Junk Science - Cell Phones

[Xiahou]

Garbage like this really gets my goat for some reason. You have some "scientist" coming out with a non-study claiming that cell phones might give you brain cancer. They admit there is no evidence to support the claim, but they sent out an advisory regardless with the ludicrous justification of "it's better safe than sorry".

"The question is do you want to play Russian roulette with your brain," she said in an interview from her cell phone while using the hands-free speaker phone as recommended. "I don't know that cell phones are dangerous. But I don't know that they are safe."

Anyone want to take a stab at carrying out moronic arguments like this to other aspects of life?

[Whacker]

I'd give it a shot, but my head hasn't been working right lately because of this huge brain tumor from cell phone usage.

[drone]

I always keep the cell phone on my right ear. Got to keep my left-brain functional, I'm a geek.

[Somebody Else]

I've heard that water is dangerous if taken in large quantities. Best not to drink it.

I also hear oxygen is flammable, we should ban it to stop the terrorists.

[PBI]

Well I guess a good example of this would be the MMR vaccine scare. One discredited but widely publicised study linking the MMR vaccine with autism was enough to scare many parents out of giving their kids the vaccine against all the medical advice. Despite the fact that even if the study wasn't nonsense putting your kids at risk of measles would still be worse.

Of course, a more controversial example would be climate change, where a lot of people seem to be willing to dismiss the view of the broader scientific community in favour of a few fringe scientists who just happen to be telling them what they want to hear.

[Geoffrey S]

It's certainly worth investigating, as the case of smoking showed. But for now it appears to be a non-issue, and largely treated as such by scientists - though apparently, not by sensationalist writers of these kind of articles. No real news yet, so they make it.

[Navaros]

It's not junk science that cell phones cause cancer.

Science bought & paid for by the big cell phone corps that claims that cell phones don't cause cancer: that is junk science.

Microwaves were not meant to be used in such a way was they are used in cell phones, and the human body is not designed to tolerate microwaves being used against it in such a way.

This subject is not nearly so funny and trivial as many posters are making it out to be. Better to take it seriously now rather than pay the severe health consequences later for not having done so.

[Xiahou]

It's not junk science that cell phones cause cancer.;

Science bought & paid for by the big cell phone corps that claims that cell phones don't cause cancer: that is junk science.

Microwaves were not meant to be used in such a way was they are used in cell phones, and the human body is not designed to tolerate microwaves being used against it in such a way.

This subject is not nearly so funny and trivial as many posters are making it out to be. Better to take it seriously now rather than pay the severe health consequences later for not having done so.

No, it's total garbage. There are no credible studies that demonstrate cell phone usage being linked to any kind of cancer. Even the university scientists responsible for the alert in the original post admit there is currently no evidence for their alarmism. They recognize the lack of evidence, yet say people shouldn't use them anyhow 'just in case'.

Along similar lines, I'd like to alert backroom members to the dangers of cancer from their keyboards. No, there's no evidence supporting that statement- but just to be safe, you shouldn't use them anyhow.

[Ronin]

No, it's total garbage. There are no credible studies that demonstrate cell phone usage being linked to any kind of cancer. Even the university scientists responsible for the alert in the original post admit there is currently no evidence for their alarmism. They recognize the lack of evidence, yet say people shouldn't use them anyhow 'just in case'.

Along similar lines, I'd like to alert backroom members to the dangers of cancer from their keyboards. No, there's no evidence supporting that statement- but just to be safe, you shouldn't use them anyhow.

Are you equating hitting your fingers on a keypad to having a microwave emitter next to your head?

getting hit with extra radiation is never good for you....at least in the small experience of this layman over here...

avoiding such a situation whenever possible even if there is no definitive proof is called common sense where I come from...not garbage.

[Xiahou]

Are you equating hitting your fingers on a keypad to having a microwave emitter next to your head?

In that there's no evidence of either causing cancer, nor does it even make sense that they could ever do so? Yes.

1. CANCER: WHAT EINSTEIN KNEW ABOUT CELL PHONES.
By now everyone has heard the news frenzy over Ronald Herberman, Director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, advising faculty and staff to limit cell phone use because there is no proof that it's not a cancer risk. Nonsense! All cancer agents act by disrupting chemical bonds. In a classic 2001 op-ed LBL physicist Robert Cahn explained that Einstein won the 1905 Nobel Prize in Physics for showing that cell phones can't cause cancer. The threshold energy of the photoelectric effect, for which Einstein won the prize, lies at the extreme blue end of the visible spectrum in the near ultraviolet. The same near-ultraviolet rays can also cause skin cancer. Red light is too weak to cause cancer. Cell-phone radiation is 10,000 times weaker.

link

Or if you want something that explains it more in a little more depth, look here.

[Viking]

link

Appears as much of an overstatement. In science, there is always room for surprises. There is also some controversy surrounding radars, whether they are able to cause children born with damaged limbs or not; and radars does indeed operate with much longer wavelengths than red.

[Navaros]

No, it's total garbage. There are no credible studies that demonstrate cell phone usage being linked to any kind of cancer. Even the university scientists responsible for the alert in the original post admit there is currently no evidence for their alarmism. They recognize the lack of evidence, yet say people shouldn't use them anyhow 'just in case'.

There are plenty of credible studies that prove cellphones cause cancer. You are just picking the answers that you want to hear, even though they are incorrect.