Another Reason to be Annoyed by Cell Phones 427
lotussuper7 writes: "This story at newscientist (free, no registration, unlike the NY Times) has some insight into the amount of RF you may be getting from all those cell phones people around you are using. Might be time to buy a cell phone jammer."
ECM (Score:4, Insightful)
If you don't like cell phones, then go find somewhere that doesn't have them.
Yeah, that'll help (Score:5, Insightful)
Reduce your exposure to RF emissions by carrying around a powerful RF transmitter! Sure, that'll do the trick.
Looks like a simulation (Score:4, Insightful)
It could be much less serious (or much more....).
Re:Yeah, that'll help (Score:5, Insightful)
A cultural problem, not a technological problem (Score:2, Insightful)
I'm not an RF expert but I am a physicist. As far as I know radiation can damage your cells in two ways:
a) Direct heating
b) Ionization
The latter one is easy to dismiss by elementary physics. Unlike in the gamma radiation, the photons of the cellphone microwave radiation simply don't carry enough energy to damage the DNA strands. Hell, microwaves pack less punch per photon than the infrared (heat) radiation!
The heating argument is more difficult to deal with. In general, the power of the RF field is again far too weak to heat your brain significantly (=more than the temperature varies naturally). However, if several fields overlap in a certain way (a standing wave forms inside your skull), then I guess there might be a possibility for an interference "hotspot" to form. Again I think this is very unlikely. Even a small head movement or the movement of the radiation source will change the geometry and thus the interference inside your head.
Quite frankly I am surprised by the anti-cellphone mentality in this thread. Most of it seems to come from experiences with annoying cellphone users. However, that's not a problem with the cellphones. That's a cultural problem. People simply have not learnt the proper etiquette yet.
Where I live the cellphones have practically replaced the landline phones. If the adaptation of the cellphones continues at this rate, there will soon be a one cellphone per citizen -- and that includes the minors. When the use is this widespread, the people in general know how to switch their phones to silent mode for meetings, movies and concerts. Having your cellphone ring, for instance, in the middle of a movie is socially extremely bad behaviour. If you start talking on your phone in the theatre, you will get thrown out -- either by the theatre staff or by the rest of the audience.
Re:don't tell me you're suprised with this news ! (Score:3, Insightful)
The studies are all public, and the results are frequently published on the TV news and in papers over here. It couldn't be any more open, seeing as the vast majority of the population have mobiles it's in everyone's interest. The fact is there hasn't been any real conclusion one way or the other yet, but that's not because of a cover up or because of people "closing their eyes", it's because science doesn't know whether it's a risk yet or not.
So it comes down to personal choice - I for one and happy to take the (slight, IMHO) risk that there may be health problems in exchange for the convenience. If you don't think that's a risk worth taking, don't use a phone. Just make sure you live in an oxygen tent to avoid pollution, don't drive, don't take drugs, drink or smoke, and avoid eating bread or cakes. All those things have been PROVEN to cause health problems, but people still do them
Re:you are rationalizing (Score:3, Insightful)
There's a much larger EM field set up by the traction motors. Why isn't anyone worried by that?
Re:*sighs deeply* Not true... (Score:2, Insightful)
Gadget gratia Geekus
Jouster
It's just a computer model (Score:3, Insightful)
The problem is, there is no mention of any real-world measurements being taken. Maybe the model is fundamentally flawed. Maybe having people in the carriage causes the signals to be attenuated more quickly than the model allows for. Maybe the metal of the carriage is not a perfect reflector. Maybe there is destructive interference between phones like the fading on AM radio stations in the evening etc. After all, if too much of the radiation were bouncing around internally, not enough would get out to allow the phones to work at all.
Re:ECM (Score:5, Insightful)
You can't escape them, so stop trying...
My great-grandfather was annoyed by cars. My grandfather was annoyed by the TV. He never like it except when he was watching it. My parents are annoyed by call waiting and so I still get busy signals. My wife is annoyed by cell phones. I'm sure my children's mega-PDA-communicator-multimedia-device will get on my nerves too.
Buy you know what? That's technology. Get used to it.
-Russ
Re:You missed the point... (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:Looks like a simulation (Score:3, Insightful)
Yes, and this is so much like the anti-RF crowd: "Let's conduct a simulation because we wouldn't understand a hard measurement if it hit us over the head." This policy began with the flawed assumptions of Wertheimer and Leper, who made one of the first studies indicating that powerlines might cause Lukemia. The problem was that they didn't measure the actual radiation --they assumed it would be propotional to the class of powerlines near each house. Wrong.
This policy of simulate instead of measure has continued to this day. And those who do measure often get it wrong. You see, none of them are RF engineers. One study using lab rats actually exposed the lab rats to 10 times the radiation level they thought they were using. Our esteemed researchers forgot to take the metal cage in to account...
The anti-RF crowd are mostly a lot of believers who think they have indentified a statistically insignificant danger and now they're looking for a theory to back it up. Instead they find statistical artifacts and use these spurious correlations to get more funding. The only known hazard of RF radiation are heating effects. Those who discover anything else deserve a Nobel Prize, if for nothing else, PHYSICS!
Jammers gonna git a whoopin'. (Score:5, Insightful)
And you actually want to jam cell phone calls? I hope those people get their asses sued off the day somebody tries to phone in a life threatening injury but can't. If you have the right to jam my phone, I must have the right to slash your tires to keep from annoying me. I can't wait until they make jamming triangulators so they can find you, beat your sorry butt down and break your little toy. heh.
Ironically, I'm betting your little jammer will produce more EM radiation than a cellphone. I used to work on EA-6b Prowlers [navy.mil] in the navy and you're going to have a tough time jamming without generating an equal or greater amount of power than the source. That, and the greater the range, the more power it'll require. Have fun irradiating yourself, chumps.
Re:Idiotic (Score:2, Insightful)
Re:This is really nonsense. (Score:2, Insightful)
You can't just the compare the powers... The frequency range is really important...
Re:Idiotic (Score:3, Insightful)
I stand corrected. The ICNIRP's credentials appear to be impeccable. My point is that the posted article cannot be taken at face value because it says nothing about that organization's credentials, or reasons for setting those standards.
Microwaves and RF waves are not the same thing- microwaves are higher-frequency than RF waves, and consequently are higher-energy. Cell phones broadcast at the high end of the RF spectrum, but still below the microwave range. Moreover, their signals are extremely weak. Yes, there is plenty of evidence that microwaves, and even RF waves, have physiological effects- they warm you up. When you absorb any sort of radiation, that energy enters your body, mostly as heat. However, you will notice that you cannot stay warm by making cell phone calls, no matter how many phones you use- the power level of a cell phone antenna is far too small to have a measurable effect on your body temperature. Thus, if that immeasurably small increase in temperature can give you cancer, we're already dead, because you heat up your head a lot more every time you stand in direct sunlight.