Topic: hematite icon bracelets

[Salpy]

Festal Creations has come out with some beautiful icon bracelets.  They have an Eastern Orthodox saints bracelet, a Coptic saints bracelet, an Armenian saints bracelet, and a bracelet with crosses from different Orthodox traditions.  I just got a couple of bracelets through the mail, and I noticed that they are made of hematite.  I also noticed that the hematite seems a little magnetic. 

I heard a while back that magnets can do something to harm your computer.  Is that true?  Can hematite harm my computer?  Should I not wear a hematite icon bracelet while working on the computer?  Or is the "magnets can hurt computers" thing just an old wives tale?

[Entscheidungsproblem]

Generally, you should keep magnets away from computers, in particular, away from the Hard Drive.  Induced voltage could also hurt some of the more delicate transistors as well.  If the magnet is weak and you are not tinkering with the internals of the computer, you should be fine though.

EDIT:  Off topic but... are there any pictures of these bracelets online?  I'd love to see what they look like!

[Salpy]

I don't think the bracelets are on the website yet, but if you e-mail them, they'll e-mail you their flyer.

http://www.festalcreations.com/

[Entscheidungsproblem]

I don't think the bracelets are on the website yet, but if you e-mail them, they'll e-mail you their flyer.

http://www.festalcreations.com/

Thanks!

[Salpy]

So now people at church are telling me that wearing a magnetic bracelet will help cure arthritis and other ills of the joints.  Any truth to that one? 

[ozgeorge]

So now people at church are telling me that wearing a magnetic bracelet will help cure arthritis and other ills of the joints.  Any truth to that one? 

"Magnetotherapy" is a common "Alternative Therapy", which, like many "Alternative Therapies" has no scientific basis.
But no evidence of benefit is not evidence of no benefit.

[Myrrh23]

You know, for some reason, I am repulsed by the mineral hematite. Can't stand it.

[Salpy]

I guess it's a matter of taste.  I kind of think it is elegant looking.  I think it was popular in Victorian times.

OK, so let me get this straight:

1.  A really strong magnet can break your computer, but a weak magnetic bracelet worn on the wrist while using your computer shouldn't hurt it;

2.  There is no proof either way about magnets helping arthritis.

Cool.  Thanks everyone.   

[chrevbel]

You know, for some reason, I am repulsed by the mineral hematite. Can't stand it.

It's magnetic.  Maybe you're only repulsed by one side?

[Salpy]

You know, for some reason, I am repulsed by the mineral hematite. Can't stand it.

It's magnetic.  Maybe you're only repulsed by one side?

I just got the joke.  That's pretty good.   

[Alveus Lacuna]

It's magnetic.  Maybe you're only repulsed by one side?

I just spotted a lurker!

[Salpy]

O.K. This has less to do with technology and more to do with the bracelets, but I just had to share.

The company that makes the bracelets is coming out with new versions in late May.  In addition to the ones mentioned above, there'll be bracelets for Serbian Saints, British/Irish Saints, Bodiless Powers, Christ Icons, Theotokos Icons, Women Saints, and North American Saints.  Cool.

I'm getting a lot of people at my church's bookstore asking for the Armenian Saints bracelets.  I think among other things, the old ladies feel it is helping with their arthritis.  They ask "Magnees eh?"  When I affirm it is magnetic, they smile.  I don't make any representations about what the hematite may or may not do for them, but they all seem to have their own ideas.   

[Salpy]

So now someone is telling me that wearing a hematite bracelet on the same arm as my watch will hurt my watch.  Has anyone else heard that?

[Entscheidungsproblem]

So now someone is telling me that wearing a hematite bracelet on the same arm as my watch will hurt my watch.  Has anyone else heard that?

I doubt it, since I have seen hematite used in women's watch bands.

[Salpy]

So now there's the question as to whether the bracelet will hurt a pace maker.  I should just tell people to ask their doctor, right?

[Salpy]

Wow!  It seems magnets can help fight cancer:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/healthnanotechnologycancer

PARIS (AFP) – Tiny magnetic discs just a millionth of a metre in diameter could be used to used to kill cancer cells, according to a study published on Sunday.
Laboratory tests found the so-called "nanodiscs", around 60 billionths of a metre thick, could be used to disrupt the membranes of cancer cells, causing them to self-destruct.
The discs are made from an iron-nickel alloy, which move when subjected to a magnetic field, damaging the cancer cells, the report published in Nature Materials said.
One of the study's authors, Elena Rozhlova of Argonne National Laboratory in the United States, said subjecting the discs to a low magnetic field for around ten minutes was enough to destroy 90 percent of cancer cells in tests.
In a commentary on the report, Jon Dobson of Keele University in Britain said antibodies could be used to direct the discs towards tumour cells.
"This provides an elegant and rapid technique for targeting tumour destruction without the side effects associated with systemic treatments such as chemotherapy," Dobson wrote.


