Play stupid games, win stupid prizes: UK man gets 3 years for torching 4G phone mast over 5G fears A Merseyside man has been sentenced to three years in jail by a beak in Liverpool Crown Court after torching a Vodafone-owned phone mast. Michael Whitty, a 47-year-old from Knowsley, set fire to the base station of the mast on April 5 of this year, after becoming convinced that 5G was directly linked to the COVID-19 epidemic, …
It's a shame they cant or wont give these muppets some additional appropriate extra punishments. Add on that he's banned from the internet (since hes proven that hes a gullible idiot that can be talked into doing violent stupidity, removing him from the internet is for his own protection) or owning a phone that can use data for the next 10 years (since he was quite happy to take away other peoples data access). Maybe he would then actually get on and do something with his life.
The wrong person is in prison, it should be Zuck, Jack, or Sundar. But they get to continually target yet more nonsense at yet more muppets until they finally do something stupid like this one has ("Like this nonsense? Here's more!") and pocket billions in ad revenue for it. That's legal.
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No, until old-age senility is setting in, one's age is not a mitigating factor in believing any old tripe spouted on the internet. Radio waves do not produce viruses. Vaccines are heavily tested and actually do work rather well, despite what all the anti-vaxers would have you believe (and said anti-vaxers have forgotten about the death and disability toll of the diseases the vaccines are there to prevent).
Even being stupid is no excuse for criminal damage.
I believe the theory is that 5G is used to control the virus rather than to produce it, and that the virus is produced in labs in China controlled by Bill Gates / Soros / Barack Obama / the US Democratic party / probably Prince Andrew as well by now.
No, I have no idea what "control" would constitute in this context. But I'd love to know how to fit a low-GHz aerial in to a virus.
Well, I'm 45, and by this age, there's a bit of rigidity stuck in and it's a bit harder to learn completely new stuff than it was when I was a child. If you add a bit of mistrust of anything different to what you're used to into that, I can see that taking the easy route of letting someone else do the thinking for you must be quite tempting...
As a not particularly good example, it's taken me a lot longer to learn to unicycle than my 11 year old offspring, despite the fact I can still handle a two wheeled bike much better than the offspring...
I buy into a theory, that kids learn certain things (like riding a unicycle) faster, because they don't (yet) have a LONG-TERM and GENERAL experience of how many various things CAN go wrong. It's not that it paralyses us, old farts, it just that this... inhibition cripples us (and for good reason) while the youngsters "just do it". Recklessly, with potentially painful (or even deadly consequences), but even in failure, their broken bones mend fast, while ours... Perhaps this, in some sense, also applies to "daring-do" thoughts, i.e. we avoid mental challenges ;)
Just point out that the first use of the SHF band was centimetric radar in WW2, which pumped out up to 30kw, which is thirty thousand watts of power. And this wasn't noticeably dangerous for people around them so how the heck is minuscule 5g levels of power supposed to be dangerous?
This tends to upset the trolls.
It's quite funny to point out to the numpties that they get much more irradiated by going outside on a sunny day.....
I kept my office / workshop entirely clear of interference by PHBs, HR muppets or anyone else I didn't want to see by putting up a "Radiation" sign on the door and a colourful warning about "Radiation Testing in Progress". I really can recommend this approach for all engineers who just want to quietly get on with their jobs!
Yes, but internet availability is also lower amongst the elderly, than it is the youngsters. I see a lot of people didn't like the original comment. Not much i can do about that. I used a specific example about technology. I didn't insunate or state older people weren't smart or wise. Ever tried teach your parents or grandparents to use technology?
" Ever tried teach your parents or grandparents to use technology?"
Bit difficult 'cos they are all dead. But I do try teach my kids and grandkids ... some of whom do make some unwise decisions over new tech imho.
But then what do I know? I mean its not as though we invented or helped develop this computery/interwebby stuff - Oh, I forgot, we did ;-)
Considering my dad is the one who taught me computers, started his own semiconductor company, and his dad bought him some of the first computers, can't say I relate with what you're saying. Usually old people teach me the old technology, and I teach them the new. Who knows, maybe that experience is totally unique to me.
Of course, I understand what you're saying, my mother is like that, but she's Polish. And she leans into it hard, will give up learning anything new before she even starts. Her father however, is an actual engineer, he even worked on Atari. I still go to him for math/algorithm problems n such, I suck at that stuff but his brain is still sharp.
I believe you're picking on the wrong factor here. It's not old people you struggle with teaching, it's non-technical people. Young people may be a little more "technical" only because they have to be, otherwise how else would they post pictures of their butts to instagram? They don't actually "know" anything about computers. I'm pretty sure my grandpa doesn't know how to post pictures of his butt to tik-tok, and he helped design Atari.
"Ever tried teach your parents or grandparents to use technology?"
Given that I'm 75 that would be a tad difficult. But I have friends and relatives older then I who are quite familiar with technology.
The real problem is with younger people who have absolutely no sense of time. The worst are those who are convinced that because they grew up with their Spectra and similar 8-bit toys that they somehow invented all that stuff. They didn't. It was invented by people in my age group, some a bit younger, some a good deal older. We were using computers longer than they've been drawing breath.
Ever tried teach your parents or grandparents to use technology?
Ever discovered that your father and two of your uncles were deeply involved in the invention and development of the technology in the first place?
If I'd ever tried to teach my dad to use technology I'd have felt the back of his hand.
30/40 plus???? Old?????
Funnily enough, I disagree (and not just because I am "30/40 plus" myself!)
