West Virginia Town of Green Bank Has Become a Refuge For Electrosensitive People (washingtonpost.com) 183
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Washington Post: Brandon Barrett arrived here two weeks ago, sick but hopeful, like dozens before him. Just a few years back, he could dead lift 660 pounds. After an injury while training to be a professional dirt-bike rider, he opened a motorcycle shop just north of Buffalo. When he wasn't working, he would cleanse his mind through rigorous meditation. In 2019, he began getting sick. And then sicker. Brain fog. Memory issues. Difficulty focusing. Depression. Anxiety. Fatigue. Brandon was pretty sure he knew why: the cell tower a quarter-mile behind his shop and all the electromagnetic radiation it produces, that cellphones produce, that WiFi routers produce, that Bluetooth produces, that the whole damn world produces. He thought about the invisible waves that zip through our airspace -- maybe they pollute our bodies, somehow? [...]
Then Brandon read about Green Bank, an unincorporated speck on the West Virginia map, hidden in the Allegheny Mountains, about a four-hour drive southwest of D.C. There are no cell towers there, by design. He read that other sick people had moved here and gotten better, that the area's electromagnetic quietude is protected by the federal government. Perhaps it could protect Brandon. It's quiet here so that scientists can listen to corners of the universe, billions of light-years away. In the 1950s, the federal government snatched up farmland to build the Green Bank Observatory. It's now home to the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Radio Telescope, the largest steerable telescope in the world at 7,600 metric tons and a height of 485 feet. Its 2.3-acre dish can study quasars and pulsars, map asteroids and planets, and search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.
The observatory's machines are so sensitive that terrestrial radio waves would interfere with their astronomical exploration, like a shout (a bunch of WiFi signals) drowning out a whisper (signals from the clouds of hydrogen hanging out between galaxies). So in 1958, the Federal Communications Commission created the National Radio Quiet Zone, a 13,000-square-mile area encompassing wedges of both Virginia and West Virginia, where radio transmissions are restricted to varying degrees. At its center is a 10-mile zone around the observatory where WiFi, cellphones and cordless phones -- among many other types of wave-emitting equipment -- are outlawed. Wired internet is okay, as are televisions -- though you must have a cable or satellite provider. It's not a place out of 100 years ago. More like 30. If you want to make plans to meet someone, you make them in person. Some people move here to work at the observatory. Others come because they feel like they have to. These are the 'electrosensitives,' as they often refer to themselves. They are ill, and Green Bank is their Lourdes. The electrosensitives guess that they number at least 75 in Pocahontas County, which has a population of roughly 7,500. Literary Hub, the BBC, Slate, and the Washingtonian have non-paywalled articles about Green Bank and the "wi-fi refugees" that shelter there.
Then Brandon read about Green Bank, an unincorporated speck on the West Virginia map, hidden in the Allegheny Mountains, about a four-hour drive southwest of D.C. There are no cell towers there, by design. He read that other sick people had moved here and gotten better, that the area's electromagnetic quietude is protected by the federal government. Perhaps it could protect Brandon. It's quiet here so that scientists can listen to corners of the universe, billions of light-years away. In the 1950s, the federal government snatched up farmland to build the Green Bank Observatory. It's now home to the Robert C. Byrd Green Bank Radio Telescope, the largest steerable telescope in the world at 7,600 metric tons and a height of 485 feet. Its 2.3-acre dish can study quasars and pulsars, map asteroids and planets, and search for evidence of extraterrestrial life.
