The most profound effect on my life is the renewed realization that I live in a society that is fundamentally illiterate when it comes to science and technology.

For starters… what the bleeping foghorn is “5G tower radiation”?

Fifth-generation cellular technology is fundamentally about two things: A broadening of the standard, allowing increased bandwidth, smaller cells, more adaptive coverage; and the use of parts of the radio spectrum that were previously not used, or not used for cellular radio communication.

Ultimately, it is plain old radio. The fact that it is used to encode high-speed data makes no difference.

The typical transmitting power of a mobile cellular device is measured in the tens or hundreds of milliwatts. A small flashlight, in other words. The typical transmitting power of a cellular tower is more, but not much more: A few ten watts, maximum, usually a lot less. In comparison with conventional broadcast (analog radio and television was often broadcast by transmitters in the several hundred kilowatt or even megawatt range) this is nothing.

The “radiation” itself consists of very low energy photons. Even at the very high frequency of 90 GHz, individual photons have energies of less than 60 microelectronvolts.

What does this mean? Well, let me compare it to a far more deadly form of electromagnetic radiation, one that, unlike 5G cellular radio, actually does kill people. This radiation has photon energies that can be as high as a few tenths of an electron volt. Let me tell you what this radiation is, named in the same spirit as “5G tower radiation”: it is stove radiation. Invisible waves of electromagnetic energy that come from stoves and, at sufficient power, can kill you.

Yes, heat. Thermal radiation.

Or how about lamp radiation? With photon energies that exceed the energies of stove radiation photons by another order of magnitude?

Oh, you are not afraid of lamplight. But “5G tower radiation”…

Don’t let scientifically illiterate scaremongerers fool you. It’s just low power radio.