During the winter it’s sometimes nice to microwave your undergarments for extra warmth but I was told that radiation can still be lurking within the underwear when putting them on, which can lead to health problems as bad as becoming infertile. Is this true?
No.
Although I suppose if they’re wet you could burn yourself, and if they’re not you could set them on fire.
Only if your butt is still in them.
When you microwave your food, are you concerned when you eat it that there may still be radiation lurking in it?
If not, then why would it lurk in your underwear?
In a certain highly convoluted sense, what you said is nearly true. It’s simply the case that heat will be radiating from the underpants into your crotch, and higher crotch temperatures may be associated with a reduced sperm count. But that’s certainly not what you were apparently concerned about.
There’s often confusion about the issue, but microwave radiation is not dangerous in the same way that X-rays or nuclear radiation is. Really it’s not a lot more dangerous than an incandescent lightbulb, which is also radiation, but most of the time people call it just “light” and “infrared”.
That said, don’t microwave your underpants while you’re still wearing them.
Or while someone else is wearing them; in case that wasn’t clear.
The defining characteristic of radiation is that it radiates. Radiation, of any sort, cannot “lurk” in anything. Radioactive material, which is one possible source of radiation, can in principle lurk in things, but microwave ovens in no way involve radioactive material, the radiation they produce is completely different than the radiation produced by radioactive material, and can no more render material radioactive than you can knock someone over across the room by blowing at them. In fact, ordinary visible light like you get from a light bulb, a fire, or the Sun is much closer to the sort of radiation produced by radioactive material than the radiation produced by a microwave oven is.
Welcome to the Dope, Shabbyskunk. I like your OP. I’d be more worried about you setting fire to your underpants in the microwave.
Microwaves don’t use “radiation” in the sense that most people use the word. The word “radiation” to most folks means ionizing radiation, which is stuff like X-rays and gamma rays. Despite the fact that we often say you “nuke” food in a microwave, the microwave oven doesn’t use anything that we would call “nuclear” at all.
Electromagnetic radiation is a whole bunch of stuff. At low frequencies, you’ve got long waves, which are useful for transmitting data at very slow speeds through polar ice, and not much else. As you go up in frequency, you have radio waves, microwaves (which are just higher frequency radio waves), infra-red light, visible light, ultra-violet light, X-rays, gamma rays, and cosmic rays. Part way through the ultra-violet part of the spectrum, electromagnetic radiation becomes “ionizing” which means that it can strip the electrons off of atoms and create ions. Ionizing radiation is bad stuff. It causes cancer. It’s the stuff in sunlight that causes your dashboard to fade. Non-ionizing radiation is much less dangerous. Microwaves are even safer than visible light, since it is lower in frequency. Is your underwear dangerous after you shine a flashlight on it? It’s even less dangerous after it comes out of the microwave. X-rays, gamma rays, and cosmic rays are all bad. Radio waves, microwaves, and visible light are all non-ionizing, and won’t do bad things to you like ionizing radiation will.
Microwaves cook food because you’ve got an awful lot of them shoved into a tiny box. Visible light can cook food, too. You wouldn’t want to be inside of a microwave oven (assuming that you could fit) and you wouldn’t want to stand directly in front of a Hollywood style spotlight either. Both will cook you.
Think of a microwave as just a radio transmitter inside a box, because that’s all it is. There’s no “radiation” left over when you turn it off any more than there would be “radiation” left over if you turned off a walkie-talkie.
I used to microwave underpants and socks all the time before we had a tumble dryer. As long as you only put them in for a very short amount of time, they won’t burn. Test different times with a pair you don’t really care about and keep an eye on them. They don’t retain warmth for very long, IME, let alone radiation.
But don’t microwave anything metallic obviously, like a bra with underwiring, unless you want a modern-day take on burning your bra.
As a nitpick, most cosmic rays are particles like protons, not light, and the cosmic rays that are light are just considered gamma rays, not their own category.
As an aside, how does underwear even get warmed by the microwave? I thought it needed some substance that was excitable by microwaves like liquids or proteins. Neither of which sound very pleasant to have in underwear that you put into the same appliance that I used to heat up my leftover chimichangas.
Just don’t fart while wearing them.
I would just toss them into the dryer instead. But only because underwear is not food-grade and I would be a little concerned about them being less than perfectly clean if they’ve been worn once and washed.
Really, all you need is complicated molecules (where by “complicated”, I mean more complicated than diatomic), and the cellulose in cotton, or whatever makes up the synthetic fibers, would probably work just fine.
Any electrically asymmetric molecule reacts at least a little to microwaves. Water is very common and very asymmetric, so it reacts better than most things, but just try putting an empty ceramic or plastic mug in the microwave. It will still get hot.
Of course, there’s water in virtually everything. A dry pair of clothes probably has some residual water from washing, and would be picking up humidity from the air in any event.
When there are no moisture molecules in the MW and you turn it on it puts stress on the system. The MW will overheat and the underwear, if dry, may catch fire. It’s always best in the case of warming something dry to place a small amount of water in the MW as well, and don’t boil it all over your shorts.
Since we’re being nitpicky, the various categories are somewhat arbitrary and don’t usually have a clear dividing line between them. If you look around, you’ll find that some references have a separate category for cosmic rays, and some don’t.
Here’s one that doesn’t list cosmic rays: http://www.kollewin.com/EX/09-15-03/electromagnetic-spectrum.jpg
Here’s one that does: http://www.psych.ndsu.nodak.edu/mccourt/Psy460/Light%20as%20a%20stimulus%20for%20vision/electromagnetic%20spectrum.JPG
Here’s one that lists “cosmic and gamma” rays: http://www.lpi.usra.edu/education/fieldtrips/2005/activities/ir_spectrum/images/emspectrum.jpg
Similarly, you’ll also find some references that list microwaves as a separate category, and others that combine them with radio waves.
Since it’s all kinda arbitrary, I picked the way I learned it in school some 30 years ago. If you don’t like it, use your own version. There’s plenty to choose from.
Maybe spritz it first with water or febreze or something? Unless febreze is flammable…