The observatory's machines are so sensitive that terrestrial radio waves would interfere with their astronomical exploration, like a shout (a bunch of WiFi signals) drowning out a whisper (signals from the clouds of hydrogen hanging out between galaxies). So in 1958, the Federal Communications Commission created the National Radio Quiet Zone, a 13,000-square-mile area encompassing wedges of both Virginia and West Virginia, where radio transmissions are restricted to varying degrees. At its center is a 10-mile zone around the observatory where WiFi, cellphones and cordless phones -- among many other types of wave-emitting equipment -- are outlawed. Wired internet is okay, as are televisions -- though you must have a cable or satellite provider. It's not a place out of 100 years ago. More like 30. If you want to make plans to meet someone, you make them in person. Some people move here to work at the observatory. Others come because they feel like they have to. These are the 'electrosensitives,' as they often refer to themselves. They are ill, and Green Bank is their Lourdes. The electrosensitives guess that they number at least 75 in Pocahontas County, which has a population of roughly 7,500. Literary Hub, the BBC, Slate, and the Washingtonian have non-paywalled articles about Green Bank and the "wi-fi refugees" that shelter there.
This is a delusion (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: This is a delusion (Score:4, Insightful)
On the other hand...putting the crunchy granola weirdo magnet out in the hills of West Virginia isn't the worst place for such an arrangement.
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It doesn't matter if it's all in their heads. As long as they move there on their own and we don't have to foot the bill, who does it hurt?
Re:This is a delusion (Score:5, Insightful)
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I think it is fine to validate that their symptoms are real and they suffer from them, but at the same time make them understand that it is not electricity that is causing it, but their mind, just like in plasebo. I think it is like fear of spiders that is so severe that it makes you feel sick when you see one. But if you don't know about the spider, there are no symptoms.
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I agree. Ignoring the facts or making up your own is not something that should be tolerated. It corrupts and erodes society and civilization. But look, there is a whole presidential campaign running on made up stuff with a candidate that hallucinated endlessly and too many people are eating the crap they are fed and are grateful for it. I think the US has lost what it takes to actually be connected to reality. In a world that is dominated by physical reality when you come right down to it, that does not wor
Re: This is a delusion (Score:3)
>But look, there is a whole presidential campaign running on made up stuff with a candidate that hallucinated endlessly and too many people are eating the crap they are fed and are grateful for it
Oh, it's worse than that. There two of those campaigns currently running.
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It hurts because they vote similar sounding whack-jobs to the House or Senate or the Presidency so that we can all enjoy the benefits of their paranoia.
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None of these people survive any of the blind testing which has been conducted numerous times.
They do seem a bit out there, but killing them is a bit extreme!
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So is blinding them.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
I believe it. I remember having all the power go out, and having a totally different feeling, like a buzz in my mind has gone off. I also sleep better with my phone in airplane mode. There are many stories of people picking up radio frequency through fillings or shrapnel, and existing military tech uses the same vibrations induced in jawbone from teeth for communication.
https://www.defenseone.com/tec... [defenseone.com]
It may be a matter of foreign metal in body in most cases, but I bet it happens.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
We live in a very noisy world, and the sound is constant pressure on us. How many people notice the noise of their fridge? Most people have learnt to tune it out, but the noise is there.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
Exactly correct. The obvious/visible sensory stimuli also has a direct impact on the mind, because it's more information processing (light, colors, visible patterns, moving parts, subtle noise from multiple noisy electronic converters like switchedmode PSUs etc) required by the brain.
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You may believe it, but the facts are not on your side. Facts are "hard" in this universe, i.e. "belief" does not change them. It can only allow you to ignore them and make up your own fairy-tale quality "explanations".
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Still I'd rather they all gather in one place and stop messing with others and forcing their delusions on them.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
It doesnâ(TM)t help if they have internet connections, they can still spread their poison all over the world.
Re:This is a delusion (Score:5, Interesting)
Yes it is a delusion.
But my Dad told me something that stuck with me: he had hypocondria. He was always convinced he had some illness that caused him pain here and there.
My siblings and I repeatedly told him all the medical tests he had done came back negative and it was all in his head. We literally told him he was hypocondriac: he was a reasonable man, he could understand.
You know what he said? "Yeah okay, I'm hypocondriac. I accept that, no problem. So what do I do about the pain? Because it still hurts even if it's in my head."
Touché...
If those folks believe radio waves make them sick and they get better by moving to a radio-free zone, isn't it a good thing even if it's all in their head?
