The Blog of an “Electrosensitive.” No, this is not a joke.
June 1st, 2008
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But I did laugh
Yes, I admit it. I laughed. This is the blog of an individual who is convinced that they are electrosensitive. It only has two entries, which are three years apart, probably because of the dangers of being near a computer. *eyeroll*
It’s pretty clear that this guy actually believes (s)he has a problem with electromagnetic fields, and (s)he does seem to be genuinely miserable with fear and perceived health problems. I didn’t start reading the site with the intention of laughing, but I’m just being honest, I couldn’t hold in the chuckles at a few sentences. He may indeed have a health condition, but I’m willing to be it’s a mental health one.
Here are a few excerpts:
At home it was impossible to remove the mast situated 250 meters away.
With the good sleep results obtained out of my home, I decided to built a FARADAY cage around my bed. During day time I wore a special shielded cap. That special shielded cap has an incredible history; one day when I felt dizzy with very strong headache I cover my head with aluminium paper and placed a cap on top; the results were quite incredible. Then I ordered a special cap on INTERNET, since then I keep that cap on my head as long as I can. I even dare to wear my special cap on my job site.
With my FARADAY cage and my special shielded cap slowly I was able to overcome my electro-sensitiveness to electromagnetic waves.
It makes now more than two years that I am obliged to flee my workplace. I am most of the times working from home. It makes more than three years I sleep in a Faraday cage. I avoid all chemicals products from food and cosmetics. I take no more antioxidant or any other potion.
The number of EHS (Electro Hyper Sensitive) people will explode in the coming years (50% of the population?). A lot will suffer from various pains without knowing why. The self made diagnostic will be almost impossible as wireless will be everywhere.
Apparently this person is spending a good portion of their time running from chemicals, wireless devices and that sort of thing. The entire blog is avaliable in French, but I don’t happen to be versed in that language and the machine translations are a bit crude. In any case, the version I’ve posted here should give some idea what these folks are like in terms of mindset.
The picture above is of the Faraday cage this individual built. Too bad there were no pictures of the aluminum foil hat!
This entry was posted on Sunday, June 1st, 2008 at 11:50 pm and is filed under Bad Science, Culture, Just LAME, Quackery, inverse square. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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June 2nd, 2008 at 12:36 am
It’s funny in a way because it’s so ridiculous but it’d be funnier if it wasn’t real. People like that are beyond hope because they have so much personally invested in that and they can never fess up and admit to being wrong. It’s sad in a way to have a life thrown away in the name of ignorance.
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June 2nd, 2008 at 1:01 am
How pathetic is that?
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June 2nd, 2008 at 1:18 am
DV82XL said:
Very pathetic indeed. As for the “hat” copper foil will work better than aluminum, but aluminum works okay. That’s for RF though. Assuming these people can even tell the difference between RF fields and electromagnetic fields like around powered devices, then the best stuff for that would be mu-metal, but be forewarned that even with that kind of shielding, you can’t block low frequency fields as easily with limited material.
Plus, they can still get in through your face!
(Best burry your head deep deep underground, actually)
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June 2nd, 2008 at 1:37 am
By the way the blogs French entries are more complete. the seem to run from January of this year to May.
The author is also afraid of Nanoparticules, sees a connection between EHS and vaccination autism: (La conclusion pourrait être que les ondes électromagnétiques interfèrent dans la capacité des cellules à excréter les métaux lourds) ‘The conclusion is electromagnetic fields interfere with the cells capacity to excrete heavy metals’. Monsieur Samson also suffers from chronic fatigue syndrome and multiple chemical sensitivity.
A real piece of work.
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June 2nd, 2008 at 8:13 am
Please comment upon
)
http://mcs-america.org/mcsanewsjune2008.htm#_The_Cell_Phone
- I’d love to hear your scepticism in full flow…
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June 2nd, 2008 at 9:15 am
That looks like a very nice bugscreen!
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June 2nd, 2008 at 9:47 am
Sung Li Kim said:
Yes… one of the main symptoms of electrosensitivity, doncha know, is the inexplicable outbreak of small, itchy skin irritations which can last for days and be a real nuisance. Protecting yourself from all the nasty RF radiation by sleeping in a Faraday cage such as the one pictured has been indisputably proven to reduce the symptoms of electrosensitivity enormously.
