Become a MacRumors Supporter for $50/year with no ads, ability to filter front page stories, and private forums.
It will be interesting what links the long term studies of cell phone exposure and brain tumours such as acoustic schwannomas. Something to look forward to!
 
You know guys, I wasn't expecting such a low display of arguments here...I mean sure enough you can do better than that...jesus...there are so many threads people can be half wits in, it doesn't have to be in mine.

The fact of the matter is that apple should make a device we all love to use SAFER, and since this device doubles up as an ipod and is used so regularly all the time and comes so close to our internal organs all the time, it's all the more pertinent that they make it the SAFEST. This is some very real reasearch I am linking here of some tremendously dangerous results. It's not paranoia, it's not as some dimwits said microwaves and black holes....There's no research implicating microwave ovens having such horrible consequences to the human body, none at all, yet there is ample about cell phones.

Build a lead box just big enough to live inside that box to protect yourself from all of the harmful radiation that is pounding your body 24 hours a day. You don't want to know how much radiation your body is being exposed just from the Sun by itself.

EDIT: Also, buy a biohazard suit so that you don't get lead poisoning from the lead box.

Clever, clever, clever. Now how do you want me to respond to that?

You know, you waste more time of your life worrying about issues like these than it would if you died early from it.

I am worrying now, I am not a neurotic gad worrier, I am worrying until I figure out how to sort things out.

I'm going to have to ask you not to procreate. Not yet at least. I mean, at least you can keep your phone right? ;)

But seriously, same argument different phone. I wouldn't worry about it, we're all dying.

Ok, jess, but let's not put ourselves in too much of harms way.

like it or not....you'll die anyway...one day.
:rolleyes:

Yeah, ok, great...

And microwaves, home phones, computers, Wi-Fi routers, all manners of Bluetooth, x-ray, CAT, MRI, and PET scan machines, pulsars, quasars, black holes, over two thirds of the electromagnetic spectrum, cosmic background radiation, and the Sun.

That's a bunch of half witted crap and you know it, or maybe not. Each radiation source carries different dangers, the research points to the very clear and distinct FACT that cell phones with high SAR ratings have horrible, horrible consequences on our bodies...and you come here trying to be a wise as s about black holes...I wonder where you get the gal...

Pretty much summed it up.

Make sure you put that SPF 100 on your kids you want to have. Wouldn't want them to catch some rays from the crappy star we call the Sun.

Hah,ahahahahaha, hahahahahah...are you laughing? har, har, har, har....

Or, take advantage of the Inverse-Square Law and put a little distance between your phone and your overly-worried body.

Yeah I am aware of that, I am a computer scientist, so far that's my main line of defence, speaker phone and the afforementioned law, thanks for the head up though to anyone who might not know.

OP, you're fear is adorable. Have fun with your next styrofoam cell phone, I'll have fun with my borked baby juice and my fancy pants phone.

A, ok!
 
That's a bunch of half witted crap and you know it, or maybe not. Each radiation source carries different dangers, the research points to the very clear and distinct FACT that cell phones with high SAR ratings have horrible, horrible consequences on our bodies...and you come here trying to be a wise as s about black holes...I wonder where you get the gal...

I get the gall, with two L's, from my research in the field of astrophysics.
 
I get the gall, with two L's, from my research in the field of astrophysics.

First of all the "typos" aka "spelling" line of argumentation is by far the most ludicrous in these forums, but it's not unlike your previous "arguments". So your esteemed research in astrophysics has lead you to have absolutely no comparative sense of judgment wrt probabilities of biological harm due to a comet, a black hole or a cell phone? Fantastic. Then there's no reason why international authorities have capped the SAR rating at 2.0 say as is in europe, or that they came up with SAR in the first place. As long as those black holes keep radiating go get yourself a 10.0 SAR mobile phone and keep it next to your pants when asleep and close to your head when awake. That's just brilliant reasoning, brilliant....why do I bother replying to such crap...

@bobfitz

hey buddy, at long last some upward spiking showing up in the iq curve here.
 
This thread isn't heading in a very congenial direction.

Unfortunately because I really meant it as some constructive criticism...I tried to pre-empt all these replies in my original post but to no avail...that said I didn't expect I d get so many of them...
 