Embrace the placebo effect? (Score:4, Interesting)
William James tried to steer clear of the theoretical constructions of thoughts by focusing on the cash value of convictions. If your religious beliefs provide value to your life and your community then that is a good measure for them. But you have to look at the full cash value.
These people leave the people they know , make costs, change what they do, get into believing hacks.
They'd better check if their beliefs aren't precluding alternative approaches which allow them to get on with other things.
There is frequently a cash value in such a thing as truth.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
It sure seems delusional, and Iâ(TM)m glad people who feel they are strongly affected have a place to go where they feel protected. Just doing that, having an area like that, doesnâ(TM)t seem to be harmful to others or to folks who are already there. And we might learn something from them, or vice versa.
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If those folks believe radio waves make them sick and they get better by moving to a radio-free zone, isn't it a good thing even if it's all in their head?
As long as they don't allow them to have any telecommunications so we don't have to hear their bullshit, sure.
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Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
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Well, they do survive, but they do not demonstrate electrosensitivity either, that is correct.
I assume that the mountain air is just better and cleaner. Like a good old-school sanatorium.
Maybe we should have more of these communities. It could be quite economically interesting.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
Re:This is a delusion (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:This is a delusion (Score:5, Insightful)
You're right, if they leave everyone else alone its perfectly fine.
But also I've noticed that groups of people with weird ideas often like to make other people conform to their delusional rules. So I'm more worried about their views spreading across the country and affecting mhttps://mobile.slashdot.org/story/24/10/18/2342223/west-virginia-town-of-green-bank-has-become-a-refuge-for-electrosensitive-people#y life.
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But a society suffers when its citizens become accustomed to believing things unsupported by evidence, and unchallenged by their peers.
You mean like, for example, religions, which not only make people believe the weirdest kinds of non-facts, but actively entice believers to convert or kill non-believers, and make them follow arbitrary irrational rules?
In comparison to religious people, those hallucinating about being "electrosensitive" are really of the harmless kind.
Re:This is a delusion (Score:4, Interesting)
I DID actually mean to include religions, good catch. Now, I'm not saying they're as bad as in their heyday. But they're still farting society up pretty good.
Tolerance is a virtue. People absolutely shouldn't be murdered or imprisoned or experience any government- or mob-imposed consequences for their antifactual beliefs. They should be free to say all the nonsense they want. And, every time, we should push the facts back in their faces. Eternal vigilance, and all that.
Re:This is a delusion (Score:5, Insightful)
But a society suffers when its citizens become accustomed to believing things unsupported by evidence, and unchallenged by their peers.
You mean like, for example, religions, which not only make people believe the weirdest kinds of non-facts, but actively entice believers to convert or kill non-believers, and make them follow arbitrary irrational rules?
That is why he referenced Russell's Teapot, Which Bertrand Russell use to show how ridiculous religion is.
In comparison to religious people, those hallucinating about being "electrosensitive" are really of the harmless kind.
Holding delusions can be innocent, sort of innocent, or dangerous. Think a dude wearing a tinfoil hat, a vegan demanding that nothing that ever touched an animal be used in their food preparation, or religious imposing their religion on others, often at the point of a weapon
But is it not better to actually find his problem, not encourage him because it isn't harming anyone but him?
We are surrounded by EMF. Cars spout a lot of EMF, new or old. Lightning storms give off EMF pulses over a wide spectrum, and a lot more powerful than a cell phone tower. They even give off gamma radiation on occasion. https://www.nature.com/article... [nature.com]
Add to the mix, anything that uses electricity.
So maybe he does feel better, but that cell phone tower isn't the cause. A cell phone tower a quarter mile away isn't harming anyone unless they climb it and fall off. The difference between that and holding a cell phone against your head is huge. And it isn't his biggest exposure, so why single that out as the cause? So if he is actually electrosensitive, he better be living inside a Faraday cage.
