Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP
Path: utzoo!utgpu!water!watnot!watmath!clyde!cbatt!gatech!lll-lcc!seismo!hao!hull
From: hull@hao.UUCP
Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga
Subject: Monitor degaussers and Micro Floppies
Message-ID: <560@hao.UCAR.EDU>
Date: Sat, 28-Feb-87 11:35:13 EST
Article-I.D.: hao.560
Posted: Sat Feb 28 11:35:13 1987
Date-Received: Sun, 1-Mar-87 13:32:49 EST
References: <847@crash.CTS.COM> <1111@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu>
Organization: High Altitude Obs./NCAR, Boulder CO
Lines: 40
Summary: minimum standard for degaussing radiation

In article <1111@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu>, page@ulowell.cs.ulowell.edu (Bob Page) writes:
> You should check other things.  First is disk quality.  Second is
> proximity to the monitor degaussing circuits and other electromagnetic
> fields - tipping the *amiga* up could bring it too close to these
> circuits.  Other suggestions: air flow (heat problems, dirt),
> direct sunlight, etc.

Holy Bit Map Batman!  This never occurred to me, and I work with this stuff
all the time.  Ok.  So how many times can one subject a floppy disk to
monitor turn-on (Say, with the disk sitting on top of the monitor, fer
instance) before the disk goes bits-up?  Has anyone out there done an
experiment with this?  I don't want to re-invent the wheel, but it might
be time to get out the gaussimeter...   Although this has nothing to do with
ionizing radiation, or even microwaves - I am reminded of the following:

"There may in fact be no safe level for ionizing radiation.  It could be that
  any amount does some damage.  But due to diploidal genes, the human body has
  a much greater resistance to ionizing radiation than most of us realize.
  Usually, cells along the particle track just die outright.  Other than that,
  minor damage is repaired as the cell reproduces by pairing protines in the
  manufacture of the needed DNA.  But there is a very thin zone somewhere
  within the ion track where, due to multiple damage sites distributed along
  the gene, irreparable damage is done.  Various functions of the cell are
  permanently altered, usually for the worse; where this puts a cell at a
  disadvantage, subsequent generations die out.  If the replication control
  is damaged, it may give that cell an advantage over other others in it's
  reproduction, even though other functions may be impaired.  Such cells are
  known as pre-malignant cells, and may do no harm until stress kills healthy
  cells and forces the damaged cells to reproduce.  Then you get cancer.  So
  the best advice is avoid unnecessary stress on the body as may be caused by
  cigarettes, alcohol, and other carcinogens - and stay away from ionizing
  radiation.  All considered, it's just a matter of how long you'll last..."
             [Remembered from a conversation with Ed Martell.]
Although smokers and non-smokers alike die of many of the same diseases, the
average life span for smokers is less by something like ten years...
								Howard Hull
[If yet unproven concepts are outlawed in the range of discussion...
                   ...Then only the deranged will discuss yet unproven concepts]
	{ucbvax!hplabs | decvax!noao | mcvax!seismo | ihnp4!seismo} !hao!hull
	for domain mailers, hull@hao.ncar.edu