A little Googling seems to suggest the findings are in question and have not been peer-reviewed, yet. While I don't doubt one should take reasonable precautions to keep safe, I think this is of dubious concern. Here is an article suggesting debate on the subject: Link

It is far from a slam-dunk case of "high-SAR = cancer" and other health problems. Also, if cell phone use increases my odds of a tumor by 10x, but my odds started off at ~0.01%, I'm still looking at pretty good odds for not getting a malignant brain tumor. Also, other factors likely weigh far more heavily on one's risk, such as family history, workplace factors, lifestyle, etc. There certainly are other factors that are proven to raise the risk to significant levels.
 
You know guys, I wasn't expecting such a low display of arguments here...I mean sure enough you can do better than that...jesus...there are so many threads people can be half wits in, it doesn't have to be in mine.

Sadly, its fairly predictable after a few posts where a thread like this tends to go. One or two replies set the tone, and then a kind of mob mentality sets in where several posters feel the need to publicly state the exact same opinion with the same cliches(like "tinfoil hat" comments) without a thoughtful response.

As far as you original concern, cell phones do emit radiation which may or may not be harmful--its not really agreed upon. One thing that I personally believe is that the cumulative effect of exposure to a variety of technology(including cell phones) probably contributes to cancer rates. You'd have to give up all kinds of electronic devices and proximity to things like power lines and X-ray machines to reduce your risk and for me its just not worth it.

So I wouldn't worry about it. Unless you want to remove yourself from the modern world entirely(a tempting option at times) there's no getting past environmental toxins.
 
The line of arguments akin to ""Larger studies are needed to sort out chance and bias" are the typical industry retorts to any findings in cell phones. (btw I wouldn't trust cnn with a news report not after the frauds they've come up with time and again and the big $ behind them, probably one of the dirties networks ever but that's another story) But let's be brutally honest here? How can you do large scale epidimiological studies unless you have a decent track record, hence they are only starting to show up right now and the ones which I linked too, most of them, the 10 year ones, ARE peer reviewed. Secondly, who's gonna fund them? These guys have mobile operators as their life support to escape a meagre university wage and you won't see the cell cos funding any negative research any time soon.

It's not slum dunk at all, but the evidence is gathering up and it's too much to ignore at the moment. And as you said we are talking about factors, and quite literally factors well they factor in so they all play a cummulative role, I wouldn't want to be adding such a high risk factor to mine. Not so when the phone CAN be made SAFER as other phone manufacturers can, why does the N series have phones similar to the iphone but yet with such low SAR ratings? It's very irresponsible from apple's part to have their flagship product with such a a high radiation absorption, they should remedy this fast. They shouldn't be trying to hide it and be hush hush about it, they should make a top notch product safety wise and flaunt it as such, as they do with their environmentaly conscious policies (after they got criticized ad nauseaum of course). That's what am saying.

I dont want to abandon my phone, but I might have, I am going at least to think a lot for taking it with me to the gym and out running and having it in next to my abdomen while getting iradiated there as well as via the headphones in my brain just to listen to a couple of tunes.
 
As simple as that. Let me first pre-empt anyone coming here and accusing me of anti-apple-ness or trying to incite a flame war: I am IN LOVE with my iphone, it's the best thing to have happened to me technologically since a very long time ago, but I just checked out it's sar rating being at a whooping 1.38 almost one and a half time the original iphone's sar. When you can get phones with as low sar as 0.15!!!! And just check a couple of very reliable news sources out:

http://www.independent.co.uk/life-s...us-than-smoking-or-asbestos-802602.html?r=RSS

http://menshealth.digitaltoday.in/menshealth/storyprint.jsp?contentid=1545&sid=5&cid=15

I mean we are talking here about quadrupling our chances of all sorts of cancers and tumors and destroying the quality of our semen. Is it really worth it? And imagine the radiation I am getting because this thing doubles up as an ipod which I use all the time, and which I keep always pretty close (when jogging say) to my internal organs...great, great stuf...

APPLE NEXT TIME YOU MAKE THE GREATEST PHONE KNOWN TO MAN TRY MAKING IT SAFE FOR US TO USE TO, BECAUSE YOU CAN'T HAVE US AS A CUSTOMER IF WE ARE IN INTENSIVE CARE WITH BRAIN TUMORS, AND YOU CAN'T HAVE OUR KIDS AS CUSTOMERS IF WE CAN'T HAVE ANY.

