Television Kills Chipmunks?

I was reading up on chipmunks the other day and in the behavioral problems, I came across a creepy little node of information...

Source
Television – prolonged exposure can result in death; this is thought to be due to electromagnetic and ultrasonic radiation from the 15.6 kHz time-based oscillator.

I've looked around a little and cant seem to find any other research but I had heard this before from somewhere. Isn't your brain wired up to be buzzing at 12-15khz?

Maybe mom knew what she was talking about when she told you not to sit in front of the television. Seems to me that as little understanding as we have on the long term effects of exposure, we sure do seem to get alot of it from just about everywhere.I've been digging around trying to find if watching Sesame Street is killing chipmunks or not, have read some intersting applications for ultrasonic radiation in neurology.

Performance Standards for Ultrasonic Radiation Emitting Products (PDF)

An ultrasonic radiation causes various chemical phenomena (PDF)

Growth inhibition of Cyanobacteria by ultrasonic radiation: laboratory and enclosure studies.

Preparation of nanoparticles by ultrasonic radiation (PDF)

Ultrasonic waves cause vibration fragments of the tumor

A Little Fringe-ish But Intersting Read

Creepy Patents

Acoustic memory in ferroelectric materials... next generation of mobile communication... and other wild ultrasonic research

Anyone think it might have something to do with the programming?



There are some seriously inane shows on TV, maybe chipmunks are very sensitive to the ennui resulting from not enough good shows to watch.

Edit: Just thought of something actually relevant, besides my bad humor. Remember that study on the effects of captivity on research animals, how it's enough to drive them insane?

www.guardian.co.uk...

Maybe something similar is at work on the chippies, they're pretty nuts (no pun intended) as it is, and they're defintely not used to captivity. It may contribute to the physiological problem, I don't know.

As far as the less deadly, but perhaps more dangerous, effects of television on human minds, there's tons of research available online. I think realizing the danger is a good first step, but it seems few people are awake and aware. It changes our brains for the worse, especially children.

Honestly, if television just killed people outright, I think it would be less horrific than the situation we've got now.


[edit on 21-5-2006 by WyrdeOne]

I've looked around a little and cant seem to find any other research but I had heard this before from somewhere. Isn't your brain wired up to be buzzing at 12-15khz?

No. Brain waves work around the range of 4-20 Hz or so, not 12-15 kHz. You might have gotten the units mixed up, since they are similar numbers, only different by a factor of 1000. (I've done that on tests more times than I care to admit...)

I wonder if it really was the EM radiation from the televisions that affected the chipmunks, or whether it was something else, like the stress of captivity that did them in? Did the researchers have some kind of control group where other chipmunks were kept in the same conditions, except with no TV present?

There's a lot of debate in the scientific community right now about the effects of EM radiation on living organisms. You've probably heard of people who have protested when power lines or cellphone towers go up in their neighbourhoods. I'm not aware of any conclusive evidence that proves that being in the proximity of EM fields is dangerous, at least the tiny fields around things like TVs. I did some calculations once to see what kind of EM fields a power line generates, and it's pretty small, even if you are standing right under the overhanging wires; the magnetic field, for example, I calculated was something like 1 or 2% of the earth's magnetic field. I remember when I took an introductory EM class at university, my prof spent one entire seminar going through article after article that had as its conclusions that EM fields like those I mentioned are harmless.

Even though the EM field generated by stuff like TVs, power lines, and all that, can be proven to be quite small, that doesn't say anything about whether that small amount is dangerous or not. Take my power line calculation as an example. I found that standing under the lines only exposed you to about 1 or 2% more EM. Sometimes 2% is a lot, though. If I increased the room temperature in your house by 2%, for example, that would be about 6 degrees Celsius. I guarantee you'd notice that!

We definitely need more research into the effects of EM on living things, especially since EM is everywhere in our modern society...

Luckily, if the chipmunks begin to revolt we'll have a plan. Look at them, outside with their ...fur. They're plotting something, i just know it.