An educated City Council voted unanimously

[phooph]

What happened to the Sonic hotspots in Santa Rosa is that Sonic downgraded the signal to all of them and made them weaker which is why my friend who lives less than a block from a Sonic hotspot gets a stronger signal from the library two blocks away.

Ruth

[Sciguy]

Folks:
Today Layna Berman on KPFA quoted a report by Andrew Goldsworthy of Imperial College supporting the possible effect of EMF on bodies, nerves and brains. The paper is available here: https://www.hese-project.org/hese-uk...weak_em_07.pdf

I took a look at it and it seems like a genuine scientific paper. It provides no conclusions but it does attempt to provide a somewhat plausible mechanism for the mechanism by which EMF could affect bodies, thru an effect on calcium ions.

I thought it suffered from a lack of quantitative data on the binding energy of calcium ions in membranes to compare to the energy that a weak EMF could apply to a lone calcium ion. But I guess that could come later. So it seems to me that the postulated mechanism has a gigantic hole in it, with the potential for rendering it moot, but I don't see anything silly or biased about it, unlike some of the other "reports" I have read about the effects of wireless on people quoted by Sasu and the other opponents of wireless. I reviewed one of those in a previous post.

Paul

To elaborate on this point, I strongly believe that knowingly using flawed evidence to make a point, as Sasu has done in her debates, is a tactic which is deeply destructive of community.

(I am not saying all of her evidence is flawed. I personally think most of it probably is flawed, but I have been working to be very careful to only address those points where she has made glaringly false factual assertions).

I believe that not correcting your errors, when they have been pointed out to you, reflects a willfulness. We all make mistakes in our discussions. To not acknowledge our factual errors is the same is to tell a deliberate lie.

To repeat those false statements is of course a deliberate, and I believe malicious, lie.

I consider using lies to further your own ends to be a deeply immoral action which is also destructive of community and humanity.

I think that deliberately mixing the sources of factual information, as the BioInitiative Report does, in order to sow confusion, is deeply troubling, but that gets into complicated questions like 'how much is too much?' And so in spite of being deeply bothered by the language of the BioInitiative Report I am unprepared to go there yet.

[Braggi]

Dane,

Can you prove your wireless networks are safe?
"More research is needed" is not proof.
...

Sandi, can you prove driving a car is safe to others in the community? I believe I can prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you driving a car is potentially dangerous to me. Therefore, I would appreciate it if you voluntarily turned in your license and never drove again.

Perhaps everyone else will do that too, and then I will feel more safe.

-Jeff

[PeriodThree]

Jeff,

I am with you. The requirement that something be proven safe is a basically impossible requirement. But then, I personally believe that the point of the anti-technology movement has little to do with safety, and everything to do with a deep anti-technology world view.

I wish that people like Sasu would simply and honestly own that they are against basically all of modern life.

I can't particularly condemn that world view from first principles. One's spiritual development doesn't seem to correlate with use of technology, and a case can certainly be made for the existential glory of subsistence living, but at a personal level I have a deep and fundamentally different world view.

Rich

Sandi, can you prove driving a car is safe to others in the community? I believe I can prove, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that you driving a car is potentially dangerous to me. Therefore, I would appreciate it if you voluntarily turned in your license and never drove again.

Perhaps everyone else will do that too, and then I will feel more safe.

-Jeff

[Zeno Swijtink]

Jeff,

I am with you. The requirement that something be proven safe is a basically impossible requirement. But then, I personally believe that the point of the anti-technology movement has little to do with safety, and everything to do with a deep anti-technology world view.

I wish that people like Sasu would simply and honestly own that they are against basically all of modern life.

I can't particularly condemn that world view from first principles. One's spiritual development doesn't seem to correlate with use of technology, and a case can certainly be made for the existential glory of subsistence living, but at a personal level I have a deep and fundamentally different world view.

Rich

If it were that simple. The evidence about electromagnetic effects on living creatures is still being gathered by serious scientists.

[Braggi]

..I wish that people like Sasu would simply and honestly own that they are against basically all of modern life.
...

I don't think Sasu is against modernity. I think she'd like her modernity in controlled doses, preferably under her control. Although understandable, such a view is completely impractical if not impossible given the realities of today. She could live in a lead bomb shelter, but it wouldn't be much fun.