I'm generalising completely for the rest of ths post, but here goes:
Those in their 40's grew up as this technology did. Many people here remember low level coding, and the importance of efficiency.. It was often a success to save one byte!
We grappled with its potentials and restrictions, and generally understand how it works. Even the non-techies at this age have some idea, because they lived through the evolution:
1) No mobile -> Mobile with games and texting -> mobile with internet -> smartphones.
2) Visit library -> use school computer -> get own computer -> get information on cd rom -> dialup services -> dial up internet -> broadband -> wifi
In comparison, to many under 30 -- even the "techies", it's all a black box. Sure, they know how to operate the things, but have absolutely no clue about the technology or principles behind the tech. It's just there. Like air.
And that's even before mentioning the under 30's tendancy to be so embroiled by the tech, they know more about some Z-list celebrity than anything that's actually important.
Stick a 25 year old and a 45 year old in an old garage, and see which one is the best "MacGyver" (google it!)
> But what do we do about the schools that are failing to teach critical thinking?
Please stop blaming schools/teachers. He's stupid now, he was stupid at school. His teachers probably were amazed they got him to the point he knows what firelighters are, let alone teach him critical thinking.
There's total freedom of speech, there's censorship, and then there's holding social networks to the same standards that the vast majority of other publishers willingly follow themselves. Considering the many problems social networks cause I really don't have a problem holding them to those same standards.
@"Uh-oh "research it". The perennial cry of the YouTube/TalkRadio obsessed conspiracy-theory enthusiast who's grasp of science is pseudo at best."
Yeah, because lead in petrol, asbestos, CFCs and all the other, who cares it works, ideas didn't create continuing problems decades later not to mention deaths.
You would imagine that we would have learned a little caution by now but there you go, caution and scientific detachment disappears when enough money changes hands.
I would, but I'm too busy researching the flat earth theory that someone told me to last year. I've got as far as demonstrating curvature, but I'm sure you'll agree that's no reason to give in to the "round earth" conspiracy right away.
When people say "research it", what I hear is "I am too ignorant to understand the difference between Google and research".
@veti
Not much research required, just answer 2 simple questions.
1. If any object with gravity more than 10% of earth could exist why are all planets and stars visibly round? ie. not displayed as the edge of a disc.
2. list the countries the countries you can fly to where everyone and every thing is visibly leaning (Pisa excepted) because gravity always acts on the centre of gravity and for a disc that is the centre.
I personally haven't seen a lot of stars as any more than points of light. Planets I have seen, and there is no conclusive evidence that they're round. They seem to change shape, much like the moon.
As for the proposition that gravity always acts on the CoG, perhaps you can suggest how I could verify that experimentally. (Keep in mind that "always" is a big claim, and the finding must be valid at very large scale.)
The only planets that change shape, "much like the moon" are Venus and Mercury, because they are between us and the sun, also "much like the moon". The shapes seen are explained by the fact that they are round "much like the moon".
The other planets we can see (yes I have several telescopes and have verified this) are always seen as round, because they are.
I think the flat Earth response to point 1 is that the Earth is not a planet, and planets and stars are close and small. As to point 2 - some of them don't believe in gravity, and think that the flat Earth is in uniform acceleration, so "down" is in the same direction everywhere.
"some of them don't believe in gravity, and think that the flat Earth is in uniform acceleration, so "down" is in the same direction everywhere."
I don't think it's that well reasoned out. They just think it's "natural", or maybe "magic"
"I probably do know a bit about it" and yet you couldn't find work in your own field.
Pure biology science over the last 30 years has created more "qualified" biologists than the job market in the UK could absorb resulting in many having to find work in unrelated positions such as sales in Carphone Warehouse or McDonalds. Now if were good enough for enviromental/water treatment/alcohol/pharma/medicine or some other related discipline that the UK was willing to invest in then your could have stayed in your field and avoided semi-skilled work.
For my part I studied all the sciences along with Pure/applied and higher maths to at least 'A' level and chose Electronic Engineering at degree before switching to computing . In between I worked with my older IchemE siblings at their own company where I was involved in many biological and chemical engineering projects.
I do see your point though, that determining the effect of EM upon the human body requires a high level understanding of both physics and biology/medicine to actually have a chance at knowing what you are talking about but since this is the networking subgroup then it is to be expected that most of the opinions are going to be based upon things other than actual knowledge or training.
Difficult to do that when Government and Commercial services are now increasingly only available through digital channels.
Internet access available only via a limited connection that only resolves .gov.uk addresses.
(and never mind the javascript, fonts and trackers pulled in from various sources, plus the clod chunks that appear to be inevitable in today's Internet environment)
"Maybe he would then actually get on and do something with his life."
Sadly unlikely. While much of the focus has been on the anti-5G element, the BBC report provides a few more details - https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-merseyside-52966950
"Whitty, who had 29 previous convictions, including for assault and for possession of a firearm"
This isn't one of those rare conspiracy nuts who finally decided to get out of the basement and actually take action, he's just a run-of-the-mill petty thug who happened to use 5G as an excuse for his latest stupid crime. Perhaps better education, treatment and rehabilitation could have helped earlier in his life, but by the time a person is in their late 40s with 30 criminal convictions (and no doubt plenty more not prosecuted or let off with warnings), it's a bit late to be thinking up unusual punishments in the hopes they'll suddenly turn their life around.
/joke
Three years in jail for burning the wrong mast - OK sure, it was stupid but maybe he should have just told the court that he was doing it to check his eyesight?
