they all get some funding for this too. I think there is a fair bit of regulation regarding TV shows aimed at children (as well - I think - as voluntary codes of practice regarding advertising), though I am not sure how that compares with the US.

      I mention this because as a specific result of heavy regulation of advertising watching free-to-air TV in the UK (which is also extended to channels offered by satellite and cable broadcasters who wish to operate in the UK) is *much* more tolerable than in the US, while it's getting worse (as the regulator loosens up and allows more advertising) you don't get the same number of annoying adverts going on, so you can actually sit down and watch a show that isn't on a premium channel without getting so PO'd with all the advertising you switch off (which seems to be the case in the US). I think that's worth understanding - and why only having only a small number of free-to-air channels wasn't really all that bad for some time.

      I gather quite a few other European countries have not entirely dissimilar set ups with regard to a "TV license" / tax. Personally I dislike the license fee enormously (though I'd happily pay a reasonable fee to access BBC quality programming) and would prefer just to enforce strong regulation on the commercial channels) and also with regard to "public service broadcasting" remits.

      Oh and the BBC have a commercial arm. Somewhat sneakily they either do - or at least used to - part own some UK cable/satellite channels - that show pretty much only old BBC content (things like Dr Who, Red Dwarf, etc.). They also make money from selling the rights to air these shows to commercial stations. As well as BBC shows that are either entirely made by a third party (e.g. they had The Simpsons for a while, and quite a few comedy shows are made-to-order by a third party) they also partner with other broadcasters around the world (and presumably they share the rights and the production costs with them for those shows).

    8. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by FireFury03 · · Score: 1
      There are around 49 freely availiable digital channels and 5 analog channels in the uk, all of which can be seen if you buy a £20 digibox (or freeview box whatever itsa called) if you get sky theres probably somewhere in the region 200-300 channels.

      This is somewhat misleading. There are:

      • 5 free analogue channels: BBC1, BBC2, ITV, Channel 4 (or S4C in Wales) and Five. Although Five is not available in all areas. These are progressively being turned off over the next 4 years.
      • 41 (42 in Wales) free digital terrestrial channels and a bunch of "+1" channels which can be received in much of the UK using a standard DVB-T receiver.
      • 8 subscription digital terrestrial channels, which can be received in much of the UK using a standard DVB-T receiver with a CAM
      • A few hundred UK-based free digital satellite channels, which can be received over the whole of the UK using a standard DVB-S receiver and a small dish pointed at the Astra 28.2E and Eurobird 28.5E cluster (known as "Free To Air" satellite channels).
      • A few dozen UK-based subscription satellite channels, which can be received using proprietory Sky branded DVB-S receivers and a small dish pointed at the Astra 28.2E and Eurobird 28.5E cluster.
      • A few free UK-based satellite channels, which can be received using proprietory Sky branded DVB-S receivers and a small dish pointed at the Astra 28.2E and Eurobird 28.5E cluster (known as "Free To View" channels).
      • A few dozen subscription cable channels, which require a Virgin Media subscription.


      There are also a few hundred free channels which can be received with a standard DVB-S receiver and a satellite dish pointed at other satellite clusters (these satellites are used for distribution of channels aimed at Europe, but some of the Sky subscription channels (which require proprietory receivers) are available for free on these beams). These satellites also carry a number of subscription channels aimed at Europe which can be received with a standard DVB-S receiver and appropriate CAM + subscription card.

      So in short, there are hundreds of channels available via many different distribution platforms, most of which are available for free with the appropriate receiver. Sadly, most of the British public have been lead to believe that they must either use terrestrial, cable or Sky and aren't aware that they can use a normal DVB-S receiver and a dish to get at a lot more channels.
    9. Re:Is BBC it for TV in the UK? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      In a quest to stir things up a bit I think we should use the slashdot effect to get the next blue peter animal named Mohamed.

      (Why yes, I am trolling, what gave it away?)

  34. Re:I can't wait!...Trouble is by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    If the enviro-collectivists win, this will usher in a decline of your way of life and you wont be sitting in your comfortable cube/office posting on slashsdot, you'll be wondering how to eat.

        Then you will wonder why in the world did you sign up for this and decades will pass, nothing will change, a few warm winters and a few cold ones in your lifes memory bank, as it has been will continue to be, no dire calamties or earht shattering events, man made anyway other than the ones you allow.

