HAM radio equipment detrimental to mental health?

a reply to: Bedlam

Yes they do.2 metres or 144/145 Mhz is VHF and is used by radio amateurs across the world in very high numbers,last time I was involved with this it was a lot more popular than HF as the equipment was cheaper and the aerials were smaller than a couple of football pitches.Then there's the 70cm band or 430 Mhz which again uses off-the-shelf and non specialist equipment,also surprisingly popular.
But I have to agree that I have never seen any conclusive proof that any type of EM fields or transmissions can cause any sort of personality disorders.Conduct a control experiment as we did in science lessons at school where identical twins grow up separately with one exposed to a strong EM presence and one which isn't and we'll have a more definitive answer.

I watched this film a few months ago, quite interesting:

www.youtube.com...

Deals with the Schumann Resonance and EMF effects on animals (including us) and insects.

originally posted by: Jainine

You know I said 'unnatural' right? What you just stated was natural and not the problem.

EM is EM. There aren't natural and unnatural flavors.

a reply to: Imagewerx

I worked 20 and 40 meters with a longwire.

2 meters wasn't that popular in the 70's and 90's when I was active. Cost a lot and it's line of sight. You can't bounce it.

originally posted by: Bedlam
EM is EM. There aren't natural and unnatural flavors.

You kind of sound like the high fructose corn syrup commercials.

There are natural levels of these things, and then there are man made over the top levels that aren't natural.

Natural sugar consumption would be someone eating a banana. Unnatural sugar consumption would be someone eating a giant grape flavored pixie stix. The sugar in a banana is at a level that we are naturally okay with. The huge amount of processed sugar in a giant pixie stix is not. The banana wont' cause diabetes. Eating an entire giant pixie stix or two at one sitting will make you sick AND could cause sugar overload in your body.

Ditto the electronic fields we are all living in. There are natural electronic fields that our bodies are built for and then there are the massive man made fluctuations that we are swimming in that we aren't built for. We don't know what, if anything, those can be doing to our bodies or our electrical circuits in the brain and/or spirit.

THAT is what I'm talking about.

a reply to: Britguy

So much of that video is just so awfully wrong, if it's the one I'm remembering.

a reply to: Jainine

EM is nothing but electric and magnetic fields. Grant you, the math is pretty stout. But there aren 't special natural versions.

The same EM you get from lightning is what you get from a spark gap transmitter. There really isn't any difference.

Sugar, sadly is pretty much the same thing. Any glucose molecule is the same as any other.

a reply to: Bedlam
Perhaps I'm not explaining myself clearly. I'm not saying it's different electrical waves etc, I'm saying that high levels of anything isn't usually good for a human body. Be it sugar or electricity or cholesterol. Everything in moderation. And the levels of man made electronic crap bouncing around in our world isn't at a natural level and it probably isn't good for us.

I can't explain it any more simply than that.

a reply to: Bedlam

You are technically correct that all if EM spectrum is natural to the universe, however you are missing the human point of view of naturalness.

For example, there is the atmosphere, in which were are literally wrapped up in and it protects us from certain bandwiths of the EM spectrum ...



Such as gamma rays and Xrays from space, which if we didn't have our atmosphere [i.e. ozone layer] the UNATURAL TO US NORMALLY radiation would clearly cook us very quickly. That is of course ignoring the fact that we wouldn't have any air left to breath and would be exposed to a hard vacuum.

originally posted by: Bedlam
a reply to: Imagewerx

I worked 20 and 40 meters with a longwire.

2 meters wasn't that popular in the 70's and 90's when I was active. Cost a lot and it's line of sight. You can't bounce it.

My dad was a radio amateur at about the same time and only had a class B licence,so could only use 2 metres and above and from what I remember it was always busy on 2 metres,even if only through the repeaters.
Oh and no bounce,what about sporadic E?

a reply to: Imagewerx

That's a subject near to my heart. Also tropo ducting. But 2m goes right through the ionosphere.

originally posted by: Bedlam

originally posted by: VoidHawk

originally posted by: Bedlam


Well, that's only because it IS rubbish.

And your evidence is?

Several studies that show people with electromagnetic sensitivity do no better than chance determining if an RF source is on or off?

It depends who's studies we choose to look at! and the type of study!
If I use mobile phones I will suffer blurred vision and dizzyness, but I dont suffer these symptoms until the following day. I'm not making this up, I've posted about it on ats before.
After extensive tests for other possibilities my doctor provided me with a certificte to show my employer so that I didn't have to use their mobile phones, I was lorry driving at the time and blurred vision and dizzyness does not mix well with that job! Had their been any other possible reason my doctor would have taken my hgv license away, but he didn't because he realised it really was the phone that caused the problem.

I could link to many studies carried out by trained proffesionals showing rf does cause some people problems, and I'm sure you could link to studies suggesting it doesn't, and thats the problem we all face these days - who do we beleive?

a reply to: VoidHawk

I don't doubt that the symptoms are real, the difference is that they're psychosomatic. Every blinded, properly controlled study shows that the symptoms disappear when the person thinks the em source is off, even when it's actually on.

originally posted by: GetHyped
a reply to: VoidHawk

I don't doubt that the symptoms are real, the difference is that they're psychosomatic. Every blinded, properly controlled study shows that the symptoms disappear when the person thinks the em source is off, even when it's actually on.

When I first suffered from this I had no idea that it might be the phone!
I'm what my friends describe as a "Secret squirrel", hence I very rarely recieved phone calls. I suffered the blurred vision on and off for about a year, and then one day it was much worse than usual and I sat and thought about everything, that included what I eat and drink etc. Eventualy I realised that the effects always occured the day after a long phone conversation, so I put it to the test and sure enough every time I used a mobile the blurred vision would return the following day. I have tested this so many times!

People often talk about the weak signal from phones, but actualy its not so weak! The reason being that we place the transmitter right up against our head, that means we are absorning 50% of whats being pumped out.

As I said, originally I had no idea this was caused by the phone, so its not psychosomatic! Also I wonder how many of those tests have looked at delayed effects, for me the affect is a full 24 hours later.