The mast was just a little issue really when compared to burning an entire country by being stupid and worrying more about your popularity than peoples lives.
@" because someone else did something worse", do you mean legal precedent and matching the severity of the punishment against previous punishments?
I don't think they should have let him off but since criminal damage carries a heavier punishment than say killing someone via drunk/aggressive/reckless driving in the UK then it might be said that his punishment is par for the course.
Three years in jail for burning the wrong mast
Yes, three years may seem a little harsh for the crime of being a stupid fuckwit, but unfortunately longish stretches like this are necessary 'pour décourager les autres' (apologies to Voltaire for the manglement.)
How much do you think a 4G mast costs to replace? And the inconvenience to customers who rely on it? And the loss of customers moving to another network while it's out of service? And of course personal risk to the emergency services that had to attend the blaze?
But see also the comment below about the severity of arson as a crime.
The thing was if it was just matter of setting the mast on fire he probably would of been put in the loony bin, but he had plans on how to take a mast out (he put some effort into planning to set something very specific on fire)
Anyone who thinks radio waves spreads virus should be on a watch list
Just for shit's n giggles, I renamed my two guest SSID's to Provider1_Covid19_5GTestt_LocalArea & Provider2_Covid19_5GTest_LocalArea.
I'm terribly sorry & now realise my honest mistake, I should have named them to Provider_Covid19_5GTest_NextCity3HoursToTheNorth.
"Whitty pled guilty on May 18 via video link from HMP Altcourse — a Category B prison in the Fazakerley area of Liverpool — where he was warned a custodial sentence was inevitable"
Good, and I hope this case is widely publicised so that other ill-educated conspiracy theory vegetables get the message that they will go to prison if they set fire to phone masts and thereby recklessly endanger lives.
The problem is, this just reinforces the conspiracy in the heads of the feeble minded.
"See! Deep State is trying to silence us by locking us way."
These imbeciles do not reason or accept empirical evidence. They will see conspiracy in everything.
Sadly, there is no vaccination against stupid.
Good, and I hope this case is widely publicised so that other ill-educated conspiracy theory vegetables get the message that they will go to prison if they set fire to phone masts and thereby recklessly endanger lives.
Means little to the rag merchants, bloggers, video bloggers, amateur publishers and 'conspiracy gurus' egging them on.
But there are a significant number who no longer have landlines - especially were the associated "broadband" does not offer a (needed) speed advantage than mobile data.
I have a land line, but it is only used when "Microsoft", "insurance claim providers" and others call offering me "help". I have never given the number to anyone and never use it to make calls as the costs are much higher than the "unlimited minutes" on my mobile contract - if it was available through my ISP, I would opt for a "data only" line.
I'd lump them in with the mast burners. Landlines are cheap, and actually work when the power goes out (from experience, cellular coverage drops to zero if the power cut is more than a blown fuse at the local substation)
And if connection to the Internet is THAT vital, you'd want a backup provider, via a diverse route, right?
Mobile phone masts have local backup power that is legally required to last a certain number of hours. I forget the exact spec.
Same as local loop for landlines. Fibre to the cabinet has sometimes required the cabinet to be moved so the batteries fit.
Of course, there's nothing saying that the backup power has to support 4G/5G or Internet DSLAMs, only "voice", whatever that means.
So you're just as likely to lose Internet either way.
In many places mobile is more reliable than landline, because it only takes one tree or flooded duct to take out all landlines on a cabinet, while most urban areas have quite big overlaps.
Also you can take a walk down the street looking for signal. Can't do that with a landline.
To respond to your comments in order
They are required to have backup, yes. But who maintains those SLA* batteries? Virgin's in their cabinets tend to die within 10 mins of a local power failure, because they've not been replaced since install. Wouldn't be surprised if cellular was the same
FTTC still uses the central exchange battery for power to the voice part of the circuit. As the cabinets age, agreed, the same arguments may apply re: local batteries, but the central exchange batteries will be better maintained, fo sho. (internet wasn't my point here, it was the ability to send and receive phonecalls, especially 999/112 type calls)
Fair point re: taking out the feed to the cabinet/DP. Indeed, that is an issue. (unlikely to happen at the same time as a power outage unless there's a MASSIVE storm, so you'll have a backup in the form of that mobile :) )
Finally... if the landline's working, you don't have to seek signal. But yes, if the local tower is out, you can drive a few miles to get a signal to dial 999
They may do for now, but what about when everyone is moved on to IP phones (which has already started)? It's then going to rely on power for the equipment and the kit you have at home (the termination hardware is required to have a battery, but they can't force it to be maintained).
Landlines absolutely do suffer outages when overloaded. Each cabinet can only handle a certain number of simultaneous calls.
If everyone on your street tried to make a phonecall at the same time, some of them would not get a dial tone.
The difference is that landlines are fixed, so it's simple to work out the installed diversity and thus ensure it's very unlikely to be a problem.
Mobiles, well, are mobile so it's much harder to work out what capacity a given mast needs to have. A concert could add 50,000 phones over the course of an hour. Landlines definitely can't be added that quickly.
I'm not sure where you're getting your info, but the cabinets are not the source of anything... unless you're on one of those fibre concentrators from the early 80s. They merely take the local cables and bundle them into huge (up to 2400 pair) cables back to the exchange. Each line HAS a linecard ... everyone could pick up the phone and get dialtone. Now actually MAKING a call (especially from a rural exchange) may have caused issues a few years back, as there would have been only so many junctions/trunks back to the main serving exchange. But that's not the case anymore.