Right now I am seriously thinking of getting at least an ipod touch to substitute my iphone in ipod uses, but I am so dismayed at this whole situation that I might as well just chuck it out of the window and get an lg chocolate that will have 1/10 the radiation. :eek:
Sorry OP but you fell into their statistics trap. People publish these studies for one reason: publicity, to make a name for themselves. You don't seem people writing about carrots are healthly. Why? Because no one would read it or care. They go for the hot button topic.
 
The line of arguments akin to ""Larger studies are needed to sort out chance and bias" are the typical industry retorts to any findings in cell phones. (btw I wouldn't trust cnn with a news report not after the frauds they've come up with time and again and the big $ behind them, probably one of the dirties networks ever but that's another story) But let's be brutally honest here? How can you do large scale epidimiological studies unless you have a decent track record, hence they are only starting to show up right now and the ones which I linked too, most of them, the 10 year ones, ARE peer reviewed. Secondly, who's gonna fund them? These guys have mobile operators as their life support to escape a meagre university wage and you won't see the cell cos funding any negative research any time soon.

It's not slum dunk at all, but the evidence is gathering up and it's too much to ignore at the moment. And as you said we are talking about factors, and quite literally factors well they factor in so they all play a cummulative role, I wouldn't want to be adding such a high risk factor to mine. Not so when the phone CAN be made SAFER as other phone manufacturers can, why does the N series have phones similar to the iphone but yet with such low SAR ratings? It's very irresponsible from apple's part to have their flagship product with such a a high radiation absorption, they should remedy this fast. They shouldn't be trying to hide it and be hush hush about it, they should make a top notch product safety wise and flaunt it as such, as they do with their environmentaly conscious policies (after they got criticized ad nauseaum of course). That's what am saying.

I dont want to abandon my phone, but I might have, I am going at least to think a lot for taking it with me to the gym and out running and having it in next to my abdomen while getting iradiated there as well as via the headphones in my brain just to listen to a couple of tunes.

I agree with you with regard to CNN's credibility as a news organization, but I don't necessarily regard "Men's Health" magazine as a scientific journal, either. Also, my Googling found several links to disputes about whether or not the SAR is a meaningful measure of risk. Nonetheless, everyone is free to do what they want with the information provided and it's likely Apple (and other manufacturers) would adopt new safety measures should it be proven that such measures are necessary. The market would certainly demand it.
 
Sadly, its fairly predictable after a few posts where a thread like this tends to go. One or two replies set the tone, and then a kind of mob mentality sets in where several posters feel the need to publicly state the exact same opinion with the same cliches(like "tinfoil hat" comments) without a thoughtful response.

As far as you original concern, cell phones do emit radiation which may or may not be harmful--its not really agreed upon. One thing that I personally believe is that the cumulative effect of exposure to a variety of technology(including cell phones) probably contributes to cancer rates. You'd have to give up all kinds of electronic devices and proximity to things like power lines and X-ray machines to reduce your risk and for me its just not worth it.

So I wouldn't worry about it. Unless you want to remove yourself from the modern world entirely(a tempting option at times) there's no getting past environmental toxins.


Thanks for the great reply buddy, less is more in terms of modern health risks and that's the approach I d like to keep, for example I am going with the wi fi at home but if I can afford it I ll buy organic and I am certainly chucking my iphone away when I go jogging, go to dust out that 169 gb classic lol.


http://ec.europa.eu/health/opinions2/en/electromagnetic-fields/l-3/5-conclusions-mobile-phones.htm

For those who don't want to read it, this article states that, after testing, the much-lauded EU found that cell phones don't increase the likelihood of cancers, tumors, or anything stated in the first post.

No again you are wrong:

"However, data on long term exposure and intracranial tumours are still sparse and in particular for acoustic neuroma some data indicate that an association with RF fields from mobile telephony is possible. "

"Animal cancer studies have not provided evidence that RF radiation could induce cancer, enhance the effects of known carcinogens, or accelerate the development of transplanted tumours. The open questions include adequacy of the experimental models used and scarcity of data at high exposure levels. These questions are addressed by the still ongoing and planned carcinogenicity studies. "
i.e. the jury is still out, and because even animals haven't been exposed long enough for us to know the risk on them, humans are instead our current guinea pigs.

and lastly (amongst other things) this is a very important point:

"The technical development is very fast and sources of RF exposure become increasingly common. Yet, there is a profound lack of mechanistic understanding of effects below the guidelines and of information on individual RF exposure and the relative contribution of different sources to the overall exposure. "


ALSO LETS NOT FORGET, under what clout and what leverage of financial power these reports are being conducted with the cell companies comanding even more power than the once powerfull tobaco cos. Under such conditions we 've seen time and again what cover ups happen.
 
