🚀 go-pugleaf

> From: diego@minerva.st.dsi.unimi.it (Diego Montefusco)
> Subject: Re: LEGAL: Epilepsy health warnings
> 
> I recall that everyone suffering from epilepsy has some kind of "critical"
> frequency, which (if I recall right) is the one her/his brain works at when
> having a crisis (sp?). If s/he gets a visual stimulation at the frequency,
> like when driving in a straight road with trees on the sides and the sun
> appearing and disappearing through the trees, an epileptic attack can be
> induced.
> Maybe they should put warnings on the trees too! :-)
> 
> Disclaimer: I am talking about things I read a LONG ago, so I may have
> completely distorted the meaning...

No, you pretty well got it right. I have someone in my family who 
has suffered exactly this. It is now under control with mild drugs.

Possibly more worrying to people who get frazzled by the flickering 
images of a Nintendo is that they may be branded for life as being
an `epileptic' (no qualifiers). If they go to apply for their Driver's
Licence, and mention `epileptic', they'll most likely get a big
red stamp across their application banning them for life. Not very
nice if they only get tweaked by Nintendos.

I recall some literature saying that if you put people into a 
*closed feedback loop* with an oscillating stimulus, such that the
brain's own waves are used to synchronise the stimulus, then 
ONE IN TWO of the population suffer epileptic-type fits. So it's
a little dangerous to label people `epileptic' without a qualifier.
You'll be including half the population of your country if you do.

Lesson: If someone goes a little wonky after being in your virtual
world, take them into a confidential area before talking to them
about `epileptic fits'. Ignorance is still widespread.

John

----------------------------------------------------------------------------
John P. Costella              School of Physics, The University of Melbourne
jpc@tauon.ph.unimelb.edu.au         Tel: +61 3 543-7795, Fax: +61 3 347-4783
----------------------------------------------------------------------------