Interestingly the scenario you describe WOULD have happened with the strowger system, in the event of everyone on a particular uniselector rack picked up the phone, only a certain number (usually 10 per pair of shelves if i recall) would get dialtone. But that has absolutely zero to do with the cabinet, which is merely a junction box
"From Statista, 22% of households don't have a landline, 3% have an incoming only landline."
I'm not sure that's an especially useful number though. There is an implied assumption that 22% of households rely on a mobile phone instead of a landline. Landline households peaked at "only" 95%, so there's at least 5% who may not have had a phone at all. There's also been a change in demographics where there are many more single person households so a landline is of less relevance. I strongly suspect that multiple-person households which are families rather than unrelated "flat mates"will be more likely to have a landline than not.
Oh yeah, stats from the same source you used, but over a longer time period and giving a different impression.
Simple demographics - basically no-one under the age of 30 would have a landline. So that's at least 16% of UK households. I reckon in the 30 to 45 age group it depends on whether renting or owning. That might amount to another 15% of households.
On a comprehensive sample of my relatives who I contact regularly by phone tthere are only 3 who I would consider phoning on their landline - and all 3 are over the age of 70.
And no pedantry about 'broadband' being a landline
incidentally, should I be looking at any particular... providers? Or is it still a rule that "we pretend that we believe that you use your mobile phone x 5 to do all those things at once"?
(I'm asking, since even basic virgin media broadband, while speed is more than sufficient (100), has steadily crept up to around 40 quid per month, and I wouldn't mind swapping it for something cheaper, even with a bit of fuss.
...
now, if only I could level that hill between me and the nearest phone mast :(
running on fttc here and get 19Mbit downstream and 1.1 Mbit upstream, as a result it's quicker for me to copy a video file to my mobile, plonk the mobile on an upstairs windowsill and upload from that taking advantage of it's vastly faster speeds (87Mbit down 29Mbit up)
When we wanted a public wifi point in a the office last year, instead of providing a wifi router and connecting it to the RJ45 jack already there on the wall and cabled down to the basement, the guy just turned up with a small 5G wifi box and plonked it on to the window ledge. We now have decent wifi speed and no landline!
The architcture of mobile communications is built on the idea that you don't need to rely on any one mast. So even if the 'two firelighters and a pair of cotton gloves' had destroyed the mast it wouldn't -- shouldn't -- knock out service for anyone. It might inconvenience people because they're Instagram's a tad slow but that's about it.
I have a real issue with the forces of law 'n order hyping things up for the ignoranti. Sure, torching masts is stupid, it displays a very special breed of gullability and stupidity, but the people involved need help with their mental issues, not being stuck in jail for years. (After all, apart from them being likely to get infected with Covid-19 in a guranteed 5G free environment what will it do?)
> The architcture of mobile communications is built on the idea that you don't need to rely on any one mast.
True up to a point, however if you were out in the boonies, it's probably not true. What would be the point in having two masts covering every single location in the country(*). For sure you need overlap to provide continuity of service, but having call-holiding levels of coverage from multiple cells everywhere is rather wasteful.
The architecture of a mobile network is to ensure that as you move, you can maintain contact with the network to hold a call. Knock one out (and burning a site down will knock out several, in general, as they usually host 3 cells each pointing in different directions) and you risk continuity of coverage in that area.
(*) where required to by regulator coverage requirements
Whilst I technically have a landline there hasn't been anything plugged into it for many years.
In fact the "master socket" is currently located in the garage.
I'm sure I'm not alone, but am equally sure that a significant number of people have forgotten what phone numbers are for... Everything is done by contact searching nowadays.
Gone are the days when we used to know dozens of people's numbers by heart.
These nutters would REALLY be upset if the lived in my neighborhood.
A 5G tower was just erected in the middle of the playground of our local elementary school.
I did take a photo of the workers on a boom lift putting the final touches on the tower which caught their attention.
They were probably thinking I was some sort of 5G protester but in reality I only snapped a quick photo as I was walking past with the dogs because I thought it odd that the workers were attempting to disguise the 5G mast as a tree that is not native to these parts of the world.
(I wonder if these 5G protesters gave any thought to the harmful toxins that might be given off by the burning of these masts or the accelerants they used?)
It's really bad when they try to disguise it as a pine tree... in the middle of the ('effin) desert. I could see it working in the northern area of my state (arizona, US) where we do have pine trees, and even tall ones, though...
(technically, the other disguise they use (palm trees) aren't native to my area either, but the tree species that are don't grow that tall...)
>(I wonder if these 5G protesters gave any thought to the harmful toxins that might be given off by the burning of these masts or the accelerants they used?)
Given that people once (and occasionally still do) protested the excessive emissions caused by SUV's with the method of setting them on fire in car dealership lots, creating a massive polluting cloud of burning rubber, plastic and fuel in the process... no, they probably haven't.
Actually, if you DO believe that the radiation might damage children's brains (I don't), on top of a school is exactly the right place for a mast. All kids these days use phones and the transmitter by your head is the one you need to worry about more. The transmission power used is varied to be sufficient to get the signal to the mast, so the closer you are, the lower the power. In addition, the mast itself will have a pattern such that the lowest power is downwards and the highest power is aimed in the distance.
Oddly you don't see many tin hat types campaigning for masts on schools though.