I agree with you with regard to CNN's credibility as a news organization, but I don't necessarily regard "Men's Health" magazine as a scientific journal, either. Also, my Googling found several links to disputes about whether or not the SAR is a meaningful measure of risk. Nonetheless, everyone is free to do what they want with the information provided and it's likely Apple (and other manufacturers) would adopt new safety measures should it be proven that such measures are necessary. The market would certainly demand it.

Granted about Men's health. I still have open questions about SAR ratings as well, but they are something to go by rather than (as was the case some years ago) nothing. That said I too have read that there's a lot of debate as to what the actual, or the effective SAR, so to speak is, other than what the manufacturer provides, because these are (or are supposed to be) maximum values.

That said, to me it's important that as apple fans and/or apple consumers we draw attention to the safety of their products as much as some people draw attention to say their environmental practises. And to me to increase your SAR by one and a half times over your previous gen model is really a dismal indication of how much apple cares about mobile phone safety at the moment.
 
That said, to me it's important that as apple fans and/or apple consumers we draw attention to the safety of their products .....

I'm sorry Jack but this is pure scare-mongering crap by "experts" who want to make some publicity for themselves by scaring gullible people.

Right now the UK has the start of a measles epidemic after years without because a charlatan "expert" scared people off having the MMR vaccine through just this kind of garbage. Lots of screaming about "industry cover ups" through all that scare too.

There's a book I'd commend to you called "Bad Science". Your references and your arguments and conclusions would make another chapter for it. www.amazon.co.uk/Bad-Science-Ben-Goldacre/dp/0007240198 As Amazon says "It is an important book and if you were to pick up just one non-fiction book this year you'd do well to make it this one."

When you've read it you might feel better. Meantime chuck away your phone as that will make you feel better for now.
 
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
Even if my iPhone kills me I dont care.... We will all die one day and according to modern research everything is gonna kill us (WiFi, phones, kittens...) so if we are gonna die anyway then we might as well own a lot of cool gadgets before we do :D
 
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
I guess it's small consolation, but according to Einstein's theories, these waves are either harmful to us or they aren't. Even if everyone moved back to wired tech, there would still be harmful waves coming off the wires.

Realistically, though, even eating a banana increases your exposure to radioactivity. Will I stop eating bananas? No. I'd rather have my bananas and die 2-3 minutes earlier than I would have. Morbid, maybe, tasty, definitely.

For what it's worth I agree with Tallest Skil. We absorb UV regularly from the sun (which we know is harmful) not to mention those black holes, and those dang solar flares and the like.

My point, long story short, is that a lot of things are constantly working to kill us. It's why we die. It's why we have medicine. And with everything taken into account, all this radiation, we're still living longer lives than our ancestors. Imagine that.
 
I haven't encountered this yet, but in general I use the earbuds whenever possible. I'm not too hung up about radiation, but I think it's better to err on the side of caution and minimize exposure.

This doesn't prevent the network signals for calls or data from being radiated outward (when transmitting) or the incoming signals from the millions of wireless signals being transmitted every second.
 
Iphone emits dangerous rays....

Its been 5 months i have been experiencing sever headaches and ear aches when i talk over the iphone,earlier i was able to talk for 5 minutes and did not experience much pain and dizziness ,but now,the condition is such i keep my phone away from my ears and ask the person to call on land line... I am absolutely fine with home phone but this one ,its wierd ,also i never had problems with other cell phones either.

Now i am scared to attend my calls and its been since last night 8.00 pm untill12.45 pm next day ,i am feeling dizzy and feel the pulsating pain..some thing is wrong with ipone radiation....seriously





I'm new here to the forum and I enjoyed the discussion, this topic is only going to grow over the next few years.

I'm a medical student and have taken an interest in this topic- there is peer reviewed research that shows changes in brain electrical activity (in animals) with normal cell phone radiation, some studies have also shown increases in chemicals that cause apoptosis (cell death) in neurons. (again, not in humans). Either way, it probably does something in the human brain, bad stuff, we don't know for sure yet. Cancer is whole topic on it's own. I personally, am playing it a little safe and am using the headphones on my 3G to talk. I am assuming (this seems to make sense although I cant prove it) that the radiation is exponentially higher from a closely placed phone than from other background man made radiation. So it probably does help at least somewhat to use the headphones. In that same line of thought, the intensity is exponentially less at just a couple feet away.