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It's not all that harmless. They can waste other peoples' time in consultations and courtrooms. IF they were forced to pay the entire costs of what constitutes harassment, then great, but the systems of consultation and justice are often built to lend an ear to lunatics who more properly should be institutionalized. If your "facts" are not merely false, but you try to impose them on others, then there should be significant and comparable consequences. It's just another form of NIMBYism, and like all forms o
Also crazy people will sometimes do (Score:4, Insightful)
We just had a major issue down south with violent mobs chasing FEMA aid workers out of their communities because they thought they were going to steal their precious bodily fluids or something.
We have hostile foreign powers actively encouraging our craziest of crazies to do crazy things. Hell we have some hostile domestic powers doing that. This has been a known risk for a long time, long enough to have a name: stochastic terrorism
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Re:Also crazy people will sometimes do (Score:4, Funny)
I got the COVID vaccine because I read it gives me better 5G reception.
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When average people are fed a soup of lies some of them will desperately seek answers elsewhere.
It went like this:
Covid? What's that?
Covid? Can't spread through the air person to person.
Covid? No mask necessary. Please don't buy masks.
Covid? Buy masks.
Covid? Shut down the whole fucking country, don't come within 6 feet of anyone, wear 2 masks, 3 is better.
Covid? Oh, haha, there was no scientific evidence for the 6 foot rule, most of the masks were crap and few knew how to fit/wear one anyway.
This is all
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Or maybe - just maybe - you get modded down because not everyone projects a conspiracy onto the fact that the best we can do isn't perfect.
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This is so reductionist as to constitute a lie.
Re:Also crazy people will sometimes do (Score:4, Interesting)
Extremely crazy things. Like blow up a power station.
Like the white supremacists [foxnews.com] almost pulled off in Baltimore. Or whomever shot up two North Carolina electrical substations [npr.org] two years ago.
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I think the crazies are getting more and crazier. Probably a reaction to the world getting more complex. Most people cannot understand how things work anymore, so they start to make up their own fake "facts". That does not go well.
Re:Also crazy people will sometimes do (Score:4, Insightful)
At least in the U.S., the country has been flooded with guns so now everyone and his brother's dog can own two. If you are a right-wingnut, Your Right-Wingnut Support Group encourages you to be extreme and if you don't get your own way, it is because you failed to shoot who was in your way. In that sense, they are not crazy, they are stupidly following what their peers are encouraging them to do.
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Well, there is really just two ways these people can be: 1. Crazy or 2. Evil. Some probably manage to be both.
Well, that brings us back to the _only_ fundamental problem the human race has: Too many assholes and too many idiots.
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I think most of us are capable of at least some degree of understanding of geopolitical, domestic and local political and socialogical situations. If we don't understand, it's because we choose not to.
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Maybe. I am not convinced of that anymore. My impression is that many people are actually not able to "chose" in a meaningful way, and are mostly slaves to the influences they are subject to.
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And I'm convinced that is a choice. If we choose the path of simplistic explanations over actual understanding, then we have chosen ignorance. The one thing I see in even the most convoluted and complex conspiracies is the simplistic notion of good versus evil. It's just a modern form of the age old mythologizing and legend making; a kind of new religion for a modern age where we surrender our wits and autonomy to those who offer us the alluring illusion of simplicity in the nature of problems and the creat
It's not that they are any crazier (Score:2)
We have a political candidate that is suggested a night of violence (Kristalnatch), blood libel, repeately talked about dirty genes and has a plan to build massive concentration camps to remove illegal immigrants. Oh and that candidate just called for using the US military against US citizens
That should be ringing every single alarm bill on the planet and th
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Well, true. The problem is that his fans are not able to even begin to understand what he is doing and too many others that are looking away and become complicit in the evil.
For some good news, in Europe the fascist Meloni just had her Concentration Camps in Albania ruled to be illegal.
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Do not make claims that are direct lies. It does not look good. Yes, we know you have no honor or decency, but why remind us of that?
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But they're really eating the cats in Springfield !!
Oh, absolutely! It happened to my cat Schroedinger, one instant it was alive, next instant it was dead.
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But they're really eating the cats in Springfield !!