My company - whilst installing some 4G infrastructure - were given the job of installing wi-fi into a school. The lads put the access points up in the appointed places, and ran the Ethernet cables into an equipment cupboard at the end of the main corridor. On their third day there, they were met by all the teachers (and a number of incensed parents) complaining that they were all suffering from various maladies including headaches, ingrowing toenails, hair loss and even curdled milk in the staff room....
They were all very embarrassed when they were shown that the Ethernet cables that ran along the walls to the cupboard weren't actually connected to anything......
Used to work in a primary school.
Installed a wifi access point in reception so that parents could jump on to check the school website or whatever.
Got yelled at by a parent about "Did I know that I'm frying young children's brains?!?!?!?".
Then watched her get in and put her kid in her 4x4, not do up her own seatbelt, pin a smartphone to her ear and drive off one-handed past all the other kids while jabbering away on it.
- then why is he being punished rather than treated.
You can't have it both ways, either he is a nutter than needs to be secured for his own and public safety or he is a rational criminal who needs locking up.
On the subject of data access and those that insist their roaming "needs" should override those who are against it, when can I come around to run my ethernet though your house?
He's nuts because he believes that 5G causes COVID, but he's also a criminal because he committed arson. He tried to cover his traces, so he knew he was doing something illegal; he's not nuts in that way. Unless you're actually incapable of understanding that you're committing a crime, your being nuts won't prevent you from getting locked-up.
Also, if you're against a public work on the basis of nothing more than sheer delusion, damn right you should be overridden. You running ethernet through my house would not be a delusion.
And in any case, in *any* case, you can't burn stuff you don't like down. If you know for a fact that a building is dumping poison, you still go through the courts, or the newspapers, or your local politicians, and if everyone tells you that you're nuts, you suck it up and live with it or move house. There is literally no circumstance where burning it down is acceptable.
What about throwing statues of slavers into the Harbour?
Metal statues tend to not burn very well[1]. Especially not when thrown in the water[2].
[1] excepting those made of magnesium, which is not very common.
[2] excepting those made of sodium, potassium and the other alkali metals, which is not very common either.
Anytime - I'll charge you £250 pcm per metre of cable inside my house for 5e. Cat6 or higher £300 per month. Setup fee £15k, as I need a new heating system, fridge freezer and oven.That's clearly not going to be of much use if you don't live in North Herts, but you can't always get what you want.
Really? Can you give me a peer-reviewed paper (or preferably more), and then maybe a review of other studies, that clearly demonstrates a deleterious effect from "5G radiation". I think you'll find it hard to come up with anything credible
What most miss it that 5G, by and large, will be using the same bands as 4G when not in dense urban environments. When it is used in dense urban areas, that's where the higher frequency bands come into play - short range, very low power - in fact made even lower by the ability to use active phased array antennas to send the power where needed rather than spaffing kilowatts in all directions from the dreaded "mast on top of a primary school" in the hope it will get to a subscriber - in all ways it's much less exposure for everyone - people near the access points and the users themselves.
Newer encoding techniques mean even in the "traditional" scenario with more remote base stations (NB, still on the same bands as 4G), you'll get a better connection with *less* power radiating into your head.
This is all just Physics and Information Theory - it's all out there to read for free, but if you choose to ignore decades experimental results and all the studies confounding EMF sensitivity (ie people would respond to a fake flashing light on a fake router almost 100% of the time and a real WiFi signal <0.1% of the time) please feel free to go and live in the wilderness and eat roadkill rather than moaning about the very tech you're using to comment here.
And what the hell your comparison with running ethernet via my house is, I have no idea - I'd love it if I could get gigabit here and share it with others. Are you using a psychic connection to el Reg by any chance?
I think you'll find that there is no such thing as "EM Proliferation". If anything, you are probably exposed to far less EMF than you were 20 years ago with only 2G phones, DECT stilll in nappies and far more local overhead cables than now. Modern electronics and software means we need far less power in watts to reach each other than we ever did. We can even communicate "below the noise floor" thanks to experimentation by both amateurs and the military. 5G is another leap in that direction, especially with microcells - instead of your phone ramping up to 5 or 10 watts to reach the cell over the hill, you'll be running microwatts to get to your nearest lamp post or traffic light. Your brain therefore should avoid the roasting that you are probably already suffering every time you call your co-conspiracy-theorist mates.
Clearly there is such a thing as "EM proliferation" or you would not have understood what I was referring to.
Also your assumption that I am a conspiracy theorist shows that you misunderstood my post, so to make things easier for you here are the points in what I hope are an easier format.
1. There is no evidence that this individual committed his act in the hope of creating terror, if you can find some then post it
2. Too many of post here against this individual are hateful, meaning full of hate. Especially so if the perpetrator is deluded.
I would add that since the mast in question was owned by Vodaphone, whom I personally see as serial thieves, then I am clearly less concerned than those that see his actions as targeting their source of income. Where I see hatred and branding shown in this thread then I will question it, as too often this kind of promoted hate has been a method used to manipulate the ignorant.
As to the effects of lifelong exposure to these particular radiations, this logically can not be known by anyone until scientifically sufficient subjects that have lived with these radiation for all their life are both dead and cleared of significant impact.
So for my part your statements and claims of knowing what you are talking about are unbelievable. This does not mean that I know either but at least I am willing to live and let live whilst waiting for impartial validation by people who have the skills and the evidence to back up their statements.
If you wanted my support then you would be better not pretending to have information that is clearly not available yet.
Lastly: Where a group acts to remove debate via vitriol and attempts to shout down the need for scientific investigation then they cannot blame people for seeing them as wanting to prevent the actual facts being known.