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June 2nd, 2008 at 5:27 pm
We know a song about this;
http://eclectech.co.uk/mindcontrol.php
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June 3rd, 2008 at 2:50 am
Its one of those things where this person has so much at stake on this and is so obsessed with it they could never admit they’re wrong no matter how much proof you put out. They think they’d look like an idiot to say it was all a big stupid self-delusional mistake.
What they forget, of course, is that they actually look a lot stupider by carrying this on like this. It would hurt to admit it was all false, but then they could try to move toward a life of not looking like an idiot.
I’m sure they’ll continue on like this. It’s sad, funny and just stupid at the same time.
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June 28th, 2008 at 8:45 am
Comment on this then……
http://www.mast-victims.org/index.php?content=news&action=view&type=newsitem&id=3227
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June 28th, 2008 at 10:33 am
The presence of an ‘alternative practitioner’ (read:quack) on the team, the small sample size, the lack of controls, and the fact that they made the totally unwarranted assumption that all subjects with high levels of the target hormones was ‘pre-exposed’, makes this study a bad joke. No double blind testing, no multiple sampling over time, no controls for other confounding variables, and no null-hypothesis, only compounds the list of experimental design errors in this paper. This is just scratching the surface, I could go on.
This work takes the cake IMHO for the most errors that can be made simultaneously in one epidemiological study. Is a farce.
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June 28th, 2008 at 10:33 am
hmmm said:
Well clearly this is not placebo controlled and stress and an expectation of change could account for this. Not to mention it was a small study and it still does not explain why the mast would be more of a cause than other smaller devices as the inverse square law applies.
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June 3rd, 2009 at 4:52 am
The condition is very real and you would not dismiss it if you suffered from it or if someone you loved did. It is already recognized in several countries and in Sweden those who have the condition can apply for government benefits if it is bad enough to keep them from work or they need special care. In other countries people can get benefits, but it is a fight. Some other countries do not recognize it so each victim must fight to get their case approved. The UK has yet to recognize even a single case and that is sad because they have some of the highest rates in the world.
It is well known this is real and Sweden and the Netherlands readily admit it and are creating the programs to provide for care and compensation. This is a good start, but if we are to have cell towers then the money should not just be government. The mobile companies should be made to pay from their enormous profits to the victims of their masts. That might make them think twice about where to locate them. They should have to pay for those who have to move their location or even leave their job.
Electrosensitivity was created by our bathing in electrosmog daily. The body can only take so much. It has exploded with 3G. 3G is much more potent.
I have ES, but I am lucky my case is mild. I know people who have been forced to live away from masts and have shielding installed in their homes. Even in Sweden the shielding is not paid for, but we are working to change that. I do not need that. I wear a radiation scrambling pendant and that helps me most of the time but I still get headaches when near the masts or someone on a phone. No mobiles are allowed in my home. If I keep my exposure low things will not get worse.
Be warned. Not everyone who has this was born with it. What causes some to get it and not others is not known, but you may be next!
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June 3rd, 2009 at 7:53 am
Lori said:
Double-blind testing in which the alledged sufferers of ‘electrosensitivity’ have been unable to distinguish what sort of em exposure they are recieving have revealed the condition to be illusory. Case closed.
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June 3rd, 2009 at 10:11 am
Lori said:
That is an example of a very bad and boneheaded government policy of Sweden. Not to single out the country, because all countries have their share of boneheaded policies (well, some more than others). Any government which has benefits for a non-existing condition has bowed to political pressure or a special interest group or may just have had a politician or two in someone’s pocket. It doesn’t mean much of anything.
The fact that the British government has approved homeopathic medications to be sold as legitimate medical products does not mean that it is scientifically valid. The fact that the US government has made the linear non-threshold model of radiation exposure the standard does not mean it is valid. The fact that the governments of African countries have called genetically engineered crops dangerous does not make that scientifically valid.
If we based our evaluations of reality on whether or not we could find a government in the world that recognized something, we’d be in some serious trouble.