Oh, absolutely! It happened to my cat Schroedinger, one instant it was alive, next instant it was dead.
Are you sure?
Re:Also crazy people will sometimes do (Score:4, Informative)
Violent mobs? It was like one guy:
https://www.thedailybeast.com/... [thedailybeast.com]
In Tennessee it was a group of terrorists [yahoo.com] threatening FEMA workers.
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So that branch of political speech now has a na
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I once suffered from severe insomnia. I thought it was medication related. Nope, it wasn't. It was just plain ordinary stress. Took me a while to take the hint.
Re:This is a delusion (Score:5, Funny)
They're not hurting anyone.
Leave them alone.
They're hurting themselves.
By choosing to live there, they're intentionally directly exposing themselves to extragalactic radio emissions, without the helpful masking provided terrestrial radio sources. Don't they realize that a neutron star is 40 orders of magnitude more powerful than a CB radio? I would never want to be directly exposed to that without the help of a cellphone tower to deflect it.
It's no coincidence that human life expectancy has greatly increased over the last 100 years, largely thanks to the development of helpful earth-based radio masking during the same timeframe.
Source: This is my very own crackpot theory.
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They're not hurting anyone. Leave them alone.
They're hurting themselves.
By choosing to live there, they're intentionally directly exposing themselves to extragalactic radio emissions, without the helpful masking provided terrestrial radio sources. Don't they realize that a neutron star is 40 orders of magnitude more powerful than a CB radio? I would never want to be directly exposed to that without the help of a cellphone tower to deflect it.
It's no coincidence that human life expectancy has greatly increased over the last 100 years, largely thanks to the development of helpful earth-based radio masking during the same timeframe.
Source: This is my very own crackpot theory.
All you need now is a Newsletter and T-Shirts! ;^)
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They're not hurting anyone.
Leave them alone.
That's what we intended for the space aliens when we relocated them to the area around the observatory.
Well, if the electro-people don't bother the aliens too much, I guess it will be okay. At least we don't have to worry about the electro's blabbing about the space aliens, since they already have no credibility.
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These particular people are not hurting anyone. However in their delusional category are people who complain about the way others live, and they very much are hurting others.
Honestly this is a best case outcome. I often joke about collecting together all the nutjobs and dumping them on an island somewhere out of the way where they can do their own nutjobbish stuff, but the people in TFA did so themselves voluntarily.
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These particular people are not hurting anyone. However in their delusional category are people who complain about the way others live, and they very much are hurting others.
Honestly this is a best case outcome. I often joke about collecting together all the nutjobs and dumping them on an island somewhere out of the way where they can do their own nutjobbish stuff, but the people in TFA did so themselves voluntarily.
What happens though is that this guy claims that a cell tower a quarter mile away from his house is causing his issues, so other kooks will pick up on the claim - again, and turn it into a conspiracy - again. Next thing there will be more congressional hearings about cell phones - again, and here we go - again.
The physics hasn't changed. Let's take a 1 GHZ signal. It's reactive near field will be a little over a meter. it's radiation near field is about 6.7 meters. Beyond that it is the seriously weak f
Some of them are (Score:2)
Some of them are, particularly since they scare people by spreading doubt.
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They're not hurting anyone. Leave them alone.
Actually they are. I am sensitive to electrosensitive people. Migranes, dizziness, constant gas and my poop is green when I am around electrosensitive people.
As soon as I am away from these people, all is well, and I even look ten years younger. Ban electrosensitivity in normal contact - it is killing those who are sensitive to electrosensitive individuals.
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The tubes would also emit a significant amount of radioactive radiation causing the disease.
Later these tubes would be encased and with the now contained radioactivity the disease stopped.
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Definitely placebo effect when it gets better and hysteria when it gets worse. That used to be the term for a delusion that makes you sick. Due to some misuse of the term, it is not used anymore in the clinical field.
Re: This is a delusion (Score:2)
I went out there about 10 years ago (Score:2)
The observatory gift shop sold one time use film cameras. No idea if even 10 years ago you could get them developed. God only knows what the deal would be now.