        The parent post is correct, the anti-GW troll off topic posts are more frequent and thats because, besides leftists and liberals social policies the biggest threat to our way walk amongst us.

    So forgive me for buying into it sometimes but it is a looming threat (GW legislation to subdue our economy) that has not diminished.

  35. Re:Of course they were wrong. by Bozzio · · Score: 1

    I'm on windows w/ firefox, noscript, and avast!.

    Avast! caught it before the page even loaded.

    --
    I just pooped your party.
  36. Re:I can't wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Maybe because as trolling mechanisms go, it's very successful? Just don't reply to any part of a thread that was started with one.

    (bugger)

  37. Re:I can't wait!...Trouble is by PHAEDRU5 · · Score: 1, Troll

    I'm actually lying in bed, sucking down nyquil, and watching LOTR.

    So, don't taze me, bro!

    (Oh, global warming, imagination, figment of, one each...)

    --
    668: Neighbour of the Beast
  38. Re: Unscientific bunk by PitaBred · · Score: 3, Informative

    Says you! I can see fire, I can't see cell phone waves. They must be dangerous, they work like magic!

    I think that's a lot of the problem... people haven't figured out that cell phones and wireless transmissions AREN'T magic. Hell, I didn't even get into wave physics until my second year in college, and that was at an engineering school... what chance does a liberal arts major or high-school dropout have of understanding it?

  39. Re:I can't wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yes just ignore it even if it makes sense and challenges your assumptions, thats the way of the left and /. moderation.

        You know why this is really happening, because there is so much love for leftists and their causes here in the absence of real definitive science. /. a place where science supposedly reigns supreme, that the word is out amongst many this is where you can do some pleasure trolling and get some geeks fired up.

    Ignoring it wont change the alternative outcome of which the science favors btw, that GW is bunk, it is a geo-political agenda and that the american left are todays Useful Idiots and many of them are represented here on /.

    So just ignore it, put your heads under the covers and wait for chicken little to call

    P.S. I did not intend to "troll" off topic but when the opportunity presents, its too tempting since the topic in reference GW, is one of the pet topics here on /. especially since its all Bush's fault

  40. Re:attention UK by JasterBobaMereel · · Score: 1

    Dear USA,

        Educate your posters to \. Some people in the UK are stupid, just like some people in the US.

        The perception from the outside of the US is that it is the majority of the US that are stupid (but I suspect that is just a perception) and I suspect that the perception of the UK from the outside is that the majority of us are stupid as well ... It's not us it's our media, they all studied "Media" in college and don't know Science (or even common sense it seems) and don't seem to care if they get it wrong as long as it makes a good story ...

        But the point of this is our media is regulated, the BBC got it wrong (they are media people they don't know science), people complained, and someone checked, and they corrected it ...

    --
    Puteulanus fenestra mortis
  41. your maths is only during conversation by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Your maths seem correct, but one can be exposed only to the phone during convrsation while we can be exposed to wifi and tower 24/7. What about the accumulation?

  42. Re:I can't wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yes just ignore it even if it makes sense and challenges your assumptions

    Except it doesn't make sense.

    Oh sure, you can argue that climate change is not caused by man, but anyone who claims that climate change as a whole is a figment of the imagination is delusional. The science does not support the claim.

    Basically:

    A rise in global temperature and atmospheric carbon dioxide? Yes.
    Is it man made? Er...dunno. Maybe?

    At this moment in time that is about the only logical, scientifically supported and honest position anyone can take.

  43. Re:attention UK by scubamage · · Score: 1

    Dear poster, Please use proper sentence structure, punctuation, and number matching. Further, you may be interested that the US is pretty far down towards the bottom of the barrel as far as world standards of education go, leaving some areas of the nation with more than a 33% illiteracy rate. That's pretty pathetic.

  44. Re:attention UK by Ragzouken · · Score: 1

    No, it doesn't.

  45. Re:attention UK by Felipe_Silveira · · Score: 1

    You are kidding right? If the quality of media content is the only direct indicator of general population IQ, I wonder what to say about people on the Fox News home country...