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August 30th, 2009 at 4:01 pm
I’m suffering from electrosensitivity, believe me it’s 100% real.
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August 30th, 2009 at 4:12 pm
weety said:
You’re suffering from a psychosomatic disorder, believe me it’s 100% real. Your imagination is no substitute for facts.
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August 30th, 2009 at 4:35 pm
weety said:
That won’t cut it. testimonials of what a given person believes they have and the cause are worthless. I’ll go so far as to say that the greatest single advancement in the history of medicine was when we started to realize that anecdotal accounts and testimonials are not of use in determining anything.
Today things are evaluated using studies with placebo controls, statistical analysis and review. To determine if something like electrosensitivity exists we don’t ask people if they have it. Instead, groups are selected for evaluation, using double-blind methods and with demographic factors taken into account. This is done repeatedly in different institutions by different researchers and then the results are compared for consistency.
The difference between this and the old method of just collecting anicodtes is as dramatic as taking off a pair of blinders and seeing the world for the first time.
The data on electrosensitivity is extensive, consistent, compelling and entirely one-sided. It does not exist.
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September 27th, 2009 at 6:22 pm
the fact is, even the US congress is investigating the risks associated with cell phones and cell phone towers. it makes sense to me that if you can take an AM radio and put it next to your computer and the computer interferes with the radio station reception, that your head and body can also pick up what comes off a computer.
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September 27th, 2009 at 8:41 pm
lace wigs said:
That means absolutely nothing. The worst kind of science comes from politicians thinking they should be the ones to decide on scientific fact. The US Congress has investigated plenty of idiotic things before. Dennis Kusinich tried to get them to investigate chemtrails. It’s amazing that they didn’t convene a full committee on it, because the congress loves forming committees where they can go be windbags about things.
lace wigs said:
It it makes sense to you it’s because you don’t understand how an AM radio or a computer works. Inside the computer there are all kinds of pulsing clocks and various interfaces that run at a variety of frequencies. Any time there is electrical current being varied or modulated there is an electromagnetic flux.
Am radios by their very nature tend to pick up on interference, if it is strong enough, they even pick up on it out of band. An AM radio has a big inductor that is used as the antenna. It picks up every electromagnetic influence and creates a microvoltage from it. This goes onto a tuner. The tuner is an RLC circuit that is tuned into a frequency and blocks out the rest. It’s basically a filter – but it’s an imperfect one, especially in cheap analog AM radios. The signal is then cut in half by a simple diode and then amplified.
Any other interference will also cause some voltage and some of that is likely to get past the tuner. This is especially true if a component of the signal is of the frequency of the tuner or a harmonic of it.
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January 28th, 2010 at 10:29 pm
DV82XL said:
It is apparently recognized by the ADA here in the US and in Canada one can get 10 years of back tax credits. Check out http://www.Weepinitiative.org, talking to your doctor link, and http://www.MagdaHavas.com let us know what you think.
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January 28th, 2010 at 10:43 pm
The Canadian Disability Tax Credit, (which is what this commenter is alluding to) is not specifically for those suffering from imagined electro-sensitivity, but any Canadian tax payer who has a disability or those who have a dependent with a disability.
I guess if you can talk a psychiatrist into signing off on a psychosomatic disorder being a disability, you could claim it.
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January 29th, 2010 at 12:00 am
DV82XL said:
Of course, nearly every country has the equivalent or has some kind of social program that is directed at providing support to those with disabilities. In the United States, those who cannot work due to disability qualify for Social Security and may also qualify for subsidized insurance and medicaid.
Of course, none of these programs have unlimited funds and many are already financially stressed. Having people with invented illnesses lobby to get a free check so they can sit on their asses doesn’t help anyone and in addition to being just plain dishonest is a huge disservice to the real intended beneficiaries of such programs.
Somehow, despite their apparent crippling disability, they manage to create their own advocacy groups – on the internet no less. I guess they’re typing with long rods that tap the keys on a computer which is in a Faraday cage.
