Wi-Fi anxiety: Man sues neighbor to shut off electronics

That's it. I'm outta here''

You can't have an intelligent Debate about something without someone getting their Knickers in a Knot..

I stand by all my replies.

reply to post by Damian-007


you and several others seem quite insistent that RF is simply and absolutely incapable of producing these effects.

the bit that maybe...maybe not posted about RF jammers being useless was particularly misinformed.

all of your claims are based on the idea that the power of the signal is so very tiny. and that the sun produces these emissions already....and so forth.

what you have consistently ignored is the fact that, although they may be of extremely low power, they still are powerful enough to exist ABOVE THE NOISE FLOOR.

if we assume that humans evolved on this planet, then we will also assume that they are condidtioned to living with the noise floor emissions of the sun. however, we cannot be so certain that signals which are above the noise floor, even a tiny bit, have no effect at all.


i am largely playing devils advocate here. but i am certain that if i really wanted to i could start poking holes in all of your debunking commentary. i have worked as an RF signal (military satellite communications) tech for many many years.

and, having the experience and knowledge that i do, i am still uncertain that surrounding ourselves with RF emissions is not damaging in some way.

reply to post by ZombieOctopus

Ok, thats kind of backwards. People suffering from delusions claimed to suffer from it, so its psychological. They also claim to suffer from thousands of other disorders; its a matter of what is convenient and handy to divert from their real issue. That has nothing to do with anything. Which is why I dismissed it in the first place.

Originally posted by ZombieOctopus
reply to post by Damian-007

 

I'm not even sure that microwaves @ 2.x GHz would be able to penetrate your skull at such low power output. Longer waves, like from a radio station would be much more efficient. Since, for example, your regular old microwave oven uses a band around 2.5GHz but operates at a power around 1100 Watts. At that power it's penetrating depth is still very shallow which is why the outside of meat cooks so much quicker than the inside.

If you go to a more industrial microwave oven, like the ones they use at McDonalds and other fastfood places, they operate using much longer waves, like 400-500MHz @ over 2KW so the food cooks all the way through.

AM/FM radio bands use 145.5KHz and up and go through everything at powers of up to 100,000 Watts.

Wifi deals in milliwatts, usually 50-100mW.

But then again RF sensitivity isn't really grounded in logical thinking. Like I said on the first page, it's a symptom of deeper psychological issues in most cases.

inverse square law applies here: The irradiance of a EM wave radiating from a point source is inversely proportional to the square of the distance from the source; so an object (of the same size) twice as far away, receives only one-quarter the energy.

For example, the intensity of radiation from the Sun is 9140 watts per square meter at the distance of Mercury (0.387AU); but only 1370 watts per square meter at the distance of Earth (1AU)—a threefold increase in distance results in a ninefold decrease in intensity of radiation.

Apply this principle to wi-fi and and you will see that yes we are being bombarded by EMF's from all over but for the most part, the distances involved render the effects to be proportionately weaker when you apply the inverse square law.

Living in a city just means that there's more chance of encountering it.

To say that it's a psychosomatic (all in the head) is ignorant of being open to the possibility of it being a true disability. I don't however make a meal out of it or ask for fame or get any special treatment - I just deal with it. I'm sure there are some freeloaders who get special treatment and others who are indeed psychosomatic -

There is no test for it from a doctors perspective so one can argue one way or the other from the scientific standpoint but when you have vast amounts of rational people standing up and saying "hey, this is making me sick" then there is a phenomenon that you can not ignore.

I'm still waiting for the person who wishes to bet me $10k that I can sit in a room blind folded and detect a transmission from a wi-fi or bluetooth.

Any takers?

I'm in Sydney, Australia.

reply to post by ZombieOctopus


once again, here with this post, you are ignoring the fact of the noise floor.

if you were out in an open field, you would likely be subject to mostly noise. i see no reason why localized emissions poking their heads out above the floor would not be at least suspect.

of course, all of my talk about the noise floor is quite generalized. each frequency band has its own usage protocols. but then again, the specificity of these protocols per bandwidth might give us clues as well as to how they might affect health.


all i am saying is: stop being so certain.

reply to post by Magzoid


I'm only coming back to say that I did take you up on the offer. If you want, I will come to you.

