If you discovered a mechanism by which it was possible for a cell phone to cause cancer, you'd win a Nobel Prize in physics.<p>Not "you discovered that they did, in fact, cause cancer"; just discovering a way that it is physically possible for them to do so.<p>This dates back to Einstein's explanation of the photoelectric effect: it's easy to show (and the only thing consistent with all of 20th century physics!) that light can only cause molecular damage if individual photons carry enough energy, which in turn only happens if the radiation is of sufficiently high frequency (like UV light, X-Rays, or gamma radiation.) Any radio signal from a cell phone isn't. End of discussion.<p>Unless you are being actually cooked by a microwave, your cell phone does not and cannot cause cancer.<p>"Radiation" is a scary word for non experts, but the California Health Department should know better.
I was hoping this article published new findings from a medical study, or at least some evidence. Nope. I think their lawyers are just freaking out preemptively just in case anyone finds an effect and a cause.
“The cellphone manufacturers want you to keep a minimum distance away from your body and you should find out what that distance is,”<p>Couldn't be more vague, what a useless recommendation.
Joel Moskowitz is a psychology professor.<p>NIH has a whole page dedicated to this <a href="https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/radiation/cell-phones-fact-sheet" rel="nofollow">https://www.cancer.gov/about-cancer/causes-prevention/risk/r...</a>
What about wifi-only mode? Is Bluetooth fine? Those'd also affect tablets, laptops, and maybe eink readers, among other things. Gaming handhelds.<p>Been kicking around going wifi-only anyway, with a crappy burner on a prepaid plan in the car for emergencies.
Okay, so we've had maybe a good ten or fifteen years or so of a significant portion of the American population carrying cell phones very close to their bodies for several hours a day. If this were a significant cause of cancer, wouldn't we have more concrete evidence of it by this point? If not now, then when?
Will they also recommend to opt out of millimeter wave scanners? If we're going to talk about risks of one type of nonionizing radiation, why not that one too?
When people try to convince me my cellphone is giving me cancer, I ask them to prove to me that using a cellphone for fifteen minutes is worse than going outside in the sun for fifteen minutes (sunlight is objectively more likely to give you cancer).<p>Cellphones communicate via microwaves, which is just electromagnetic radiation (EMR) of a lower-energy (per photon) wavelength than visible light. Yes, the UV component of sunlight can give you cancer because it's just barely high enough energy to be ionizing. Visible light won't do that, and microwaves are safer still.<p>Oh, thermal burns can cause cancer too you say, and we use microwave ovens to cook things! Yes. My phone has never cooked me though. A 3.7V, 3700mAh cell phone battery contains about 10 Wh of energy. A typical microwave oven uses around 1000W, so it would drain a cell-phone battery completely in around 36 seconds. Try putting a kilogram of something that's mostly water in a microwave oven for just 36 seconds. It's barely going to warm up. I wouldn't be worried about my cellphone cooking me even if it lasted just 36 seconds on a charge, but mine lasts for many <i>hours</i>.<p>Can I prove that your phone isn't giving you cancer? No. That's not how science works. I can't prove the theories of gravity or relativity either. When I admit this, some people pounce on that as if this lack of proof is something that <i>must</i> be acted upon. Well, I can't prove a meteor won't crash through your roof and kill you tonight, or that a mega-eruption won't end civilization tomorrow, or that a parasite from some half-cooked beef you ate last week won't spontaneously mutate into a chest-burster like in "Alien". What are you going to do about those smart guy?
Is this the same department that requires the carcinogen label on every product under the sun? I'm probably being pithy, but that alone pushes me to ignore their recommendations. Never mind the dodgy physics...
Has anyone here looked at these studies? In what way are cell phones supposed to be dangerous? Do the studies say that they raised mice with smart phones in their cage and they got cancer or something?
So does non-ionizing radiation cause health issues or not? I get called a conspiracy nut for worrying about ELF radiation even though there are studies showing some correlation with health issues.
reminds me of <a href="http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/28/cancer-warning-labels-on-products-a-cause-for-concern/comment-page-1/" rel="nofollow">http://thechart.blogs.cnn.com/2008/10/28/cancer-warning-labe...</a><p>i purchased an OBDII reader and it had a "this cable contains PVC and may cause cancer" warning label on it. i thought wtf? after some research the cause was clear: California.