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January 29th, 2010 at 1:42 am
It’s obvious you have too much time on your hands. Maybe you should spend some time researching the issue, or actually looking at the information on links that have been provided, then watch the documentary from http://www.fullsignalmovie.com
I guess think you know more than this person:
The Largest Biological Experiment Ever
by Arthur Firstenberg
(original in Eldorado Sun)
In 2002, Gro Harlem Brundtland, then head of the World Health Organization, told a Norwegian journalist that cell phones were banned from her office in Geneva because she personally becomes ill if a cell phone is brought within about four meters (13 feet) of her.
Mrs. Brundtland is a medical doctor and former Prime Minister of Norway. This sensational news, published March 9, 2002 in Dagbladet, was ignored by every other newspaper in the world.
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January 29th, 2010 at 3:46 am
Electra said:
I spent over six months, on two separate occasions going through the research on this subject with a fine-tooth comb, the last time about four years ago when I served on a joint company-union committee on health and safety. Not only have I researched it, I have the background to evaluate it professionally.
I went in with an open mind, it would not have been the first time something that was thought benign turned out to be a serious industrial hazard, PCB’s spring to mind as an example, as does phenol, also known as carbolic acid. The latter was sprayed about like Lysol when I was a kid, and now most companies won’t let it, or anything that it is in within a mile of their plants. So it would not have been that much of a surprise, if it turned out that there were issues with EM fields.
But after an exhaustive review of the literature, we found nothing that could not be explained away by statistical noise, or hysteria. I don’t mind telling you it had been almost thirty years since I had done this sort of research, and I was appalled at the lack of rigor, the poor experimental designs, and the sloppy execution of the studies that I saw. Worse, the statistical analysis in most of these papers boarded on fraud; in my day at university, anyone floating such a document would have found themselves on academic probation not published.
So don’t tell me I haven’t done the research: I have. So I feel free to tell you to go get an education in the sciences before running off at the mouth about a subject you obviously know nothing about.
Or at the very least spare us your pathetic appeals to authority.
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January 29th, 2010 at 12:53 pm
The military has been working on the applications for years and full well know there are biological effects, maybe you should review some of the current work, or that of Dr. George Carlo,
and then again, some will always think the world is flat.
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January 29th, 2010 at 1:30 pm
Electra said:
The military was one of the first groups to do large scale studies and apply rigorous scientific review to electromagnetic field safety. There was a large interest from the 1940’s on after there were a number of injuries resulting from RF burns and problems which happened especially after the cavity magnetron became standard for radar. As VHF tends to mostly go through the body where as microwaves can heat tissue more effectively, the introduction of microwave radar lead to some technicians being seriously injured because they worked on equipment energized.
Say what you will about the military, but the fact of the matter is that it doesn’t do them any good to have their soldiers injured and taken out of operation, especially a technician who they’ve spent a lot of time and money training. This is all the more of an issue when they’re at sea or in a remote location and the one guy who knows how to fix the antenna is in sick bay with severe internal burns.
There were therefore many exhaustive studies on the topic to establish the mechanism of injury etc. Nobody is going to deny that RF can be dangerous if the field intensity is high enough to cause significant dielectric heating.
The militaries of many countries also experimented with directed energy weapons using radio beams. This included the UK, the US, Japan, Germany, The Soviet Union – without exception they found that they were useless. Sure, you could toast someone at a few feet, but the inverse square law ruins it for any distance. It’s also all but useless on anything metallic, as it will reflect the waves. No matter how hard they tried, they could never get a beam of radio energy focused narrowly enough or get the power high enough. The Japanese even went to systems with hundreds of kilowatts, but again – useless for combat.
In recent years the US army has developed something called the “Active Denial System” which people are now getting all hot and bothered about (figuratively as well as literally) The ADS achieves a high degree of focus using a frequency range that is on the border of what is considered RF and what is considered infrared. Basically, it’s a giant heat lamp. It still has range limitations, and it’s fairly easy to block, but the primary idea of it is to basically make it uncomfortable to enter certain areas by creating an effect similar to standing uncomfortably close to a radiant heater. It’s considered an alternative means of crowd dispersal and area discouragement. The other two that are in use are tear gas and acoustic means. The ADS is being tested to see how it stacks up to those two. The big advantage is that if you could use the ADS to break up a brewing mob it would allow people to basically go back to what they were doing. The current standard is tear gas, and that leaves everyone with burning watering eyes for the next couple of hours – potentially elevating the system.