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You can still get them developed at a drugstore or specialty camera shop, just it takes a few weeks and it's like $25+.
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Plenty of places develop photos, but it depends on the quality you want.
Professional photographers like film because high end film, particularly high end medium and high end large, has a higher effective resolution and higher dynamic range than any affordable digital camera, so there are high-end developers to cater for this crowd. In the UK, Analogue Wonderland is a good starting place.
But Walmart and other cheapo stores have cheapo film development sites, usually off-campus so it can take a few days. Howe
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I was there last weekend and they still sell disposable cameras. You have to turn off all electronics to go through the gate past the gift shop that lets you walk down to the telescope. I got an awesome Blenko glass suncatcher with the telescope on it while I was there. I highly suggest everyone visit that area, there's a lot of cool shit around there and it is absolutely beautiful.
Reminds me of someone I know (Score:5, Interesting)
One day I was at their house and I surreptitiously removed the batteries from the TV remote. Then I said "hey look here!", pointed the battery-less remote at their face, and very obviously pushed one of the buttons. They shut their eyes hard and gasped in pain; "are you TRYING to blind me, that HURT!" they said. Then I took the batteries out of my pocket and showed them to to them, then removed the battery door from the remote and showed it had no batteries.
They said "..well, it must have a residual charge or something. Don't ever do that to me again!"
Unless someone has scientific proof this 'EM sensitivity' thing is more than just a delusion or phobia, I remain as skeptical of it as I do of my friend and their alleged ability to see infrared light.
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The most likely illness will be psychological stress induced effects. That's why there is no particular cause they can pin down and also why getting away from the stressful environment reduces the effects.
Re:Reminds me of someone I know (Score:5, Interesting)
On the other hand these "Electrosensitive People" are making claims involving minuscule power levels, which is not credible.
Re:Reminds me of someone I know (Score:4, Informative)
Actually the brain is EM sensitive, you just need a strong enough EM field.
Your eyes are EM sensitive. You just need the right frequencies.
Re:Reminds me of someone I know (Score:5, Funny)
Confirmed. Bright pink clothes melt my eyes.
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I know someone who claims to be able to see infrared light
You _can_ actually see infrared light. But at intensities that also will cause eye damage quite rapidly (it involves two IR photons hitting the light-sensitive molecules within a short window).
People who've had a cateract op (Score:2)
..and had artificial lenses put in could see UV light because the retina is sensitive to it but our natural lenses block it. I say could because maybe the modern replacements now block it because UV damages the retina.
Re:Reminds me of someone I know (Score:4, Interesting)
"Electrosensitivity" is soundly proven to be a delusion (cassically, it would have been called "hysteria" in the past). There really is not test needed. Same for other claims like the one you just describe. There really is not need to "remain sceptic". Instead I recommend it for what it is: A mental condition that makes them ignore how some aspects of the physical world work and substitute some constructed fantasy instead.
Interestingly, the hysteria commonly includes "attention seeking" in the spectrum of symptoms. Oh, and look, these people all have some special "talent".
Re: Reminds me of someone I know (Score:2)
Not this shit again (Score:4, Informative)
They've done test after test after test and they've NEVER found a single person that could actually be shown to sense an electromagnetic field. Never, not once over hundreds of tests.
This stupid story pops up every year or so, blah blah blah, and never once has anyone, anywhere ever been able to show that they're 'sensitive' to or affected in any way by electromagnetic or electrostatic fields.
Wouldn't a faraday cage work too? (Score:4, Interesting)
Doesn't seem that hard to line walls with metal mesh, then ground it.
Wonder if people would be willing to book rentals at a place designed to help them test the theory empirically. Meaning record how they feel, and periodically block or don't the EM waves. See if any correlation happens.
Even if this all turns out to be placebo... How can we use this pattern/data to harness a benign placebo to use instead of 'run away and avoid many modern things'? Can the modern propensity for manipulation be harnessed for good?