With that out of the way, that brings me to a question that only you guys can answer. I had read that the 3G has an antenna built into the headphone jack, does this mean that the headphones themselves can somehow act as an extended antenna, specifically, transmitting signals. If so, it would be completely useless to use the headphones to avoid a lot of the radiation.
 
I'm sorry Jack but this is pure scare-mongering crap by "experts" who want to make some publicity for themselves by scaring gullible people.

Right now the UK has the start of a measles epidemic after years without because a charlatan "expert" scared people off having the MMR vaccine through just this kind of garbage. Lots of screaming about "industry cover ups" through all that scare too.

There's a book I'd commend to you called "Bad Science". Your references and your arguments and conclusions would make another chapter for it. www.amazon.co.uk/Bad-Science-Ben-Goldacre/dp/0007240198 As Amazon says "It is an important book and if you were to pick up just one non-fiction book this year you'd do well to make it this one."

When you've read it you might feel better. Meantime chuck away your phone as that will make you feel better for now.


You are obviously replying to someone in your head because I didn't come here "screaming" but quoted reputable sources, peer review researches, academics performing studies and all that will rationality and argumentation. Save me the bad-science sceptic lecture and book because I am a scientist for a living and I read probably 50 times over what you do. On the contrary the other camp here gave me most of the time the most ludicrous unscientific responses I have ever gotten, "the sun emits uv anyways", "everything carries electricity", "stay inside a shed because life will kill you " blah, blah.

It's a known fact of certain dangers that cell phone emmisions have, what is debated is the extent. IF THERE WEREN'T ANY DANGERS AS YOUR GENIUS "SCIENTIFIC" LOGIC WOULD HAVE IT THEN WHY DID EVERYWHERE AROUND THE WORLD, THE US, THE EU, HAS ESTABLISHED A SAR, FOR MAXIMUM LEVELS OF RADIATION, WOULDN'T IN YOUR WISDOM HAVE JUST SAID OK BOYS NO SAR NO NOTHING ELECTROMAGNETIC RADIATION IF HARMLESS RADIATE AWAY WITH YOUR PHONES AND IMPOSE NO LIMITS....Exactly.
 
As an Amazon Associate, MacRumors earns a commission from qualifying purchases made through links in this post.
Its been 5 months i have been experiencing sever headaches and ear aches when i talk over the iphone,earlier i was able to talk for 5 minutes and did not experience much pain and dizziness ,but now,the condition is such i keep my phone away from my ears and ask the person to call on land line... I am absolutely fine with home phone but this one ,its wierd ,also i never had problems with other cell phones either.

Now i am scared to attend my calls and its been since last night 8.00 pm untill12.45 pm next day ,i am feeling dizzy and feel the pulsating pain..some thing is wrong with ipone radiation....seriously

You are doing a wise thing avoiding it, may I suggest you use a bluetooth headset (with it's on radiowave frequencies but much lower than iphone's) if you have to use your phone. I have a lot of friends who complain of similar symptoms, especially those that live in areas with not so good 3g signal, there the iphone has to increase wattage to get a better signal/noise ration and hence can be more harmful.
 
You are doing a wise thing avoiding it, may I suggest you use a bluetooth headset (with it's on radiowave frequencies but much lower than iphone's) if you have to use your phone. I have a lot of friends who complain of similar symptoms, especially those that live in areas with not so good 3g signal, there the iphone has to increase wattage to get a better signal/noise ration and hence can be more harmful.

Why would you ever suggest a bluetooth headset? You're just introducing more radiation to the equation; The Bluetooth device is much closer to your brain than the cell phone will be (assuming you don't press it hard against your head). I would suggest using wired speakers (like those apple earbuds), or the speaker phone option.

Anyways, the risk of cancer due to radiation isn't nearly as bad for the brain, because it contains none to little stem cells. Cells aren't at great risk for DNA damage unless they're dividing, because the DNA is more packed. This is why part of cancer treatment involves radiation therapy; the rapidly dividing cancer cells are much more susceptible than surrounding tissues.

My advice to all: We live in a constant flood of radiation, from natural and man-made sources. Cutting down on your own cell phone usage is really the best you can do short of living in a Faraday cage.

Mods, please lock this thread.
 
Register on MacRumors! This sidebar will go away, and you'll see fewer ads.