Yep my profits, no mobile signal I don't get money for jobs that I won't be getting
Vodafone is very aggressive at overlapping coverage so probably have to take down 3 masts per area just to cause a problem
Non ionising radio waves is below light (ghz range) its Thz range (light and above the visible spectrum) that can be more harmful
You should be more worried about light bulbs and the sun then a mobile mast (at best a mobile mast might heat you up if you hug it or closer then 1 meter to it in front of the cell, phones power output is very low as well)
Quote: As to the effects of lifelong exposure to these particular radiations, this logically can not be known by anyone until scientifically sufficient subjects that have lived with these radiation for all their life are both dead and cleared of significant impact.
And this will never be know precisely because 100% of people die at some point of many other "causes" that are in some cases educated guesses and in others "old age". Can you tell me the precise day *you* will die and from what cause? Can you give the precise sequence of events that lead to the death of those you have known who have departed? I understand the yearning for certainty, to be able to know exactly what we should seek and what we should avoid - but our universe just doesn't work like that. In fact, I think it would take the value out of all human happiness and joy if we could predict our lives with complete certainty - we have to evaluate risks and choose to accept, ignore or avoid them, and there by the grace of God go we...
Quote: So for my part your statements and claims of knowing what you are talking about are unbelievable. This does not mean that I know either but at least I am willing to live and let live whilst waiting for impartial validation by people who have the skills and the evidence to back up their statements.
I don't understand what you mean by "impartial". I get the feeling you think that means someone who agrees with you. I'll give you a clue - if a majority of well informed and qualified people using or trusting in the scientific method (not that it's always perfect - but it's sure as hell better than most other ways of predicting outcomes) disagree with you - regardless of political views or state affiliation - there stands a very high possibility that you may be mistaken and misguided. It's not certain, but highly probable.
There's a 0.00000000001% chance I'll step on a stonefish and die next time I go on holiday. I will still choose to take that holiday as the benefit outweighs the risk. I'll leave the exercise of evaluating the benefits of ubiquitous, high speed, low-latency IP connectivity versus the risks for others.
@High tension and his grace of god
I am all for acceptable risk based upon facts, I can then weight up the pros and cons and make my own decision limiting the impact of my decision like a good citizen to only myself i.e. the person who chose that route. Which is unlike the mobile phone situation where one side insists upon having what they want without regard for any impact upon those that do not. Like the ethernet cable you say that you can be bought off and that is fundamentally my issue with the people pushing for more proliferation, they do not care so long as they get their pound of flesh even if it is at someone else's expense. Where I want an honest unbiased opinion instead I am flooded by only biased ones with any that go against them being branded as we have seen here.
Science does not yet have the facts, all that is available instead is IMHO vested opinions, biased science and the desire to cash in overriding the desires of the demonised portion of society.
It really doesn't matter which side is correct if they are also wrong and this campaign of cash now regardless of cost, ignoring those that disagree is plain wrong just like it was every other time this happened.
Society is made up of everyone not just those that agree with you and if you insist upon ignoring and excluding them then you are going to see more of the behaviour discussed here. Whilst the companies that profit from this technology will be happy you can guaranty that someone is going to die if things continue as they are even if your view is correct is it worth any person's life? do your really hate anyone who disagrees with your belief that much?
Science doesn't deal in facts, buddy, that's the domain of belief systems... but it's arguably the best invention humanity has ever made.
I both guarantee someone will die if things carry on this way, and also if they don't carry on this way.
Finally, I disagree with your premise (belief) that nothing is worth a human life; I believe some are worth more than others, and certainly some are worth more *to* others. (Thought experiment, is it worth bankrupting a country to help an 80 year old rapist live in prison for another 2 months... no? OK, so now we can argue about where the line is on a case by case basis)
Anyway, back to the point: my honest, unbiased opinion is that you are either too tired, drunk, or uneducated to be here - as without addressing the merits of your argument it appears that your understanding of what science actually is, and how society judges value, is either misarticulated or lacking entirely.
@cbars
"I disagree with your premise (belief) that nothing is worth a human life" so what is your price for your own? I ask as those that do not value life equally put a much higher value on their own than others, allowing for all the monsters in history who were happy to rid the world of what they considered to be less value than themselves only for the world to be a better place with their absence.
"unbiased opinion is that you are either too tired, drunk, or uneducated to be here", show me the notification of any of your requirements to read the register beyond your own rant, after all they let you post too.
I'm sorry but you don't understand the basics of wireless and energy. Radio signals are non-ionising in that the photons don't have enough energy to have any effect on chemical bonds, to do that you need around 2ev of energy which you get from ultra-violet light which can cause skin cancer.
Below the energy level of UV light the most that could happen is you get a bit of warming of tissue like standing in sunlight and being warmed by infra-red.
If you don't want to be laughed at then I suggest that you educate yourself on the topic with ***proper*** peer reviewed papers - try looking at Google Scholar to find them. If you want to understand the scientific process then go and watch the YouTube channel "potholer54". He has some very good explanations. Not all ideas are worth a lot of effort and consideration if they aren't backed up with any evidence to support them. One example is saying "the moon is made of cheese" - nobody will take you seriously unless you have some pretty good evidence! Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.
By the way, we have had a lot of experience with the long term effects of wireless signals, even in the multi GHz region. I've been involved in design and testing of wireless systems for 35 years and have seen lots of stuff pre-dating my entry into the industry. I've had to go through the ICNIRP guidelines many times when producing safety declarations.