    PS: Please don't try to flip-flop on me now ;-)

  46. Re: Unscientific bunk by Cracked+Pottery · · Score: 1

    That is because in your case you chose to not to consider the anecdotal evidence, which is abundant. Of course the telecommunications industry is not likely to fund a comprehensive statistical study, or any study that shows that cell phones are dangerous if used almost constantly. I can hear you, you don't have to shout.

  47. Re:I can't wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Here is some information that you may not have heard and its no surprise since the media have an agenda in suppressing information that contradicts the leftist political agendas.

        Why, because journalists are inherently left leaning, need a story and see their careers benefitting from the advancement of fear, it sells. This coupled with their political ambitions to "shape the future" is another factor.

        Some years ago I watched a documentary where deep ice cores (forget where)harking back millenia to when the earth was covered by glaciers, showed higher levels of C02 in these ice cores. Now this particular expedition was not conducted under the guise of investigating GW, it was just a study of ancient climate before the politicization of the topic. At the time I thought nothing of it but its no surprise I have not seen this information since and its because funding streams depend on reaching the correct conclusion which is not in tune with the conclusion that GW is not a serious threat and is not man made. Careers are being made as we speak thanks to the Man Made Global Warming "threat".

          I was a kid in the 70's and read the newsweeks story on Global Cooling while waiting in the dentists office and thought, shit, were all gonna freeze to death. Well its not happening and will not in our lifetimes if at all. We just dont know. Same for warming, we just know.

          If GW was given the same level of scrutiny as leftists give religion (in the absence of definitive proof of god) in disproving the existence of a creator etc. What conclusion would we be discussing now and would Al Gore have his stupid Oscar?

          Why does suspending belief in GW come with more credibility but those ID people are freaks etc? The data on both topics is dubious at best.

          Using C02 as some sort of proof of Global Warming is like using a rectal thermometer to conclude you have cancer, simplistic science applied to one of the most complex processes known, billions of years of earth process.

        Has the earth been warming, of course and if it wasn't, we would not be here.

  48. OT: sig comment by gobbo · · Score: 1

    Who the f*** decided that sentences on the Internet shall no longer be formatted with two spaces after a period?!

    It was decided during the development of typography, pre-internet, by typesetters, editors, and designers.

    Double spaces between sentences are for monospaced fonts, like typewriters or courier font families. Variable-width fonts like the one you're probably using to read this don't need two spaces, largely because the eye groups words more easily. E.g.: typesetting in books uses singe spaces between sentences. Old newspapers are more variable.

    Maybe you're confusing Usenet with the Internet, or email (txt=monosp) with the web (usually varable-width).

    All part of the rules of font usage and interacting with the design of your expressive tools. Literacy now extends into minor forms of publishing and email daily for most of us, such as this thread, so we have to learn them to break them. FWIW.

  49. This matters, why? by Orig_Club_Soda · · Score: 1

    A ruling is an opinion, its not fact or necessarily backed by science.

  50. Re:Of course they were wrong. by el+americano · · Score: 1

    Why not try common sense and don't follow a link to snipurl.

    --
    Those are my principles. If you don't like them I have others. -Groucho Marx
  51. Re:I can't wait! by zippthorne · · Score: 1, Interesting

    The brilliance of the enviro-collectivists is that they can't possibly get *all* of their measures approved, but they can probably get some of them. So, in 50 years, or 100 (though few around now will be around in 100..) when things are not nearly as dire as the scaremongering predictions deemed, they can point to the staggering array of freedom-reducing half-measures as the only reason it wasn't much, much worse, and so we should implement new, stronger measures, shouldn't we?

    --
    Can you be Even More Awesome?!
  52. That's right. by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Funny

    Only trust links from domains you can trust.

    Point proven, I think.

  53. Negligible vs. Non-existant by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    It remains that three times negligible remains negligible.

    "Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence" applies to all claims, including those that handily advance socialist causes.

