Recently I was asked by a dear friend to comment on this web site listing the dangers of electromagnetic radiation (EMR). It is written by Jeromy Johnson who is no longer able to tolerate electromagnetic fields without suffering from horrible headaches. Jeromy associates this with exposure to radiation from a bank of smart meters that were installed in his apartment complex in San Francisco.
His website is an advocacy site no different from say a tobacco industry or oil industry site. Do not expect an objective presentation. That is not to say the information is wrong, or that it isn’t worth reading, but he presents only one side of the issue. As long as you keep that in mind then freely explore his information; it’s a bit frightening.
In the course of reading more on this topic, I came across this news story. It seems that the California state government has been compelled by court order to issue a warning on the dangers of radiation exposure from cell phone use. Since they use the same radiation bands the warning should also apply to smart meters. Obviously I’m not saying that you’re holding your smart meter to your head for hours.
Of course, cell phones are not universally viewed as dangerous. The National Cancer Institute website declares cell phones safe and cites many studies supporting that conclusion. So what’s going on here?
I hope that I can provide more context to the debate and fill the dark spots to allow you to make up your own mind.
I decided to look into this because it is a wonderful example of how we all must live with uncertainty and ambiguity. I’ll say right up front that I’ve personally reduced my cell phone use because being constantly connected doesn’t fit with my desire to live life mindfully. However, you may see things differently, so here are both sides to one of life’s complicated situations.
I also find this topic interesting because it’s an example of how bias and advocacy is shaping thought in our society. From what I’ve read, the situation is very similar to how the church shaped thought through the middle ages. The ideas are different but the methods are remarkably similar. I love seeing this stuff in action.
I chose to break this into three posts. This one will give background to the radiation debate in my life time. Then I’ll post on the arguments for a harmful effect, and finally follow up with the argument that there are no damaging effects from the radiation.
I realize that there is danger in dividing the information like this, it feeds confirmation bias. Confirmation bias is the tendency of humans to accept information in accordance to one’s views, in preference to information contradicting one’s views. So, if you want to indulge your bias finish this one and pick the post conforming to your bias and read that one.
Inference of cause-effect relationships
Assigning a cause-effect relationship is hard. It must be done either by well-designed experiments with lots of observations, or by a causal methodological approach. Neither method is perfect.
A further complication is ethics. The well-designed experiments must be done on animals because it is absolutely unethical to assign randomly selected humans to experiments that may result in injury or death. This is a complication because we want our inference to cover people and animals are genetically only part people. Thus the experiments can only cover the portions of the human genome shared by the test animal, which is much but not all.
It’s also very difficult to design an experiment covering the range of variation in the human genome, much less the variation in human behavior and environment. This means huge sample sizes;. Small effects may not be revealed until thousands or even tens of thousands of subjects are observed. And in our impatient society we wants results today, not next century.
To complement the animal experiments, researchers use testing by methodological processes. This means they build a theory of how the cancer works, which genes are modified, and how. Then test to see if the suspected mechanism results in a genetic change. An example would be subjecting tissue samples to radiation and seeing what genetic changes take place. This is a somewhat onerous task as there are over 100 types of cancer and 25,000 human genes, an awful lot of potential combinations to check.
I’m guessing that this is why there are so many ambiguous results in medical science. The mathematics behind the inferential system has been strained past the breaking point.
In a way this is good. It puts the responsibility for evaluating the results back on the individual. You must personally evaluate the results, think about them, and decide what and how much you are willing to accept. In this case, is instant communication worth the potential risks to your health? Right now, that’s for you to decide.
History of concerns
Concern for radiation exposure is nothing new. I remember the sensation caused by the first television to come into our neighborhood. A friend’s father brought home a huge bulging cabinet with a glass front. The set came with a warning, cautioning viewers to sit back at least six feet from the screen to minimize radiation exposure. These sets displayed pictures by spraying a stream of electrons against a phosphor screen. The stream of electrons was shooting you right in the eyes as you watched. Of course, the electrons were mostly attenuated by the phosphor and the glass. But, nobody knew what the effect would be of placing millions of these boxes in front of the public.
When my parents finally got our family a set my father, a radio-chemist, mounted the small box on a shelf in a corner near the ceiling. This prevented us children from sitting within 10’ of the screen. It also made changing channels a chore. He never said anything, but I think he was concerned with our radiation exposure.
In the 1970’s as part of the back to the earth movement there was an outcry against the EMR from high voltage powerlines. At one point there was a movement to require new homes to exclude in wall AC power wiring. It was argued that the EMR emitted from these wires although much lower due to lower voltage was also much closer and the field surrounded the house’s occupants. There was a flurry of upgrades to low voltage (12 volt) lighting systems. It never caught on, maybe because 12 volts was just not enough to power the TV set; it might work with LCD and LED displays.
Microwave ovens were also greeted with the same concerns, falling under the regulation of the Food and Drug Administration in 1971.
Now the concern is wireless devices that bring radio waves into close contact with the human body. I’ll admit to being no fan of smart meters, so I find anything that brings dishonor to them welcome. I also figure their installation is inevitable. Hopefully by the time they get to me they will be communicating over the wires of the electrical grid.
Burden of Proof
The scientific method is built on a specific set of rules. These rules are based on the rules and methods quantified by mathematical logic and expanded by statistical inference. One of the basic rules is: you can’t prove a negative. This always puts the burden of proof on the side of those who wish to show harm. It isn’t fair, it’s just the way it is.
You, as an autonomous individual, must also put aside your inclinations to distrust and balance the results to the safe side unless proven otherwise. I know it’s unfair; that’s one reason you should have the freedom to think.
As a graduate student we were admonished that the burden of proof in science is much, much, higher than is the burden of proof in a courtroom. The problem with this is that it ignores ambiguity. The Statistics profession spends far too much time advocating for a red line; truth on side only. The world doesn’t work that way; nor should it. Success in change requires diversity of action. Everyone has a unique scale for interpreting the world; that diversity should be encouraged and validated.
With that in mind let’s look at the evidence on both sides so you can decide what’s right for you. Oh, and remember, failure to decide is at times a reasonable decision. But failure to decide does not absolve you from acting. It’s perfectly reasonable that you decide there is insufficient evidence to make a conclusion but modify your behavior anyway. Do your best, and don’t be afraid to change your mind; now or in the future. That’s science. That’s life.