We all need to observe, if we can, the risk benefit ratio of our modern conveniences. Some, are only for the direct benefit of others, not me. Women's rest rooms, for instance. But it's not my place to make those rest rooms unavailable to others. Even if they're not for me, the cost benefit ratio, to me, given the convenience for my wife and daughter, reaches the point where I'm even willing to help finance the building of those rest rooms, just as I would be willing to pay a few bucks toward the establishment of the Sebastopol wifi, even though I don't live in Sebastopol. I just think it's too cool.

Maybe we should take up a collection. Now that would be a poll. Vote with your dollars.

-Jeff

[Braggi]

Of course, Zeno, and it will ever be thus. However, the example you show here is ludicrous. Those men, while putting themselves at great danger, no doubt, are working with the one substance that has saved more human lives on planet Earth than any other. And Rachael Carson was mostly wrong about it. (The effect on egg shells, for instance.)

-Jeff

If it were that simple. The evidence about electromagnetic effects on living creatures is still being gathered by serious scientists.

[PeriodThree]

If it were that simple. The evidence about electromagnetic effects on living creatures is still being gathered by serious scientists.

I would accept that view, except that so much of what Sasu posted was literally just not true. Some of what she posted was clearly knowing lies, other parts may have come from simple ignorance, but it was the form of malicious ignorance in which she refused to correct statements which were clearly factually wrong.

Basically nothing which Sasu posted was serious science done by serious scientists. It was intellectual crap. There may be real science to be done on the 'electromagnetic effects on living creatures,' but the WiFi opponents have proven themselves to be active enemies of reason.

Knowing your background Zeno I have been confused at your efforts to find reason in what have been the clearly irrational and unreasoned positions of these anti-technologists.

For example, you have accepted without question their requirement that WiFi be proven safe. And yet, we know that this is an impossible task.

Craig Litwin's response to me echoed that fundamentally anti-reason position. He said he voted against wifi because there is 'mistrust of what government does.' Some people had fears, and those fears were more important to Litwin than reason.

Again, there may be real science to be done, but Sasu, and Litwin, and the crazy freaking anti-wifi 'greens' are not part of that science. They are anti-technology as their base position.

Quoting cell phone studies of headsets emitting .2-.6 watts at effectively zero distance as evidence of the risks of WiFi emitting at most .2 watts (and a 200 milliwatt Wifi system is atypical, more likely is 0.03 - 0.1 watts) at a distance of 15-20 feet at the closest (for the Access Points which Sonic wanted to put on poles) is deeply and terribly deceptive.

Sasu and her crowd, told bald faced lies in order to evoke the classic FUD (fear, uncertainty, and doubt) effect, and due to our council cowards Craig Litwin and Linda Kelley they won this one.

[PeriodThree]

I don't know if I would go so far in singing the praises of DDT as Jeff does.
There is a lot of sound and fury over the question of DDT, with some apparently reputable sources claiming literally millions of people have died because of the DDT bans.

Malaria causes one to three millions deaths annually in the world. (cancer caused 7.6 million deaths in 2007). DDT has, at various times, been very very effective at malaria containment. OTOH, resistance to DDT has arisen in mosquitoes, greatly decreasing the effectiveness of DDT.

I personally believe that it is possible, albeit not certain, that had DDT use been continued malaria could have been eradicated in much of the world before resistance became the controlling factor.

Of course, Zeno, and it will ever be thus. However, the example you show here is ludicrous. Those men, while putting themselves at great danger, no doubt, are working with the one substance that has saved more human lives on planet Earth than any other. And Rachael Carson was mostly wrong about it. (The effect on egg shells, for instance.)

-Jeff

[danejasper]

The statistic I was looking for has been found. Thanks to Rich for the finding this again, we'd both read it but forgotten where.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wifi#Q...f_health_risks

Excerpt:

Dr Michael Clark, of the Health Protection Agency, says published research on mobile phones and masts does not add up to an indictment of Wi-Fi:

All the expert reviews done here and abroad indicate that there is unlikely to be a health risk from wireless networks. … When we have conducted measurements in schools, typical exposures from Wi-Fi are around 20 millionths of the international guideline levels of exposure to radiation. As a comparison, a child on a mobile phone receives up to 50 percent of guideline levels.

So a year sitting in a classroom near a wireless network is roughly equivalent to 20 minutes on a mobile. If Wi-Fi should be taken out of schools, then the mobile phone network should be shut down, too—and FM radio and TV, as the strength of their signals is similar to that from Wi-Fi in classrooms.^[1]

1. "Wi-fi: should we be worried?", The Times. Retrieved on 2007-09-16.

