Tinfoil Hats

Pop off to the nuthouse:

The head of a prominent cancer research institute issued an unprecedented warning to his faculty and staff Wednesday: Limit cell phone use because of the possible risk of cancer.

The warning from Dr. Ronald B. Herberman, director of the University of Pittsburgh Cancer Institute, is contrary to numerous studies that don't find a link between cancer and cell phone use, and a public lack of worry by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.

"Really at the heart of my concern is that we shouldn't wait for a definitive study to come out but err on the side of being safe rather than sorry later," Herberman said.

"Although the evidence is still controversial, I am convinced that there are sufficient data to warrant issuing an advisory to share some precautionary advice on cell phone use," he wrote in his memo.

So basically what you're saying is: Forget rigor. Forget the scientific method. Forget the huge preponderance of studies which found no causal linkage whatsoever. In fact, forget everything because you've got an opinion.

What about those magnetic resonance imaging monstrosities into which you oncologists love to shove your patients? How many orders of magnitude stronger is the magnetic field they generate compared to the average cell phone?

This is the same sort of "precautionary principle" crap which environmentalists use to beat businessmen and politicians over the head, and it has precisely as much validity here -- i.e., zero.

Dr. Ron is in the same category as the nutcases who think power lines kill their babies, and bedfellow to that astronut who says governments are hiding little green men from us. Education is no guarantee of intelligence or mental stability, and people such as they prove the point. What is your doctorate in, Ron? Accounting?

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(Hat-tip to Banduar)