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Oscar H. Suarez Professor Cole ENGL2010-043 08 May 2013 Danger in my pocket That day in spring 2012 the air was clear; the skies were beautiful. I was on my way to school, and having to do a long drive from Ogden to Salt Lake City, I took advantage of this time to review in my mind the topic for the English class. I was trying to focus on the reading I had done the night before about persuasion, how it is a tool to transmit messages, and expose ideas to a specific audience. My cell phone did not stop ringing that morning; this device had bothered me with calls from work, my family, and some friends. I remembered that day how our lives were before cell phones reached their popularity, and affordability. That day I realized how dependency on technology has taken me as a silent hostage. When I arrived at the campus that day, I went straight to my classroom at the Technology building located in the basement. I was thinking about our dependency on technology, and I reflected on my environment at school. Tablets, Laptops, smartphones, and other music and media portable devices surrounded me. At that point I analyzed how times change, and people as well. It is a progressive development making our lives easy, comfortable, and sometimes lazy. It provides great benefits for us, but at the same time brings us some disadvantages. That day the classroom was full of people. I noticed that the guy that was always sleeping by the back of the classroom did not show up; the cute blonde girl with the angelical smile was texting on the phone as usual, and my partner, Zach, was surfing the web while the teacher was giving us a lecture. When the class ended I went to the student center with Tim, my best friend at school, and

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Zack. It was difficult to find a good spot to connect our devices to the power outlets and hook up them to the network. The room was full of people studying, hanging out, using personal computers, or just having lunch. It nearly was impossible to find an available power outlet as there were devices plugged in everywhere. We went to a restaurant to get some tasty oriental food; the exotic specialties flooded our senses. The fest of gluttony had opened our minds to a discussion about the hidden dangers of our cell phones. We do not have these types of conversations often, but this time we were motivated to get into the same discussion we had started in the classroom about technology dependency. We were taking sides about advantages and disadvantages of our little unanimated smart devices. Tim alleged health problems related to RF (radio frequency) exposure. He said: Our cell phones emit RF waves that affect our health after prolonged use. We were wondering how it could be possible, and he said, Do you think those headaches we get sometimes are for free? We are getting exposed to these RF waves, and they are linked to cases of cerebral tumors! Zach was skeptical to Tims point of view but he added some flavor to the conversation when he remarked, I think the problem is societal, and dangerous to our health. We realized that every electronic device emits RF waves and microwave radiation, some more than others. With our bodies as direct receptors, they absorb all these invisible threats. It is up to the scientists to determine how much, and how long it takes to impact human health. Our day at campus was different that day as we broke the routine to watch some videos on YouTube, and see a few websites expanding the subject of our discussion. Internet is an independent republic and we had to be cautious looking for information to expand our knowledge on that area. We found an interesting article about cell phones and traffic accidents in the United States. Zack said, Oh, hey lets take a look to this information in Edgarsnyder.com!

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and then he started to read, over 1/3 of drivers (37%) have sent or received text messages while driving, and 18% said they do it regularly. About 13% of adult drivers have surfed the Internet while driving. Drivers using a cell phone while holding it to their ear were 5% in 2010. There were 3,092 deaths in distraction-related accidents in 2010, but the number is likely much higher in 2009. There were 5474 people killed in the U.S. because of accidents that involved distracted driving. Another 448,000 were injured. (Banjo) When he was done I exclaimed, Wow, interesting numbers! They show how we are affected by a simple call or text message bringing undesirable consequences Tim was looking for some more information on his tablet, put it on the table and said, It is not only happening with automobile drivers, cell phones are well-known to interfere with navigation systems on aircrafts, as we can remember the worst U.S. train crash in 20 years in California, which happened in 2008. The train driver was blamed for it. He was sending and receiving text messages seconds before his crowded commuter train skipped a red light and collided head-on with a freight train. (Chatterjee) We concluded that mobile phones affect us more by being distracted, and isolating us from our daily activities. The harmful effects on health are still debatable, but the discussion is on the table. Upcoming research and multiple studies will demonstrate how much RF waves and microwave radiation are dangerous to our health. Personally, I think that these radiations have harmful effects on health, but it is a cumulative process taking its time. It will affect us sooner or later. Driving back home I remembered those days when life was simple, without all those invisible threats. Every step in technology has its advantages and disadvantages, and cell phones and devices that make life easier are not an exception.

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As my day ended, my beautiful sky had vanished.

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Works Cited

Chatterjee, Syantani, Henderson Peter, and Maler Sandra. Train engineer was texting just before California crash. Reuters. Los Angeles,CA, U.S.A. October 2nd, 2008. Web. 10 Feb. 2013 <http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/10/02/us-usa-train-crash-idUSN0152835520081002>

"Cell Phone & Texting Accident Statistics." Edgarsnyder.com. Web. 10 Feb. 2013. <http://www.edgarsnyder.com/car-accident/cell-phone/cell-phone-statistics.html>.