Seeing the World through X-Ray Glasses

I've just read one of those irritating American articles by columnists that can't be bothered to even check things up before agitating the populace. Such people explain why there is very intelligent stuff coming out of the States as well as ridiculous moronic stuff. In this case, one Carol Felsenthal tries to liken airport scanners to 1950s fluoroscopy — a bit like saying your iPhone is like a chest x-ray.

For the benefit of those who like it pictorial, look at this picture. The millimetre-wave scanners suggested for use in airport scans produce radiation in the EHF range (wavelength roughly 10 mm), while x-rays are typically about 10 million to 100 million times stronger. You would get about 0.5 to 1.5 chest x-rays worth of radiation just by flying across the Pacific, as even the EPA admits.

In short, choosing to fly already exposes you to millions of times more radiation than being scanned at airport security. Heck, they could scan Carol Felsenthal a million times and she'd still receive less radiation than she would flying from her office to her holiday home. As for privacy concerns, I'd rather pass through the scanner than be patted down.

Them 'Phones WILL Fry Your Brain

Studies have shown that using a mobile phone close to your head for ten years will double your chances of brain tumours. This is borne out by the fact that the chance of the tumour occurring is greater on the side which you normally use the phone. So far so good. At this point, the key thing we want to know is: what is the chance of a person getting a brain tumour after using a cellphone for the NEXT ten years?

You see, there is one BIG flaw in all these studies. I am 100% certain that nobody has used the SAME phone at the SAME distance from the centre of the the tumour that was found for the SAME amount of time over the SAME ten years in the SAME environment. I am willing to concede that you can control for at least one of these conditions, perhaps two, but not three or more or anywhere near all (which would include all the other things a good scientist can imagine).

In fact, since such phones use less radiation these days (the US limit is 1.6 watts/kg, the European limit is 2.0 watts/kg) and more users are resorting to hands-free connections which move the phone some distance away from the head, the risk is dropping faster than it is increasing.

So why is the title of this post so alarmist?

Well, I was just thinking about the other kinds of radiation. Radio waves are actually very low-frequency emissions that take forever to do anything to your body. At the other end of the spectrum are things like cosmic rays and gamma rays, that are even more high-energy than x-rays, and will KILL you (I was going to say KILL you DEAD, but most people get that point quite easily). You will get literally thousands of times more deadly radiation from climbing ONE mountain at high altitude or flying ONCE from New York to Singapore, than by using a mobile phone for ten years.

Actually, I cheated there. We know that cosmic radiation is deadly, but we don't know that radio waves are. We know that humans have been exposed to radio signals for decades without suffering directly-related damage from them. We know that people have turned into green superheroes died from gamma-ray exposure, and we can even watch it happening if we want.

So those phones will fry your brain, I guess, but only if you think so hard about them that you forget to shield your head from the sun, that obvious fusion-powered source of lethal radiation.