[LINK] EMF Health problems

jim birch planetjim at gmail.com
Tue Jun 5 14:29:40 AEST 2007


On 05/06/07, Stewart Fist <stewart_fist at optusnet.com.au> wrote:
>
> Jim Birch wrote:
>
> > (Just about) everything we do entails risks and benefits.
>
> Yeh.  But we normally try to reduce the risk as much as possible.  Living
> is
> a risk, but we try to prolong it.


Who eats a nutritionally optimized diet?  Or does the right mix of
exercise?  These are highly effective accessible means of improving lifespan
(within limits:)  But people generally make choices as much based on
enjoyment, fashion and addiction as health.


> > Eating leafy
> > greens is beneficial but leafy greens contain known carcinogens.  In
> fact
> > virtually all plants contain toxins that the plants developed to counter
> > creatures that would like to eat them.
>
> Now you are getting scientific, and this statement is wrong.  Toxins are
> often highly specific.  Some toxins kill lab rats, but don't effect mice.
> What is toxic to a caterpillar, may not be toxic to a human.


True.  But lots of plant toxins are toxic to us too at higher dosages.  Some
insecticides don't interfere with us maybe at all because we don't have the
same biochemical pathways.  We also have a very clever liver that can
more-or-less neutralise many ingested toxins.  But bump up the dosage of
those same chemicals and even nutrients like vitamins and you start to get
noticeable toxic effects, and death.   In many cases the low dosages
probably aren't good for you either, but if you don't eat...

We can only work out the risk-benefit balance when we know what the risks
> are, and can measure the benefits (the term is usually meant in the
> economic
> sense, to me community or business benefits).  Risks aren't just
> associated
> with immediate effects, we know from sad experience that many of those we
> are trying to deal with today only act over decades, and often
> insidiously.


Sure, but there are a lot of  people who've spend hours a day on their
mobile for years now.  You might not know the exact risks but we  can place
some limits.

In fact, the first hint that asbestos was a problem was in the 1890s, yet I
> was taught at school that it was the 'wonder fibre'.


Killing your workers and customers has acquired an increasing bad aura over
the years...

> I'd love to see the risks of mobile phones worked out so that people could
> > potentially make an informed choice, but on the evidence I've seen I
> expect
> > that it will turn out to be the kind of low level of risk that most
> people
> > are more-or-less happy to live with.
>
> I agree with your assessment, but I don't agree with your certainties.
>
> I'm not in a position to know, and nor do I believe you are.
>
> As with the tobacco industry, the cellphone industry has engaged for years
> in a deliberate campaign of misinformation and the promotion of dubious
> science. The electronics industry, which sets the standards for health, is
> even more casual with the truth.
>
> And until that is all cleared up, even the best scientists working in the
> area can't make any sort of informed judgement.


Ok, we're more-or-less in agreement.  (Certainly in regards to those BS
artists who get paid lots of money for disinforming the public.)

But I haven't been following the issue as closely as you.  So, do you use a
mobile, and what's your recommendation?

Jim



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