    3 x 0 = 0 would be an example of three times non-existant remains non-existant

    Just because something is considered negligible doesn't mean, that after compounding it, it won't be consequential. It just depends upon what your tolerance is.
  54. Re:I can't wait! by photon317 · · Score: 1


    I whole-heartedly agree with you. However, I think there's sometimes a bias among otherwise smart people to only realize this thinking process is going on in certain situations and not others. For most "controversial" ideas where something could in theory be settled by the proper application of logic and science (although perhaps fully convincing data doesn't yet exist), the argumentative "believer" partisans operate like this on both sides of the argument. The Global Warming thing is a perfect example. Somewhere in between Gore and Bush lies the scientific truth behind the cause of the warming, but it seems everyone has already decided to "believe" one way or the other to the extreme anyways. Same thing with all of the other touchy political subjects, like abortion, guns, the death penalty, euthanasia, social welfare programs, tax/debt/spending issues, just about everything to do with the current USMiddle East situation, etc...

    I think education is at the root of it all. If we (a) guaranteed a good education through age 18-ish to everyone in the US (we don't, most of them get shitty educations) and (b) ensured that the core focus of that education was not memorizing facts to pass a test, but instead learning how to reason, apply logic, and learn new things independently, we might see some improvement after a few generations.

    --
    11*43+456^2
  55. Re:Benefits Costs by suitti · · Score: 0, Redundant

    YMMV. Nutrasweet gives me 6 hour migraine-like headaches in the smallest quantities. Getting my tongue wet with DC is too much. My diet drink is water. It's an acquired taste.

    --
    -- Stephen.
  56. You can't learn that in a classroom. by mosb1000 · · Score: 1

    "learning how to reason, apply logic, and learn new things independently"

    You don't learn to do that by sitting in a classroom.

    1. Re:You can't learn that in a classroom. by Arterion · · Score: 1

      You can. Critical thinking classes were taught at my college, and they were very good. Some of the students actually learned something from it. They need to make it a standard, 12-year program, starting in 1st grade. It needs to be just as important as math and English and science. If you drill thinking skills into someone's head, they WILL pick up at least some of it. Repetitio mater studiorum est.

      Also important to note that critical thinking skills beget critical thinking skills. Kinda like the Singularity idea that if we're smart enough to make a machine smarter than us, it can make a machine smarter than it, etc. So even a little bit would go a long way. I don't know any ANY high school programs that require a critical thinking course. But I have seen a many that require a "how to study" type of course. How backwards.

      --
      "That which does not kill us makes us stranger." -Trevor Goodchild
  57. Re:I can't wait! by Afrosheen · · Score: 1

    Bah. I'm working towards quickening the Idiocracy of the future. I only wish I could live long enough to see the day US currency has a picture of a WWE wrestler with a mullet and has colorful phrases like "that's what I'm talkin' bout" and "haulin' ass, gettin' PAID!". http://farm1.static.flickr.com/157/363916236_e250c458b3.jpg for reference.

  58. epistemology by suitti · · Score: 1

    If you talk to someone about global warming, intelligent design, horrible management practices, whatever, you'll find that someone with credentials has written articles, books, etc., that pass the most horrific crud as fact. When journalists site this crud, their own credibility eventually suffers, but there will be a faithful following notwithstanding. Unfortunately, figuring out what is good and what is bad requires passing the Turing Test, which is hard work. You can't just go with the majority opinion. Aristotle said that the Sun goes around the Earth, and basically everyone said that was true for 1,500 years. Can everyone be wrong?

    --
    -- Stephen.
    1. Re:epistemology by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

      When journalists site this crud, their own credibility eventually suffers When journalists site this crud, their own
      journalists site this
      site
  59. Actually, there is plenty of evidence. by Fantastic+Lad · · Score: 1
    No, there is NO statistically significant evidence suggesting a correlation between cell phones and tumors. There has been NO scientific study to suggest that, only idiotic scaremongering, which is what this article is about. Not only is there no empirical evidence, but there is no known basis for it in physics/biology/chemistry since microwaves are NON IONIZING RADIATION. That means that they have NO EFFECT on matter other than to heat it up if you bombard it with enough. It's no different than standing in front of a fireplace and absorbing the longer wavelength infra red spectrum.

    Saying loudly, firmly and often that studies don't exist doesn't make it so. Just because they don't make the front page and because you haven't read them doesn't make them not exist.

    In any case, the question of whether or not EM radiation ionizes tissue is a bugaboo designed to misdirect people's attention. The first two places I heard this obvious fact touted was within literature promoted by the Telecoms themselves, and before them, the U.S. Airforce which was trying to quash lawsuits with regard to their radar operations and people getting sick. The point is that there are recognized mechanisms through which brain chemistry and cellular behavior is affected by low power, nom-ionizing EM. For example. . .

