[OT] "It is 10:00. Do you know where your children are"

[Atrocities]

You must be right Narf, DNA made Rossie fat, no wait, that was the spoon. Man I am so confused! Does Rossie use a cell phone? Perhaps that would explain it.

Back in 1986/87 I wrote an essay on things that would happen in the next 20 years. I had to do it as a final for my writing class. I still recall everyone laughing at me when I read it.

I said that by 2000 everyone would have hand size wireless phones. Laughter.
That money would be phased out by credit card type system. Laughter
That Communisium woud fail.
Another shuttle disaster (Actualy I said two and we still have 3 years to go)
Lawsuites agaist Tabocco, Firearm, Car, fast food, and Porn industries alleging damages and other tort thingys.
I also predicted the escalation of youth violence.

These all seemed like likely things to happen in the future.

I also mentioned computers, satellite tv and radio, war in the middle east - Over oil, and increasing terrist attacks here in the US.

That was 16 years ago, and I had no crystal ball to see the future. Like I said, these were things that logic dictated would come about. Technology improves, people still get angry, and lawyers will sue.

I now predict that in the next 20 years, lawyers will sue the Cell phone industry for causing cancer.

That Microsoft will loose it standing in the PC industry as something better comes along.

That as population continues to climb, we will see an increase in the reductions of our rights.

SE V will be a smash hit and sell well for years.

[narf poit chez BOOM]

Another shuttle disaster (Actualy I said two and we still have 3 years to go)

uh...it's past 2000.

very good predictions. any you got wrong?

[Atrocities]

Oops, the predictions were for the next 20 years from the time I made them. So 2000 was 13 years into it. I should have made that clearer.

Yes, I have missed on a lot of things. There were about 50 predictions total, and I am batting about 50% thus far.

I predicted that we would have another moon landing, would land people on mars, and have a fuctioning space station. None of those have happened yet.

I predicted that cars would be running exclusively on syntetic fules.

Things like that.

I predicted that North Korea would again attack the south, but that has not happened. I predicted that the Arabs would gang up on Isriel (sp) and take them out. No so.

That the US would loose a Nuclear sub. We did not, but the Russians did.

Most of it was guess work based upon logical deductions. (And a lot of ... um .. leasure time mind expanding medicinal research.)

Drugs are bad!

[Member 4148]

Originally posted by Imperator Fyron:
[QBEM radiation has to be in the x-ray or smaller range of wavelength, or be operating at many orders of magnitude greater in energy than cell phones operate at, to even have a chance of mutating DNA. [/QB]

that false!
uv is a source of skin cancer and thats a longer wavelength than xray!
http://www.cdc.gov/mmwr/preview/mmwrhtml/rr5215a1.htm
http://www.ipac.caltech.edu/Outreach...ave/links.html

uv still way shrter than radio, but its not xray or smaller. you cant be so sure of the dividing line. a simple study may be a good thing.

[Will]

The problem with the whole "Cell phones cause cancer!" scare is that it is impossible to get accurate numbers at the moment. To get a (relatively) definite answer would require a small number of independently run studies spanning over around 15 to 25 years. They would have to take into account the amount of mobile use, the power of the output of the mobile, and any other factors that would increase the chances of a subject getting cancer (family history, exposure to carcinogens, etc.) As of now, there is no legitimate study into the risk of getting cancer from cell phone radiation.

Personally, I think that any results from a properly conducted study of this kind would yield results showing a statistically insignificant difference between the group of mobile Users vs. non-mobile Users. A large part of the concern about cancer is due to the general public having no clue what radiation is, and the fact that it was made into a boogieman for every generation in developed countries since the 1950s.

It's actually kind of fun, when people use the words "radiation" and "cancer" in the same sentance, to point out all the things that emit radiation. Like television, computer monitors, light bulbs, speakers, power lines, the Sun, the stars, the Earth, etc, etc, etc. All of them give of at least a little bit of radiation. After telling people this, there are usually one of two reactions: complete disbelief of everything I just said (sometimes even including the Sun), or extreme paranoia and the urge to make a tinfoil hat.

--edit: In Fyron's defense, he did say that the longer wavelength radiation would have to be orders of magnitude more powerful than that emited by cell phones. The UV radiation from the Sun is several orders of magnitude more powerful than the output of a cell phone.

[ January 03, 2004, 01:08: Message edited by: Will ]

[narf poit chez BOOM]

and that's why we're not going to have solar power beamed down any time soon.

[TerranC]

Originally posted by Atrocities:
I predicted that North Korea would again attack the south, but that has not happened. I predicted that the Arabs would gang up on Isriel (sp) and take them out. No so.

That the US would loose a Nuclear sub. We did not, but the Russians did.

Most of it was guess work based upon logical deductions. (And a lot of ... um .. leasure time mind expanding medicinal research.)

Don't quit your day job man.