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."
Re:ECM (Score:2, Interesting)
Given the current popularity of mobile phones, you'd be hard pushed to find a "phone free zone".
Besides, the argument (and I suppose it's exactly that at the moment until we get solid uniform proof) is that it's damaging to one's health. Using that analogy, would you tell non-smokers to find a smoke-free zone or put up & shut up?
Besides, mobile phones are not limited to RF poisoning: something which hasn't been mentioned is the damage to train users' ear drums when the entire carriage errupts in a shouting match of "ARE YOU STILL THERE? HELLO? HELLO?..." when the train goes through a tunnel...
Meanwhile.. (Score:2, Interesting)
Some nerdy slashdotter want to head out and measure it themselves while this jackhole is sitting there with a pencil? Please post your results.
It seems to me (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:ECM (Score:3, Interesting)
We lived for thousands of years without:
Why on earth should they suddenly become essential?
The other day my friend called me on my mobile phone, from his mobile phone, because he'd just had an accident on his bike. I was able to call another friend (on their mobile phone) to arrange a car to go and get him.
Re:I can see it now... (Score:2, Interesting)
Lots of movie theaters, concert venues, etc. tell you to extinguish your portable (that's a literal translation anyway
Re:Better design of jammer (Score:2, Interesting)
Something to think about... (Score:4, Interesting)
Or what about wireless ethernet for that matter...
We need science, and we need to know what is dangerous and what is not. But these reports, or the reports about the dangers of potato chips, is not especially valid yet. I belive that two independant studies has to be made before you can draw any conclusion, and both of them has to live up to certain scientific standards.
All a bit narrow minded (Score:5, Interesting)
Phones may not do this to such a great extent - but open up one of the many "monkey drum" microwave dishes found all over the place in the UK, and the USA as well I should imagine. What do you find? A conventional cooking microwave magnetron. Ok, slightly different, and usually of a lower power.
Radar can produce huge bursts of power - and round radar sites, there are exclusion zones to stop you receiving a dose large enough to make you infertile or even kill you. Precision Approach Radar can be very dangerous in this respect due to the fact that the frequency and power used are dangerous, the dishes are located at ground level, and some of them can rotate 360 degress in seconds (the unit has to realign when different runways are used, and if you are in the way). Yes, this is an extreme case... but it still shows something.
I think that dismissing RF as safe because it doesn't cause ionisation or heating is stupid. In the same way as smoking was once viewed as safe, and that skin cancer has only been noticed very recently. Often our bodies do not behave in the ways which we think they should. I just think we should wait to see all the evidence before we jump to conclusions.
Surely electric currents in the brain are affected by RF? Do we know if this is bad or not? People also die when they are using their phone and can't pay full attention to the situation they are in.
Other issues are that when many radio waves are in a small space, they do not always combine to produce the same frequencies. Harmonics and other frequencies are generated, so saying that the frequency that the phone transmits is not dangerous doesn't mean the area is. Powers can also mount up.....
And jammers tend not to be high power - they disrupt the signal in a more clever manner. Although in the short term, the phones will transmit with more power, people will turn them off or the phones will stop trying so regularly.
I don't have a mobile. I don't want one mainly for the reason I don't want to be conctacted when someone doesn't know where I am. Landlines tend to be cheaper as well.
Re:you are rationalizing (Score:2, Interesting)
I have no idea what that is supposed to mean. Both kinds of radiation can kill, as can a rock that's dropped on your head. The question is whether the RF you are exposed to daily is a significant risk compared to other risks (including risk from ionizing radiation) you are exposed to daily, and whether we can control those risks through public policy.
I don't know whether it is dangerous or not, but I do know that your arguments for why people shouldn't worry don't hold. We know that individual cell phones operating in normal ways have measurable biological effects, so it stands to reason to suspect that they might be harmful if either radiation increases or exposure is long-term.
There's a much larger EM field set up by the traction motors.
Not necessarily inside the passenger cabin, which is usually shielded from those motors. They are also much lower frequency and don't result in tissue heating. And nobody has demonstrated physiological effects from that.
Why isn't anyone worried by that?
Lots of people are, in fact, quite worried about it.
What about CB radio? (Score:2, Interesting)
imagine the radiation you'd be absorbing then. Surely all truckers would have cancer by now?
Sure its a much lower frequency but I can tell you
from persojnal experience (I once held an aerial that was transmitting by mistake) that even SW
radio can heat you up quite considerably!
Why bother with a jammer... (Score:3, Interesting)
As for the train, the only area not covered is the windows, adding a fine mesh of wire (inside the glass) and connect it to the body off the train, and you have an effective mean of shutting down most of the mobile phone emmision, they only remaining is the mobile phones trying to reach a base station.
If people travel a certain amount of time, say 20 minutes or more, they are likely to turn off the mobile phone since there is no access until they get off the train. And they will save some power on the battery (not as big a problem as it used to be though).
Re:What about CB radio? (Score:2, Interesting)
1/d^2 where d is the distance. Say you measure power at one foot. The power at two feet will be 1/4 of the power at one foot. At 4 feet from the radiator, it will be 1/16th of the power. At 50 feet, it will be 1/2500th of the power at one foot, at 100 feet, 1/10,000th.