    60 htz wall socket power in conjunction with the Earth's magnetic field resonates with the Lithium ion, exciting it and causing it to move on a vector. This is based on the principle of cyclotronic resonance. Your blood stream has a natural lithium content and it plays a role in the balancing of your brain activities. When artificially excited, lithium ions cross the blood brain barrier more readily and brain chemistry is altered. Many anti-depressant drugs use lithium as their active ingredient, the logic being that increasing the amount of lithium in the blood raises the number of blood brain barrier crossing instances under normal conditions. When specifically energized, however, the natural quantity can have a medicinal effect. That's one way in which the brain is directly affected by non-ionizing EM. There are other ways.

    I read a series of studies which demonstrated that cancer cells in vitro divide and grow many times faster when exposed to certain wavelengths of low power EM as compared to control samples. Everybody has cells going cancerous in their bodies, but a healthy person's immune system is able to deal with this. It's when those cells get a foothold that problems occur. I had to buy a book to read about these studies. You never see this stuff on TV. --All we get are scare mongering stories on the BBC which are, I am certain, designed to be shot down strawman style just like that dumb 'fake moon landing' thing.


    -FL

    1. Re:Actually, there is plenty of evidence. by PitaBred · · Score: 1

      If you had links or anything other than hearsay, you wouldn't be. But so far, you really DO sound like some nut decrying the moon landings based on "evidence" such as a flag supposedly waving.

    2. Re:Actually, there is plenty of evidence. by Fantastic+Lad · · Score: 1
      If you had links or anything other than hearsay, you wouldn't be. But so far, you really DO sound like some nut decrying the moon landings based on "evidence" such as a flag supposedly waving.

      Huh? I wouldn't be what? If you want to offer mean-spirited opinions rather than ask for clarification, you would do well to actually make sense when you write. You defeat your own intentions otherwise.


      -FL

    3. Re:Actually, there is plenty of evidence. by aproposofwhat · · Score: 1
      But all the cyclotronic resonance effects are at frequencies of

      The study you refer to didn't even use EM radiation - it used a magnetic field oscillating at 60 Hz, in tandem with a steady magnetic field of 0.2 Tesla aligned in parallel.

      The cancer cell division studies require the presence of a promoter chemical - pure RF at 2.45 GHz caused no increase in cell division.

      I see nothing to worry me in the studies you reference - the levels of RF radiation used in the studies are far higher than my WiFi router (sitting 3 feet away from me as I type) and my laptop can apply to my body, plus I don't plan on drinking any 12-O-tetradecanoylphorbol-13-acetate today, so I'm quite safe.

      --
      One swallow does not a fellatrix make
  60. Re: Unscientific bunk by Hatta · · Score: 1
    The plural of anecdote is not data. While the telcos may have a vested interest in not performing studies that might show cell phones to be harmful. However, there are plenty of research institutions with their own grants to study phenomenon that may affect public health. If you search PubMed you will find plenty of such studies, and they all say something like this:

    We found no overall increased risk of brain tumors among cellular phone users. The potential elevated risk of brain tumors after long-term cellular phone use awaits confirmation by future studies.

    Results of these studies to date give no consistent or convincing evidence of a causal relation between RF exposure and any adverse health effect.

    This article reviews the strength of the available epidemiological and laboratory evidence and notes that this falls short of what is normally required to establish a causal link.

    The weight-of-evidence of these 18 studies shows that long term, low level exposure to RF energy does not adversely affect survival and cancer in laboratory mammals.

    All of the authoritative reviews completed within the last 2 yr have concluded that there is no clear evidence of adverse health effects associated with RF fields.


    That's just a small cross section of the findings. I found one article that said, "Results from present studies on use of mobile phones for > or =10 years give a consistent pattern of increased risk for acoustic neuroma and glioma."(Occup Environ Med. 2007 Sep;64(9):626-32.) But that's just one study based on 10 cases of neuroma, and directly contradicted by another major study. (Am J Epidemiol. 2004 Feb 1;159(3):277-83). The balance of evidence suggests that cell phones are entirely safe to use.