The rules will be that the whole Experiment is VideoTaped and that if, in any ten hour period, you do not detect the Switching On or Off of a WiFi router or Bluetooth device, the experiment ends and I go home..

Pretty Simple.

Moderator Comments

These aren't strictly on-topic, so please forgive the digression, but I think it's important to point out some problems that have been derailing this thread and hopefully promote a better discussion environment. I'll be using the figurative "you" to keep things simple, but am not referring to anyone in particular, so I ask that nobody take any of this personally.

First off, if you inject yourself into the discussion, don't be surprised if you end up being criticized. If you don't want people commenting on you, don't inject yourself into the discussion. It's not important who you are. You're an ATS member, that's all that matters. What's important is what you think about the topic. That's what it's all about.

Secondly, if you do get upset, take a moment to cool off and avoid posting in anger. When you post insults, you're not just offending the person you attack, but everyone who has to read your unpleasant post. It's rude and disrespectful to the entire community. Self-control is a necessary skill for posting on a board that routinely discusses some of the most outrageous topics on the Internet, so please cultivate it.

Third, when someone else breaks the rules, don't wrongly interpret that as a license to break them yourself. If everybody did that, these forums would be utterly unreadable. A "forum vigilante" is nothing more than a troll with a bad excuse, and is no better than the people against whom he or she would campaign.

Nobody's perfect. We all have bad days, and we all have something that can get us wrapped around the axle.

All I'm asking is even if you're mad as hell and you're not going to take it anymore, that you remember where we are and keep your comments civil out of respect for the ATS community, if not for the particular member who has offended you.

Anyway, sorry for the digression, and I really don't want to be guilty of derailing the thread myself by commenting overmuch on the "meta-discussion".

Our topic is: Wi-Fi anxiety: Man sues neighbor to shut off electronics

As is painfully obvious by now, this topic can clearly lead to some strongly differing opinions and emotional responses. It's okay as long as they're expressed with reasonable courtesy. Also, it's wise to keep in mind that no matter how right you may think you are, you may be wrong.

So please, stay on topic, keep an open mind, keep it civil and be cool.

Thanks.




P.S. I know I've spit out quite a mouthful here, and that this post will tend to invite responses. Please don't post them here (though you're welcome to send me a U2U anytime if you want), since it will only distract from the topic. I'm just trying to give some background for folks who may think us evil mods are out to get them. We're really just trying to keep things on topic, even if that means having to jump in like this now and then.

Just sayin'

[edit on 3/28/2010 by Majic]

Originally posted by saturnine_sweet
reply to post by ZombieOctopus

 

Ok, thats kind of backwards. People suffering from delusions claimed to suffer from it, so its psychological. They also claim to suffer from thousands of other disorders; its a matter of what is convenient and handy to divert from their real issue. That has nothing to do with anything. Which is why I dismissed it in the first place.

It's the same with people that think they have bugs under their skin, or that people carry dangerous electromagnetic fields that can shock and cause them pain. Like "EM sensitivity" these are symptoms of deeper seeded issues. These among others aren't conditions on their own that people with delusions or OCD pick up and call their own, they are specific symptoms of larger problems.

If you go to a doctor and say you see spiders everywhere, they don't follow you around to see if there are really spiders following you lol. They know that these are common symptoms of well known conditions.

reply to post by Magzoid


Im curious about exactly how the inverse square law would work in some cases. Obviously, I can understand it with small devices. But are you of the opinion that large devices (like cell towers) would then have the same effect, if one was close enough? Ive always figured that there were implementation specific differences in devices that accounted for the variance in effect.

[edit on 3/28/2010 by saturnine_sweet]

reply to post by ZombieOctopus


That is nothing more than a logical fallacy in your assumptions. Meaningless.

reply to post by tgidkp


I worked and Studied in the field of Radio Frequency for 6 years and for the last 20 odd I have stayed in the field, somewhat..

If you want to get into a mathmatical debate about inverse law and ERP (Effective Radiated Power), I would love to have that debate with you..

If I can ask 1 question. What do you think the ERP would be for a 0.5 milliwatt, 2.4ghz signal using the normal Omnidirectional Antenna that is mainly used?