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Radio Frequencies are REAL!!! (Score:2)
But RFI affecting people's health has been debunked so many times.
If you don't believe in the scientific process, and your personal anecdote (backed up by nothing other than subjective feelz) is all you have... you have the right to your opinions, and you can move to nowhere West VIrginia.
No need to "publish" your "manifesto" or claim that you could bench press 600lbs but then cellular phones and towers and you became a krytponite-struck Clark Kent and fortunately moving to Nowhere, West Virginia fixed all
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But RFI affecting people's health has been debunked so many times.
I think I remember a story from some years back about a town where lot of people were complaining about a cell tower's adverse effects, so someone looked in to it and found that the tower had been shut down for years.
Need to rename it to the Placeboland Observatory (Score:4, Informative)
Because then the article would have to say:
"People who believe they're RF-sensitive are moving to Placeboland to feel better."
Free link to entire article (Score:2)
Mass hysteria (Score:2)
Tin foil hat didn't work ??? (Score:2)
There are no "electrosensitive" people (Score:2)
There are people that think they are, but there are no known mechanisms for it and actually scientifically sound test never show anything. That is not do deny these people are getting sick from their delusion. But the treatment they need is in the mental space, not the physical one.
Psychosomatic disorder (Score:5, Interesting)
There is a class of illnesses called psychosomatic disorders. For whatever reason your brain believes that you should be ill, and your body reacts to it and causes the symptoms of the illness. And there is NOTHING you can do about it.
In this case here, there are people who's brain thinks they should be ill because there is WiFi present. Trying to convince them that WiFi causes no damage is absolutely useless because the WiFi doesn't cause the symptoms. It's the brain's belief that WiFi is bad that causes the symptoms.
This is why living in this WiFiless area helps. WiFi is gone. The brain knows it is gone. Therefore the brain thinks there is no reason for your body to be sick. Therefore your body stops producing symptoms.
I had exactly the same problem. Three hours commute every day caused me problems. Got worse over the course of six months. With extremely painful symptoms. Doctors found no physical reason. The pain was real. Heavy painkillers stopped it (because the brain knows the pain should go away for a while with a strong dose of painkillers, therefore it goes away). Then came Covid, I started working from home, within a month all symptoms were gone. Which my GP also told me was impossible. Didn't know what caused the pain, but it shouldn't have disappeared within a month.
These people getting ill from WiFi do _really_ get ill. They don't make up some story. What fixes the symptoms is believing that the WiFi is gone. What doesn't fix the symptoms is turning WiFi off. Of course in this type the legal absence of WiFi makes the mind believe there is no WiFi, so that helps. What doesn't help is any attempt at education. What doesn't help either is _knowing_ how this works (from personal experience). Any attempt at ridiculing these people just demonstrates you are an arsehole and fully deserve something similar happening to you.
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Wish I had mod points. If this was called a mental illness right from the start people here on slashdot would be a lot more sympathetic as many folk here have personal experience with it and how dehabilitating it is. A little empathy goes a long ways.
Last weekend (Score:2)
I was there and the surrounding area last weekend. We didn't have any cell or radio signals most of the day.
Nice to able to afford that level of placebo (Score:2)
It's BS, we all know it's BS, and the only concern is that BS repeated often enough becomes a republican talking point.
Neurotic people (Score:2)
Why this isn't acceptable (Score:3)
There is no such physical medical issue. They have a delusion.
If they accept that and seek appropriate treatment (which can involve putting them somewhere they believe there is no trigger while they work on resolving the underlying issue), fine.
What is not acceptable is entertaining their delusions as real, because then they spread them and we get other suggestable people affected by them. That and a general reduction of the value of truth and evidence in society.
Basically, don't ask me to treat these people with compassion so long as they insist their delusions are in fact reality and demand to be catered to.
Somatization Disorder (Score:2)
West Virginia Town of Green Bank Has Become a Refuge For Hypochondriacs. There, I fixed the headline for you.
Re: (Score:2)
This area is radio quite 24/7.