    I'm still not getting one though.
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  61. Re:I can't wait! by BlueParrot · · Score: 1

    Somewhere in between Gore and Bush lies the scientific truth behind the cause of the warming, but it seems everyone has already decided to "believe" one way or the other to the extreme anyways.

    Somewhat ironically, the most balanced summary the public will ever get about this is available here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_warming

    Written in layman terms, properly sourced, reviewed by god knows how many experts... Sure, it's not perfect but it is as close as you will come without a a university degree in the subject. It certainly beats any media outlet or politician.
  62. Re:"Radiation" -well, no, not really by Bearhouse · · Score: 1

    Most of the immediate fatalitites in Hiroshima were caused by the intial blast and its direct effects, (building collapse, fire..)

    From Wikipedia, (so must be true, eh?)

    "directly killing an estimated 70,000 people. By the end of the year, injury and radiation brought total casualties to 90,000-140,000".

    Although, also note:

    "Since then, thousands more have died from injuries or illness attributed to exposure to radiation released by the bombs."

    So yes, radiation from a nucler bomb is a bad thing, but in the real world you still have a greater chance of being killed by your car than by your mobile phone or wifi.

  63. Re:I can't wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Great-great-grandfather AC here. I was trying to make a crap joke about people always replying to troll "first posts" rather than make any comment about global warming, man-made or not. I just wish people wouldn't keep replying to offtopic first posts (seriously - what has global warming or the lack of it to do with alleged wifi "danger"?).

    (bugger again)

  64. Misunderstanding Lithium by DrYak · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Your blood stream has a natural lithium content and it plays a role in the balancing of your brain activities.

    No it hasn't. Lithium in the body is normally under the "trace" level. Unless you're on meds.
    In fact Lithium is highly toxic, and the therapeutic margin (doses at which it can be used in meds without causing the toxic effect) is pretty narrow.
    That's why it is forbidden in product that will be consumed by humans.

    Also I have some doubt about 30-to-60T and 60Hz being the correct parameters needed, and I have also serious doubt the 60Hz AC current found in houses generates a strong enough emission to have an impact on lithium. But I'll give you the benefit of doubt.

    When artificially excited, lithium ions cross the blood brain barrier more readily and brain chemistry is altered.

    WTF ? Lithium - as a ion - is charged, whereas the blood-brain barrier is hydrophobic. Moving the ion around won't make it cross the barrier, it would just get stuck against it and refuse to move further (the size orders aren't the same : the lithium would have to cross a width several order of magnitude it's own radius. And path has defavorable properties on its whole length).

    What you need is either :
    - changing the properties of the barrier (for an example see how electric fields are used to transfer transgenes inside bio-engineered cells. It's not used because it makes the genes move (like in a electrophoresis gel) but because it makes the properties of the cell surface change and it becomes transiently permeable to the gene. Similarly ultrasounds are used in needle-less injectors to make the skin permeable to the drug)
    or
    - special transporter (that what may be the case with lithium, because it mimics closely enough Sodium, and may sometimes be using the same channels).

    In fact the "get stuck against the barrier instead of forcibily crossing it" effect is used in some medical NMR image techniques like tractography (imagery of nervous fibres inside the brain). To explain it in a simple way : you make the water vibrate along a specific direction, if there's room for the water to move, you'll get a signal, if the water encounters a barrier, you get none. Thus you can know if the fibres are oriented in the same direction (because water can move along them) or not (because water can't easily cross their borders). Do it for a lot of different directions and you can get a nice map of the overall fibers directions in the whole brain.
    There's no water leakage produced by this method with water forcibly crossing the nervous cell membrane (for that you would need to change their surface properties, or change the amount of water channels on the surface like killing-white-cells do).

    Many anti-depressant drugs use lithium as their active ingredient,

    FYI, your confusing with mania & bipolar drugs, which may be based on lithium.
    Depression drugs are mostly organic compounds that interfere the metabolism of monoamines (mostly serotonin in most recent product like fluoxetine/Prozac, or mostly dopamine and nor-adrenaline in other drugs).

    the logic being that increasing the amount of lithium in the blood raises the number of blood brain barrier crossing instances under normal conditions.