If you can work that out then I'm sure you know why I debate the OP about his issue.

[edit on 28-3-2010 by Damian-007]

reply to post by Magzoid


It's hard to tell what side you're on here lol I think we agree but I'm not sure.

Of course inverse square law applies... if you move just a few meters away from a wifi transmitter the power output drops to a couple milliwatts. That's what I'm saying, it's too weak to penetrate much of anything, especially skin which is full of water.

Originally posted by saturnine_sweet
reply to post by ZombieOctopus

 

That is nothing more than a logical fallacy in your assumptions. Meaningless.

You haven't really argued anything of much substance other than repeating that I'm wrong and don't know anything lol

I've explained my logic, you haven't explained anything.

Originally posted by tgidkp
reply to post by Damian-007

 

the bit that maybe...maybe not posted about RF jammers being useless was particularly misinformed.

G'day Tgidkp

I made no judgement regarding the effectiveness or lack thereof of RF jammers.

Kind regards
Maybe...maybe not

reply to post by saturnine_sweet


re: "implimentation differences".

yes. this is a very very important factor. radio antennas are designed to focus the signal in a specific direction or distance.

for example. i could go out and hop out into my 60 foot satellite antenna while it is transmitting and i would probably be okay for several minutes. however, from around 50 to 350 feet outward from the direction the antenna is pointed, it would start cooking me internally almost immediately.


also, someone was saying earlier that the shorter waves (microwaves) have less penetrating ability. errrrr.....

all other things being equal, a gamma ray is going to go a hell of a lot further than your local FM radio station. smaller wavelength equates to higher state of internal energy.

reply to post by ZombieOctopus


I described a phenomenon, which was related to the news article, with an interest at discovering causes for it. To say that anyone who disagrees with your is crazy, because some crazy people agree with them, is a logical fallacy. If you'd like to supply me with the equipment, Im sure I could find a way to measure the physiological effect. Me, Im a little on the poor side at the moment.

reply to post by Damian-007


my answer to that question is quite simple:

enough to bring it above the noise floor.....and probably not much more than that (for the sake of efficiency).

Originally posted by ZombieOctopus
reply to post by saturnine_sweet

 

You didn't read it did you.

Like I said, I had to accumulate volunteer hours in university by volunteering at the hospital where I ran across quite a few people who claimed they had this. In all cases they either suffered from OCD or some other delusion causing disorder. A few were brought on by psychosis relating to opiate addiction, usually heroin or fentanyl. What starts it is they read about it or hear about it from someone and they believe they also have it.

To calm their delusions all that needed to be done is convince them that there was no RF in the room, or in the wing of the hospital we were in. You'd tell them that we turned it off to respect their condition or something along those lines and sure enough it would go away.

One time I walked in on a patient carrying some black folders on a clipboard and she thought it was a laptop and had a total conipition fit, writhing in pain. When I showed her what it actually was, she changed her mind and said it was because the door was open and people had computers outside.

So you're basing your whole "it's in your head" theory argument on 'mad people' who will constantly hear voices in the head, be on medications they don't need and medications to counter the side effects of the first medication.

I neither have OCD or take medications

I first found out I had it whenever I used a 3G phone. At first I didn't want to believe it but every evening on the way home from work, I would get a headache and nausea from it. It cost me $500 to end the contract and go back to a conventional 2g phone, The phone was a sony errickson colour screen phone which was great but for the fact that it too gave me a headache. I looked into it and low and behold, these phones emitted more power than nokia so i'm on nokia and have ever since with minimal problems.

for 10 years I have worked in investment banking where wi-fi and wireless networks are never used for security reasons and this has suited me fine.

I'm still waiting for the smart person to take on my $10k challenge for some skeptic/scienist to prove that this is all in the heads of 'mad people'.

In my business, Money talks and BS walks.

reply to post by Maybe...maybe not

I agree.....you'll just replace the RF with more RF

this is from your post on page 1. your words give the impression that you believe RF jamming would be of little effect.


but if you consider that people experiencing these effects are sensitive only to localized disturbances above the noise within certain bandwidths, then an RF jammer would be totally effective as a cure.

reply to post by Magzoid


You realize that 2G and 3G work on the same band, right? Just sayin.