Mobile Phones Make You Senile?
from the now-what-was-that-again? dept
Having finally reached the point where enough studies have now shown that mobile phones are not likely to cause cancer, we have the latest mobile-phone induced problem to deal with. Researchers in Sweden are saying new research shows that mobile phones may cause senility for teenagers who use the phones. I'd argue against that idea, but I can't remember what we're talking about any more... Well, actually, as you might imagine the mobile phone industry has already responded quite quickly to the reports (which some say were already toned down at the insistence of the industry) saying that the tests were done on rats, and the researchers confuse the development stage of a rat's brain with the development stages of a human's brain. The researchers say the work was done on rats that were 12 to 26 weeks old, which they say is the rat equivalent of teenaged years, and their brains are still developing. The senility comes along later, suggesting that teens who use mobile phones now may be wandering around aimlessly lost in a fog of their own confusing by their early thirties. The mobile phone industry responds that the comparison is pointless, because human neurological development is generally done by the time a baby reaches 12-months (not in their teenaged years) - and you don't hear too many stories of babies chatting away on mobile phones.
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Win-win
If it doesn't, older techies will have to invent new ways to turn kid brains into mush through video games, virtual reality, or vibra-phones that emit ultra-low frequency sound waves.
More seriously, perhaps this was just one of those Euro government funded third-rate research "findings", in which Sweden wanted to get one up on Finnish Nokia, who they have always regarded as their cultural inferiors.
I have a feeling that we've been swimming in a sea of microwave emissions emitted by a certain object in the sky for a long time.
Perhaps we have more serious pediatric problems to worry about, like this one.
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Maybe that's why cell phone users drive so poorly
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Just Ask Bill Cosby
Hello? Anybody TALK to any teenagers lately? WITHOUT cellphones they're senile.
Dad: Get your homework, it's time to go to school.
Kid: Homework?
Dad: Yes, the homework we sat down and did together last night?
Kid: I dunno.
As Bill Cosby said: All kids are brain damanged.
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