    No. Although, not all the details of the Lithium effect are known in details,
    the logic of lithium is putting in a substance that was never meant to be here in the first place and thus can interfere by several mean :
    - concurrence with sodium : it may replace it in some circumstance, but not be processed in the same way by all ionic pumps. Most of the toxicity also comes because of Lithium replacing Sodium.
    OR MAYBE
    - interfere with the expression of some genes.
    OR EITHER
    - interfere with the function of some enzymes.

    When specifically energized, however, the natural quantity can have a medicinal effect.

    There's almos

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
    1. Re:Misunderstanding Lithium by Fantastic+Lad · · Score: 2
      No it hasn't. Lithium in the body is normally under the "trace" level. Unless you're on meds.

      A trace quantity was the level being discussed. --Here's a the relevant excerpt from the referenced study taken from this book.

      But please do me a favor: stop trusting random snake-oil vending charlatan's crackpot theories just because they use nice buzzwords like "natural" and "energize" and try to sell you a "natural magnetic therapy cyclotonic machine".

      Ouch. --Do me a favor please and don't make such bold assumptions. I admit I do not have any medical training beyond CPR and general first-aid, but I am not a fool. I have done a lot of reading all over the spectrum and I can identify a snake-oil salesman better than most. --There are qualities about people and their works which can be readily used to determine a given crackpot factor. Generally, when people have obtained degrees in medicine, I can assume that they know the basics. When multiple labs are referenced, that also lends credence since you have more than one person examining a set of ideas. When theories are presented clearly and succinctly, this also indicates something about the mind of the author. The various employers a researcher has had also indicate levels of integrity, etc. Then of course, the actual ideas being presented and how much sense they make and how they fit within all the other things we know and which can be researched indicate volumes. It's all about comparative research, which incidentally is why I post on Slashdot; in the hopes of running into guys like you who might have useful bits of information to add or subtract.

      When it comes to these topics, I can only proceed in this manner; networking and cross-analyzing to build a knowledge structure. I am certainly not going to stop being curious about the world simply because I am not a specialist, or because the general population is accustomed to punishing those who refuse to follow popular wisdom, by hooting and hollering at them from the peanut gallery.

      In any case, it should be noted that my primary intention was to illustrate that low-power EM was capable of affecting the normal operations of the brain. Here's a couple of other items which support this idea. . .

      here

      here's a story where EM is used casually to shut down a man's visual cortex


      -FL

  65. WARNING: Unsafe Redirect, mod down parent. by sethstorm · · Score: 1

    URL obscures shocksite redirect.

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  66. So wrong by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    > it will be melted (and possibly under quite high pressure) in the middle, but still cold on the outside.

    Microwaves work by exciting water molecules. Ice has them locked into place. This is why you get a hot core in frozen stuff when you put it in a microwave regardless of how focussed the microwaves are. once it's thawed, microwaves heat from the outside in.

  67. Re:I can't wait! by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    Yeah, and by the state of the US economy, by the time that $10,000,000 note is available next year, it should just about be enough to buy a coffee with.

  68. Re: Unscientific bunk by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    ah, wouldn't infrared be shorter wavelength?

  69. OK, so how come they got it so wrong? by cheros · · Score: 1

    Maybe they're sitting near a mobile phone mast?

    Oh, wait ..

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  70. Put it in perspective by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 0

    I think the fact the US test 1030 nuclear bombs from 1945-1992 is likely a far greater threat to our health.

    That over 16 nuclear explosions per year or one every 22 days. More than all the other nations of the world combined.

    Humans are made to withstand low energy radiation pretty well, and the amount we receive isn't a constant as the earth's shielding goes through cycles in it's ability to filter out radition, creating spikes of solar radition, which we should be in right now. Eventually the magnetic field of earth will flip poles and eventually even fail as the core of the planet slows down/cools.

    However, high energy particles are an entirely different thing and between nuclear tests and the hosts of chemicals we allow in the air, food and drinking water I think we shouldn't have to ponder long why cancer rates are going UP. Death's may go down, but only because we can sure many more types of cancer now. It's still a great burden on your body and VERY expensive. We've been using high watt radio/TV transmission for decades upon decades without people complaining plus all the military communication frequencies.