[danejasper]

BTW, I'll note that the item below is probably something that Sandi and I can actually agree on! Bye-bye Mr. Marconi and Mr. Tesla, it's been useful, but the benefits of radio just might not outweigh the risks, egh?

If Wi-Fi should be taken out of schools, then the mobile phone network should be shut down, too—and FM radio and TV, as the strength of their signals is similar to that from Wi-Fi in classrooms.

-Dane

[shellebelle]

You know this brought my mind to something.

BTW, I'll note that the item below is probably something that Sandi and I can actually agree on! Bye-bye Mr. Marconi and Mr. Tesla, it's been useful, but the benefits of radio just might not outweigh the risks, egh?
-Dane

Radio - TV

"This is a test of the emergency broadcasting system. This is only a test - had this been an actual emergency you would have been instructed where to turn in your area for updated information. Thank you. This has been a test."

Which lead me to VA Tech (RIP)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Virginia_Tech_massacre

Virginia Tech massacre was a school shooting comprising two separate attacks about two hours apart on April 16, 2007, on the Virginia Tech campus in Blacksburg, Virginia, United States. The perpetrator, Seung-Hui Cho, killed 32 people and wounded many more^[2] before committing suicide, making it the deadliest school shooting in U.S. history.^[3]
Student response


Virginia Tech students mourn the victims at a candlelight vigil.


After becoming aware of the incident, students communicated with their family and peers about their conditions, using telephones and social networking services;^[64][65] some bodies were found with cell phones and PDAs still ringing.^[66]

Do you think WiFi potentially gave someone that last chance to say good bye?

Note below some articles about how web, email and text alerts potentially has or will save lives. Now I may be wrong BUT . . . I think a turned off computer or cell phone means no alert received. Is it worth your life, your child's life or your friends life? Not that someone with EMF fears would be any where near a wired campus, hotel, convention center, or any major community event but just a thought.

This is my favorite:

Welcome to Alert DC

The Alert DC system provides rapid text notification and update information during a major crisis or emergency. This system delivers important emergency alerts, notifications and updates on a range of devices including your: e-mail account [work, home, other] cell phone pager, BlackBerry wireless PDA When an incident or emergency occurs, authorized DC Homeland Security & Emergency Management personnel can rapidly notify you using this community alert system. Alert DC is your personal connection to real-time updates, instructions on where to go, what to do, or what not to do, who to contact and other important information. Alert DC is available to citizens of the District of Columbia as well as individuals traveling to or working in the District. Sign up for an account to receive alerts and emergency notifications today. Note: Subscribers may be charged, as set forth in their wireless provider's contract, for messages delivered to their wireless devices.

Thursday, 03 May 2007

E0062 bc-texting(smw) 05-02 0478

Daily Herald

Tacoma campuses trying out text-message emergency alerts Karen Hucks Tacoma News Tribune TACOMA, Wash. -- If Tacoma Community College has an incident on campus anything like Virginia Tech's recent shootings, students could know there's a problem almost instantly. At least, the students who sign up for a new text-messaging program -- called e2Campus -- at the college would know. "The students really use text-messaging," said college spokesman Dan Small. "We could get the word to students in a classroom via text messaging, for instance, that we needed to lock down a building or we've had an incident. They could see it in a classroom, where they wouldn't be answering phones." They're not the only school in the area that's noticed that the best way to get in touch with students might be with text messages. The University of Washington Tacoma will also have a text-messaging emergency alert program in place by the fall, said spokesman Mike Wark. The University of Puget Sound will do the same, said spokeswoman Melissa Rohlfs. After a deranged Virginia Tech student killed 32 people April 16 in the worst shooting in U.S. history, campuses across the country started questioning their own security measures.

February 18, 2008 Would a Text-Message Emergency-Alert System Have Helped at Northern Illinois U.?

The deadly shootings at Northern Illinois University took just a couple of minutes from the time the gunman walked onto a classroom stage and opened fire, killing five and wounding 16 more, and the time he shot and killed himself. Campus police officers were on the scene quickly, and officials posted e-mail and Web alerts within minutes, urging everyone on the campus to steer clear of King Commons and any buildings near where the shootings had taken place.

The campus did not have a system that can send emergency alerts to cellphones, though officials had been considering installing such a system. And an IT official at Northern Illinois told The Chronicle that he is still not sure whether the alert system would have added much to its emergency response. Are the systems worth the cost, or are resources better spent elsewhere? —Jeffrey R. Young"