It’s been contended that the ADS could be used for torture. It certainly could, if someone were held down and subjected to it. The same could be said of any non-lethal system. Tear gas, pepper spray, tasers, acoustic denial, dazzler strobes, flash-bang grenades and so on can all can be potentially missused.
ADS is not a mind control system, it’s not magic or part of a conspiracy. It’s a big focused heatlamp.
Electra said:
Oh and here it comes! George Carlo doesn’t do any scientific research, he makes a living off of doing lectures on these invented issues, writing columns, getting product endorsements. The man is what you call a “professional liar”
He’s the same assclown who helped fabricate scientific data on silicone implants in the 1990’s.
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January 29th, 2010 at 11:02 pm
So what do you think of Magda Havas and Dr. Rhoda Zione Alale?
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January 30th, 2010 at 2:41 am
Electra said:
It doesn’t matter what anyone thinks of them, what matters is if they have done proper research to back up the contentions they have made, and they have not.
Magda Havas makes claims based on the precautionary principle with nothing other than the assertion that EM fields haven’t been proven safe. Her papers were among those that I reviewed for the committee I was on, in particular her 2000 Biological effects of non-ionizing electromagnetic energy: A critical review of the reports by the US National Research Council and the US National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences as they relate to the broad realm of EMF bioeffects. for Environmental Reviews 8:173-253. 80 pages of tripe that end with the conclusion that she cannot come to a conclusion because she cannot make sense of all the conflicting data from the very research she was reviewing. The fact that she took a paid sabbatical to write this rubbish, and then ends it by covering her own behind, tells me just about everything I need to know about this woman.
Rhoda Zione Alale, a ‘nurse scientist,’ is an outright fraud. She claims to have “engineered the first disposable bio-shield SMART GRID to clear, harmonize, and/or deflect electromagnetic frequency (EMF) radiation,” which is quite an accomplishment seeing that its function would violate most of what is known about electromagnetism. She also claims to have discovered ‘Black Breast Syndrome’ which she asserts comes from irradiation of breast tissue by EMF radiation which, according to her causes essential minerals to be depleted from the breast tissue thus making the tissue turn black. It goes without saying that this condition is not recognized by any competent medical authority.
Nether of these two people are worth the price of the rope to hang them.
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January 30th, 2010 at 11:21 am
How about Stetzer, is his work credible?
Have you seen the conclusions of the International Association of Fire Fighters report http://www.iaff.org/hs/Resi/CellTowerFinal.htm?
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January 30th, 2010 at 1:05 pm
Let me address something here that is really becoming pervasive: The best place to look for good scientific information is rarely from “famous” scientists. Occasionally a good hard researcher becomes well known for some extraordinary accomplishment – like for example Jonas Salk or any number of Nobel prize winners. However, in general, most good research is done by those with a relatively low profile and who do not actively seek out media attention or advocacy. This is actually for good reason. Science should stand on its own and not based on the perceived reputation of the authors. It should also be objective and not have a lot of bias or interest riding on it.
A big red flag should be anyone who is using their “research” or their “expertise” as a means of backing a primary goal of doing things like endorsing products or giving lectures and advocacy meetings or something like that. George Carlo, Doug Rokke, Earnest Sternglass, Rosalie Bartel are all good examples of this. Their career is really not one of science – it’s what I call “a professional liar” but basically they make their living advocating various crusades against toxins/radiation/emf or whatever. Usually this involves things like inflating their credentials and doing various poorly controlled and small scale “studies” simply as a means of backing up their claims to authority. “Listen to me, I did a study, I’m a scientist”
When you’re dealing with real science, there’s no need to try to gain attention and inflate credentials. Science should stand on its own, not based on someone’s reputation or past accomplishments. If a scientist is fresh out of grad school, having done only a few low-profile research studies and is not known for much, that shouldn’t matter. If the data and analysis are valid then they’re as good as anyone else’s.