    I can't see why you single out wifi. Cell phones are obviously a much much greater risk device since they are so close to your body and HEAD. When was the last time you cuddled up to your WIFI access point ? You probably get more radiation from your faulty microwave or old television unless you sleep next to your AP or wireless card.

    Oh and what about cordless phones. I assume we can safely say more people own cordless phones than wireless networks.

  71. Sorry... by DrYak · · Score: 1

    Sorry, I may have snapped out a little bit too violently.

    I'm just sometimes exasperated because of people who have read some random crackpot theory on the net, and thus refuse to use any other form of medicine than the corresponding snake-oil. And automatically buy the argument that "scientific establishment refuse to admit it because it's new, think of Galileo !" or other theories about "repressed scientific evidence !", etc. And then completely shut off and refuse to listen to your explanation about why the new "thoery" seems wrong, given the fact it contradicts a lot of previous observations and would completely fail to explain a lot of technology that are commonly used and to work, whereas the "establishment"'s theory models fit nicely the observed data and do give an explanation about how what we use di function. That's why those theory are currently used, because they "work", not because some wise bearded guy said them.

    I don't refute your arguments about cyclotron. It's a well understood technology and used in several modern apparatuses (Fourier-Transform cyclotronic resonance mass spectrometers, to give an example).

    The problem was the whole chapter about lithium :
    - The required medicinal level are several order of magnitude higher than the very low level that might be found in the brain (and those low level may more likely be due to pollution than to a minimal level required by body function). ( ppm vs. ~ 1 M )
    - There's a big mix-up between bipolar disorders and depression. They are different class of sickness reacting to different type of drugs.
    - A charged substance cannot go thru a much more thicker hydrophobic barrier just because it vibrating in that direction. Specially because that would it require to cross a long path of defavorable condition. ( pm radius vs. m thickness)
    - Lithium mimics sodium - that is the commonly accepted explanation of its toxicity. It can thus traverse the blood-brain barrier using the same channels. There's no need of "pushing it in" to get it into the brain.
    - An effective dose of lithium is close to a toxic one ( ~1M vs ~1M too). In an uncontrolled experiment if lithium manifests its psychiatric effet, you would expect some toxic effects too, none were reported by the study cited in your article.
    - Psychiatric modelisation in animals is very complicated. Depression is a specially tricky one. Inferring medical effect of a substance based on animal behaviour is not something obvious. Thus the whole "the rats seemed to be calmer, thats what anti-depression drugs do, therefore we proved that lithium done it because it's a bipolar-drug. Thus the EM emission influenced lithium" is a HUGE jump on conclusion.

    The problem with this cyclotron model is that it contradicts a lot of the current knowledge and evidence about lithium. There's a lot of stuff that currently works and is explained by current theories that the new one fails to explain.

    Also the study cited jumped on conclusion by interpreting vague behavioural change in rats. For what matters the exact same effect could be obtained with Transcranial Magnetic Stimulation (TMS - the same technique used to shut off brain region on the last article you cite) which is an entirely different beast. Or something completely different.

    The source cited are all old : around 20 years. That's a long time for science. During this time, a lot of other data and theories may have come forward and could contradict the various proposed hypothesis. Our knowledge about Lithium has changed as had numerous other information we have now. Always take old scientific information with a grain of salt : the knowledge my have advance and some models proven to be wrong in the light of data obtained since then.

    About the paper about effect of cell-phone-type radiation : at the end of the abstract the authors admit that the emission they used were different (stronger and longer) than actual cell phone. With only this paper we may not draw definite conclusion

    --
    "Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
  72. Distance based logic by dindi · · Score: 1

    Oh well, if that did not appear to the readers, that their wifi signal disappears after a few walls, or 100ms of open space, while their cell phone works miles away from the towers then they are, hmmmmmm not thinking (/polite) ?

    Have you wondered how your cheap wireless phone worked 100m from your house and your $$$ wifi signal disappears in the garden?

  73. GRAMMAR NAZI WARNING ALERT by tehcyder · · Score: 1

    Less absorption means less base stations, repeaters and transmission power needed.
    Less absorption means that fewer base stations, fewer repeaters and less transmission power are needed.

    It's Friday afternoon at work and I'm bored.

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  74. Re:attention UK by tehcyder · · Score: 1

    You're thinking of "half-witted." The noun is "half-wit."

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