I'm not on the asa list but Keith forwarded this one to me:
> >From: "Steve Bishop" <stevebishop_uk@hotmail.com>
> >Many cancers can now be traced back to pollutants which in turn can be
> >traced back to human misuse of creation. There is also a strong correlation
> >between childhood leukaemia and the proximity of overhead powercables.
> >Floods in Bangladesh can be traced back to human mismanagement of the
> >environment, be it deforestation or the escalating greenhouse effect. The
> >flu virus that killed millions after World War I was a direct consequence of
> >the use of mustard gas during the war. The mustard gas mutated the flu
> >virus and thus it was unknown to the human immune system.
> >
I cannot speak to mustard gas or Bangladeshi floods, but there is
certainly NOT a "strong correlation" btwn human cancers of any
sort and power line proximity. Each human epidemiologic study
that has been done since '79 with increasingly better exposure
assessment methodology has come up with weaker and weaker
associations, and none of the many laboratory studies of cells or
whole animals supports a correlation btwn electric or magnetic
fields and cancer. Please be careful interpreting your science from
the popular press, especially if it involves human epidemiology.
The science is far too complicated to get interpreted correctly in
the popular press. If you'd like references etc for this particular
topic, go to IEEE COMAR's website:
http://www.seas.upenn.edu/~kfoster/comar.htm
and scroll down to COMAR Reports.
> >
> >God is not responsible for natural evils, it is largely human mismanagement
> >of the stewardship of creation.
A statement with which I generally agree, but it is probably
necessary to clarify our mutual lists of "natural evils".
Ruth
Ruth Douglas Miller, Assistant Professor
Electrical and Computer Engineering, 261 Rathbone Hall
Kansas State University, Manhattan, KS 66506-5204
ph: 785-532-4596; fx: 785-532-1188
rdmiller@eece.ksu.edu
WWW: http://www.eece.ksu.edu/~rdmiller/home.html
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