Hacker News new | ask | show | jobs
by giantg2 1544 days ago
Are you saying that we understand the biological effects and their mechanisms for non-ionizing radiation exposure, or that we should be careful because we don't know all of them (specifically mechanisms)?
2 comments

In fact we don't understand their effects. And, we don't even understand what is important about details of the exposure. About all we do know is that modulation is critically important, and that certain modulations under certain conditions of very low power transfer have profound effects.

Ask literally any biologist whether you should expect to be able to calculate the effects on an organism of some stimulus using only physical formulas.

> About all we do know is that modulation is critically important, and that certain modulations under certain conditions of very low power transfer have profound effects.

Citation needed.

Seriously, the burden of proof is on you for such a statement.

And be precise, which modulations, which conditions, what effects.

"Certain" and "profound" are filler words in this situation. They mean nothing.

You may find this interesting on the topic of importance of modulation, polarization etc.: https://www.spandidos-publications.com/ijo/59/5/92
It seems to me your contradicting the original posters comment. Or am I reading that wrong?
I don't know who I might be contradicting.

We know pretty precisely how much of a microwave radiation exposure will be absorbed in various kinds of living tissue. We know that the mechanism of absorption is via induced nanoampere currents. We know with certaintly that those nanoampere currents will all end up, finally, as heat.

We don't know all of the effects of the nanoampere currents produced by that absorption, otherwise. We do know that induced nanoampere currents can, under certain circumstances, have profound biological effects.

super late response, but I'm saying we understand. EM radiation from your router is just way too low energy to enact any changes in the atoms making up the molecules in you for even chemical let alone biological effects to start playing a role.

the only thing they can do is transfer some heat energy to you, orders of magnitude lower than your average light bulb in the office (certainly entirely incomparable to sunlight).