On the other hand you could just listen to people like David Icke who have some strange ideas (to put it mildly) with no experimental evidence to support them.
Here let me fix that for you
Radio frequency signals are traditionally non-ionising and have less energy than the frequencies higher up the EM spectrum in that single "photons" don't have enough energy to have any effect on chemical bonds ignoring completely how humans can see in a band between these two extremes and that resonance can magnify rotating effects so as to ramp up their magnitude the longer they are applied.
Not all ideas are worth of my consideration, where the evidence can only be obtained only after a lifetime then I reject the idea that evidence is possible or worth waiting for, lessons from similar scientific reaching such as lead in petrol, CRCs and asbestos etc are isolated incidents unrepresentative of science as whole and can be ignored completely or risk me having to find work in some other subject where what qualification I hold would be even more irrelevant.
By the way, we (royal?) have had a lot of experience with the long term effects of signals, admittedly not in this band or this modulation, I have been involved with wireless systems for 35 years and I am not dead yet so clearly there is nothing for anyone to fear, I have to work within some guidelines that were written before this technology existed but hey they were all just hoops they made us jump though.
I will not make any comment regarding any medical conditions of which I suffer such as need for IVF if I ever found a woman who was willing to stay still long enough nor reference to the higher incidents of insanity associated with my field.
Hey this writing nonsense is easy and I feel good about myself, if only other people would take me more seriously in real life.
Do not take this hateful post seriously as I have not but I did enjoy spouting something I am not in any way qualified to to have an opinion about.
Amaaaazing!!!! Resonance!? Well, my god, you're right!!!
How could we have been so blind?
*shouts over shoulder*
You guys, we forgot resonance!
Asbestos, CFCs (which...you've....misspelled....)... don't forget knives, we now know knives kill people too, even though "ug" said they didn't - see, another controversy *proving* that "scientists" are stupid idiots whose theories get disproved radically and in the complete opposite direction, all the time.
"As to the effects of lifelong exposure to these particular radiations, this logically can not be known by anyone until scientifically sufficient subjects that have lived with these radiation for all their life are both dead and cleared of significant impact."
Slinger/signallers who instruct tower crane operators, etc. have been using handheld transmitters close to their head for decades and I'm not aware of any adverse consequences. And those units operate at a constant power when transmitting.
Modern mobile phones have a variable power (lower power if close to a base station, higher power when further removed) which they try to minimise to make the battery last longer. So the exposure may well be lower. Furthermore the wavelengths used by 5G have long been in use (4G, TV, PMSE, etc.). That previous use didn't cause COVID so the use of these frequencies for mobile telephony won't either. (Quite apart from the fact that there is no causal link between EM radiation and viruses.)
Hateful posts?
The fact this unholy alliance of extremist right-wingers, anti-vaxxers, conspiracy-theory- spreaders and fake-potion-peddlers is gaining ground here means action is required to combat this scourge. With truth and science.
Foisting one's (baseless) belief system on others through violence or intimidation or infrastructure damage? Terrorist.
@" Foisting one's (baseless) belief system on others through violence or intimidation or infrastructure damage? Terrorist."
No a terrorist is someone who promotes terror in others so as to achieve a (usually) political goal.
This chap burned Vodaphones property because he believed that it was a health risk, whilst fire can be very dangerous in this instance it was contained without lost of life or injury being mentioned in the article.
If you are going to brand someone one then you might consider learning what your brand actually means
as to your list of people who support this then I say let evolution take its course
Someone needs to go read the definitions of terrorism from the 2006 Terrorism Act.
Violent act in persuance of a political, religious or ideological cause.
Damage to property and disruption to electronic systems are included in the list of violent acts.
Again there has to be the intent to cause terror without which the acts alone are meaningless
Damage to property- you crashed your car does automatically this make you a terrorist? disrupt electronic system by shutting down your computer, you do not seem to be getting the point.
"BTW, the guy's a violent offender with a long string of convictions including firearms offences, battery and assaulting a police officer."
Then clearly this was a preventable crime and a damning indictment of the courts, police and mental health workers, that is if what you say is true rather than just something you made up.
Post where you got the information or it didn't happen, same for your definition since this court didnt brand him thus
No need to post where this information came from regarding his large number of convictions for a larger number of offences including assault of a police officer and possession of a firearm...
... As The Register had kindly done it for you in a link to the local paper's reporting on the case right there at the top of the article.
You know it's almost as if you have an instant knee-jerk reaction to anything that anyone posts which you disagree with and rather than question yourself and maybe do all of ten seconds research, you just immediately discount it with no reason other than you don't want to believe it.
And on a different topic to those commenting on the length of his sentence, I would imagine his past convictions would have had a large part to play on this.
There was fear involved in the offense.
But the fear was his own.
Gov and Police are increasingly trying to add 'Terrorism' on to offences for (I dunno, the publicity, higher sentences or just to ramp up fear on the rest of the population).
Come to think about it, baseless labelling of offences as 'terror related' is terrorism, as it alarms and unsettles the public.
@"But naturally occuring EM" or more correctly radiation that we have evolved to live and even benefit from against the man made radiation that we have neither adapted to or have scientific knowledge sufficient to gauge the impact of.
As to food, there is some evidence to support the premise that how and where you grow food has an impact on how nutritious and beneficial it is for human consumption.
@"But naturally occuring EM" or more correctly radiation that we have evolved to live and even benefit from against the man made radiation that we have neither adapted to or have scientific knowledge sufficient to gauge the impact of.
Once again: power levels.
