[TowerTalk] RF Fields

[Rajiv Dewan, N2RD]

Tom wrote:

> RF is non-ionizing radiation. It either creates damage from heat, or
> it doesn't do anything. It does not cause accumulated harmful
> effects over time like ionizing radiation.
> ...
> The people I worked with had been evaluating the biological effects
> of EM fields for well over 20 years. Much of the early equipment
> that I re-designed was tube-type gear! One would think hundreds of
> researchers looking hard at one problem for well over 20 years day
> after day would have found some small correlation between
> cancers and non-ionizing radiation.
>

Indeed, a lot of experimentation has been done.  All that I have read
supports Tom.
Experimentors have tried to find effects by stacking the decks for finding
such effects - to no avail. For instance, they placed rapidly dividing
cells (mouse embryos and others) in high strength fields to no effect.  They
have conducted epidemiological tests to find nothing statistically
significant.
Tests that have shown negative effect to non-ionizing radiation have not
stood
up to close examination.  For instance, the link between powerline radiation
and abnormal incidence of cancers in Swedish school children was based
on falsified and fraudulent statistical tests.  Another instance - the oft
quoted study
of CA silent keys has a lot of confounding factors (employment).

But then again, this is science and not religion (I hope).
Science has a curious way of evolving - through refutation (proving false).
Progress in science is littered with theories that had been taken to be true
and
later shown to be false.   Who knows what we may find out about effects of
non-ionizing radiation?

Even more crucially, we have difficulties applying the
little science that there is.  Simplifications, like the ones in FCC
Technical
Report 65 part B (Ham radio rf safety) depend on a lot of assumptions.
What if these do not hold?  For example, the tables assume that the
radiation is whole body.
What if a part is exposed more?   Resonant eye sockets? Resonant cranial
cavity?
A kid who is exactly 1/2 wavelength at 6m?

So what are we to do?  So what is an intelligent response?

For starters - Not using more power than is necessary for communication is a
good response and required of us by Part 97.

Regards,
Rajiv, N2RD




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