Anyone who has a big ego and is obsessed with their own stuff is really pushing an agenda that has nothing to do with scientific research. A big clue: They use the word “I” a lot in their interviews/writing and such “I tried to warn,” “I found evidence of,” “I was told not to tell the public,” “I felt obligated to let everyone know the dangers”
This is not to say that good scientists can’t engage the media or shouldn’t. It’s great when they do things like write books intended to increase science understanding or when they try to advise the media of things. In fact, most researchers I’ve talked to would be delighted to provide their services if a newspaper called them up and asked them if they would mind giving some advice on a story to make sure the scientific information was accurate or to give some comments on some new study or whatever.
That’s not what I’m talking about. What I mean is those who are first and foremost public advocates and who use their claims to scientific expertise for no reason other than to bolster their public profile.
Science is not about trying to get attention for yourself.
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January 30th, 2010 at 2:27 pm
drbuzz0 said:
Well said Steve.
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January 30th, 2010 at 2:53 pm
Electra said:
David Stetzer claims to have developed a filter called the ‘Stetzerizer’ which is purported to help reduce blood sugar levels in diabetics, and cure multiple sclerosis. He is a classic medical quack, and snake-oil salesman.
Electra said:
Yes, it comes to no conclusions, only reiterating the usual precautionary principle call for more studies to find out if there is anything to worry about. Quite frankly, it looks to me like both the union and management here lost control of the process. I was lucky that we had a union full of very technically savvy members, and a company that didn’t take a dismissive attitude toward the subject.
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January 31st, 2010 at 1:22 am
Have you read the Evidence for Effects on the Immune System by Olle Johansson?
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January 31st, 2010 at 1:23 am
Have you read the Evidence for Effects on the Immune System by Olle Johansson? or seen the information on blood brain barrier by the Finnish Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority?
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January 31st, 2010 at 1:39 am
Electra said:
Yeah… this is the claim that EMF opens the blood brain barrier and “embeds toxins into the brain cells” or something. Somehow they managed to mix this up with the whole autism/mercury bull****. I brought this up before, I think. It’s one of the nuttier ideas floating around in a sea of nutty ideas.
There are a few versions out there. One is that it “energizes toxin molecules” and causes them to get embedded into cells or “Supercharges their toxicity” and another is that it somehow opens the blood-brain barrier and lets “toxins” in but not out. Nevermind that the blood-brain barrier is a misnomer to begin with, since all manner of nutrients and oxygen and such are transferred from the blood to brain cells and the “barrier” is only a partial thing.
Then there was some claim that it makes the blood vessels in the brain “leak” which is just stupid.
I’m getting so tired of this bull****
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January 31st, 2010 at 2:05 am
Electra said:
Do you mean this:
From: Statement of STUK (Finnish Radiation and Nuclear Safety Authority) on Effects of mobile phone radiation
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January 31st, 2010 at 2:48 am
One more question. So if firefighters say they experienced negative symptoms such as migraine headaches, extreme fatigue, disorientation, slowed reaction time, memory loss, attention deficit amidst life threatening emergencies that they can attribute to onset when towers were activated, then they’re lying?
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January 31st, 2010 at 3:37 am
Electra said:
I have yet to see evidence of this phenomena that is not anecdotal. I do know that on more than one occasion, people have claimed that they where experiencing symptoms when in fact the antennas in question were not radiating, and that these same people reported that their symptoms disappeared when they were told the towers had stopped working, when in fact they were still producing an RF field.
This evidence suggests that the issue is by in large psychosomatic.
I am impressed however with your questions Electra, you seem to be honestly searching for the truth, a rare POV in this argument.
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January 31st, 2010 at 2:14 pm
Electra said:
Ah here we go again. Siting a sympathetic group and using their perceived heroics and good status to back some kind of woo by implying that disagreeing with it insults them.
It could just as easily been: veterans, 9/11 widows, cancer survivors, police officers or little Johnny in his Iron Lung. It doesn’t matter.
Sure firefighters run into burning buildings, get up at 2 AM to rush to the scene of a fire and risk their lives and for that they have our eternal gratitude. BUT that does not make them any better observers or any less prone to the placebo effect or bias than any other human being.