Never mind that the 'naturally occurring' EM radiation, especially the segment from about 700THz up isn't quite so beneficial to a lot of multicellular life forms, especially Brits, although they may not encounter this radiation in their default habitat.
Oh FFS, are you a troll or simply an imbecile? We *can not* by definition be 100% certain that B will always follow A, that the sun will rise tomorrow, that the LHC won't suck the solar system into its own black hole, that we won't all die within 1 year of COVID, that god does or doesn't exist, that it's safe to eat red meat, white meat, eggs, milk, carrots, alfalfa, or carburettors.
There is no, I repeat *no* way to say "this thing is 100% safe, for everyone, under every possible circumstance. We simply cannot be because to be 100% certain of that we'd have to know the entire future, and every possible future. The only thing we can do is:
a) observe the universe and form a conjecture
b) formally state that conjecture and propose one or more methods of testing it
c) test the above
d) ask others to retest the conjectures with the same methods to confirm or otherwise
e) the above with other documented methods
f) rinse and repeat until a pattern emerges
Even if we repeat b-f a trillion times and all the results point to the conjecture being correct, we can never say it's certain. Newton's laws of motion were seen as certain until Einstein came along.
It's just the same thing to try to say "This type of phone signal is 100% safe, forever" - we can never prove that conclusively, but we can say "on the basis of all experience so far, it is far more likely that 5G is safe than it is unsafe for general exposure".
If you find this difficult, please tell me how homeopathy and herbal medicine has never lead to any deaths worldwide (because it's natural!).
I am a scientist and I work with high-energy infrared, visible and ultraviolet lasers (1.5 exaHertz to 1.5 TeraHertz), measure molecular spectra in the GigaHertz to TeraHertz regime, and I use electronic devices emitting frequencies below GigaHertz on a daily basis -- like most modern humans you might encounter. I teach quantum mechanics and understand the science behind matter-light interaction pretty well (of course within the limits of our current scientific models). I published extensively on bio-molecular photochemistry -- that's the part where EM radiation destroys molecules and therefore might kill you.
Now, after having presented myself as a scientist, let me tell you that 5G technology will not harm you, except in fringe cases where you might hurt yourself when your drive your car into a cellphone tower. If you want to learn more, I suggest you enroll in some University program and study the matter.
Good enough?
I thought the link was going to be this one.
Whats is good for vodaphone IMHO is only a benefit to others by accident.
Oh really? It's only good for Voda because people see benefit in using their infra, sufficiently so that they are paying for access to that infra. No benefit to people -> no paying users -> Voda (and other providers) go bust.
Trolling attempt: feeble, barely passable.
Reasoning capability: none detected.
Arson (criminal damage by fire) – UK Sentencing Council
There's a 3x3 matrix on the page: 3 degrees of harm on one axis, 3 degrees of culpability on the other.
Our friend's actions here were pre-meditated (not done on impulse), there was some degree of planning, and they used accelerants, and they intended to cause serious damage. That's high culpability by the parameters on that page. The category of harm appears to be level 1 (the highest): serious physical harm caused / serious consequential economic or social impact of offence / high value of damage caused …
Looks like they could have gotten 8 years!
3 years appears non-punitive and within the parameters proper sentencing guidelines.
A kinda connected issue here, but once again it seems that the British Justice System is coming down harder on crimes against property compared with crimes against the person. i would imagine that once the Authorities catch up with the current bunch of statue-topplers the perps will banged up for a considerable time, whereas whacking and robbing granny will earn you a stiff talking to and maybe a fine (if you can afford it).
And yes, he was right to be sentenced.
Propagation of THz irradiation energy through aqueous layers: Demolition of actin filaments in living cells
Just to put things into perspective, the demolition of actin filaments in living cells described in [https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-020-65955-5] required pulsed THz radiation with 64 MW/cm**2 intensities. (80-microJoule pulses with 5 ps duration, collimated to 4 mm diameter at some 500 Hz repetition rate.) The authors themselves discuss that the resulting mechanical shock-wave affects the actin filaments, not the THz pulses themselves.
Then the authors (it's a medical journal) show their ignorance of basic physical knowledge with statements such as: "In the near future, THz waves will become a popular tool used in daily life. However, focused THz radiation might exceed the 80 μJ/cm2 energy threshold, changing actin structure. Therefore, the biological effects of THz radiation via shockwaves must be considered when defining safety standards." When parsing this statement, be aware that they used a >>$10**7 Free Electron Laser, which is pretty much the only tool we have to generate such intense but short THz pulses. Longer pulses are easier to generate (5G!), but you can't reach MW powers. It should be obvious to the physically educated reader, that generating 64 MW/cm**2 focused EM energy is not trivial; your microwave reaches some 600 W and represents the optimized tool to cook proteins.
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This post has been deleted by its author
This poor misguided fool was clearly the victim of the conspiracy theory about 5G & Covid. That theory is obviously wrong.
What the REAL 5G story here is that 5G radiation is deadly to the Lizard People. Therefore, in order to defend themselves, and cover this up, they've put about this fake story about a disease called "Covid-19", and also the conspiracy theory that it's connected to the 5G rollout.
Why do you think that the vast majority of people (ie the humans) have been unaffected? Why else is Trump sending his minions around the world trying to block the 5G rollout? Why are a number of Tory backbenchers in the UK trying to push the PM into agreeing? (Judging by the current displays of dimness, clearly the PM can't be a Lizard Person himself). Why are there all these obviously implausible anti-5G theories being pushed across the world?
The Truth is out there folks! Trust me!
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