So are they lying? I don’t know. Some of them might be. Being a firefighter does not automatically make a person 100% honest. More likely though, most or all of those claiming to be effected by this stuff are just manifesting psycosomatic symptoms or are attributing real symptoms to something unrelated as the cause. This being the case, it’s the liars who convinced them of this who are guilty here.
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January 31st, 2010 at 4:55 pm
At the root of this ‘electrosensitive firefighters’ idea seems to be spin put on several confirmed reports of firemen getting serious RF burns coming into contact with radiating antennas and live feedlines while putting out fires on a roof. Yes some were deeply burned to the point where they were hospitalized, and efforts were made to provide in-service training to make everyone aware of the potential for injury in these situations, but keep in mind these were very high field-strength radiators that were involved.
It look to me like the frauds have been spinning this out as proof of their idiotic notions.
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February 1st, 2010 at 1:39 am
Steve, I just want to know how do you know so much? I mean, from talking to you I think you’re brilliant, but I don’t quite get how you can be so knowledgeable, especially for how young you are, about these kind of issues.
What I mean especially is your note above about sources of scientific information. I think you are right, of course, that attention seeking individuals are not a good sign and I know you know a lot about peer review and science in the media and how facts get twisted. How are you so familiar with these things? From the way you talk about it, it seems like you’re an insider or an expert in science reporting.
Just how do you know so much?
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February 1st, 2010 at 12:49 pm
You make me blush.
Yeah, I read a lot but I’ve been heavily involved in empirical skepticism and bad science stuff for years and picked stuff up along the way. A lot of it is the same stuff old reused and the same kind of things come up over and over.
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February 11th, 2010 at 5:38 am
I suffer from it. I didn’t expect to and it’s very inconvenient so I have nothing invested in it. My symptoms come on five minutes or so after the wifi transmitter has been switched on and begin to fade about ten minutes afterwards. Joint pain, nausea, headache, tingling sensation in my face. It’s no more psychosomatic than being hit over the head with a blunt instrument. I now have a very long ethernet cable instead.
It’s not good business to research this scientifically – the big money’s with the telecommunications industry, not with the so called quacks and weirdos, which is one possible reason why one has to rely on anecdotal evidence – same with herbal medicine. Anecdotal evidence isn’t necessarily bad you know. It’s people saying how they feel, what they experience. You can always dismiss if you’re so inclined, but it’s a bit narrow minded, and you miss out on most knowledge. Scientific research isn’t the only way to know things, and doesn’t always get it right anyway.
We’re really very ignorant about the workings of the brain and body and the way that knowledge advances is through curiosity, an open minded attitude, a willingness to consider new ideas.
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February 11th, 2010 at 6:19 am
SJ said:
‘We’, are not SJ, but you are. I am willing to bet you any sum of money you are willing to wager that you cannot consistently pass a double-blind test in a shielded room, to detect a wifi signal, at common field strengths.
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February 11th, 2010 at 12:39 pm
SJ said:
Oh, you’ve got to be kidding me. There are few subjects like trumped up claims of RF field dangers to attract grant money and get attention for researchers. Not to even mention the potential litigation money it could mean.
SJ said:
No, anecdotal evidence is very bad! It’s misleading, it’s completely unreliable. It’s not even evidence.
The rise of modern medicine is entirely based on learning that anecdotal evidence is worthless. The birth of science based medicine occurred when we finally began to realize how worthless it is. The cornerstone of both science and medicine is the understanding that evidence needs to be of an empirical nature, with observations that remove human bias.
SJ said:
It is if you care about actually getting the facts and being accurate. To say science “doesn’t always get it right” is to completely misunderstand what science is. Science is not a collection of knowledge or a single test or experimental result. Science is a methodology, a way of making and interpenetrating data and a means of making sense of the world.
SJ said:
There is much we do not know or understand about how the brain and body work. Yet there is much we do understand. Saying that we don’t know everything is much different than saying we don’t know anything. We are learning more all the time. However, we don’t learn more or advance knowledge through anecdotal evidence or claims made by one person of their own experiences.
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