Not that the hematite bracelets would kill cancer cells--I'm sure the magnets in the study were specially designed--but it's fascinating that magnets can be used for so many things.

[ytterbiumanalyst]

Cool! Yes, we've been using magnets in medicine for a long time. I once had to undergo a diagnostic test called a Magnetic Resonance Image. Most of you would know it by its acronym: MRI.

However, it seems every scientific advancement spawns a thousand rumours. Medical misinformation is everywhere, and Dr. Internet is the world's most influential quack.

[FatherGiryus]

Well, I find it interesting that magnets are supposed to help the body when, in fact, we live on a giant magnet called the earth.  It's magnetic force is so strong it can be measured with the crudest of instruments.  We also are effected by strong magnetic forces from the moon (we call them 'tides').  So, I'm not sure how Hematite can effect the body with much stronger forces in our environment.

However, cows find magnets very helpful when installed in the stomachs to prevent ingested barbed wire from passing entirely through the digestive track (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cow_magnet).  I'm all for those kind of magnets.  If a little magnetism helps, a lot more should be even more helpful.  The trick will be swollowing a a 3" bar of iron. 

[Quinault]

My biological father gave my brothers and I cow magnets when we were kids. He grew up bucking bales on farms as a kid and knew how fun they were to play with I guess.

[orthonorm]

For all intents in purposes hematite is not a magnet nor is it magnetic, not in any meaningful sense for us everyday folks:

Hematite is an antiferromagnetic material below the Morin transition at 250 K, and a canted antiferromagnet or weakly ferromagnetic above the Morin transition and below its Néel temperature at 948 K, above which it is paramagnetic.

The magnetic structure of a-hematite was the subject of considerable discussion and debate in the 1950s because it appeared to be ferromagnetic with a Curie temperature of around 1000 K, but with an extremely tiny moment (0.002 µB). Adding to the surprise was a transition with a decrease in temperature at around 260 K to a phase with no net magnetic moment. It was shown that the system is essentially antiferromagnetic but that the low symmetry of the cation sites allows spin–orbit coupling to cause canting of the moments when they are in the plane perpendicular to the c axis. The disappearance of the moment with a decrease in temperature at 260 K is caused by a change in the anisotropy which causes the moments to align along the c axis. In this configuration, spin canting does not reduce the energy.[7][8]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hematite#Magnetism

For all intents and purposes, "hematite" is a magnet and is magnetic even for us everyday folks, because it ain't probably hematite you are wearing. You are wearing hematine:

Hematine (also magnetic hematite, hemalyke or hemalike) is an artificial version of hematite. Hematine is widely used in jewellery.

Although it is claimed by many that it is made from ground hematite or iron oxide mixed with a resin, analysis has proven it to be an entirely artificial compound, a barium-strontium ferrite[1]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hematine

FWIW.

And I have never heard or read of "magnetism" from the moon having anything to do with tidal motion. As I understand it, it has pretty much been known since Newton that tidal motion is a function of gravitational force. That insight has just been refined ever since.

Again FWIW.



 

[Suryoyutho]

Any new places to buy icon bracelets? I found some Coptic ones but either they don't ship to Sweden or they don't have any left and they seem inactive on filling up stock.

I tried to mail festal but it doesn't deliver the mail so I'm guessing the mail user/address has been deleted.

[Nephi]

Any new places to buy icon bracelets? I found some Coptic ones but either they don't ship to Sweden or they don't have any left and they seem inactive on filling up stock.

I tried to mail festal but it doesn't deliver the mail so I'm guessing the mail user/address has been deleted.

While I haven't ordered any myself, have you seen this site?

It has a number of icon bracelets, including both EO and OO (Coptic, Armenian).

[Suryoyutho]

While I haven't ordered any myself, have you seen this site?

It has a number of icon bracelets, including both EO and OO (Coptic, Armenian).

Thank you but unfortunately it doesn't look like they ship to Europe (besides UK).

[Shanghaiski]

Tonight, I hope I dream about magnetic cows and awake tomorrow morning in a world purged of stupid icon bracelets.

[LBK]

Tonight, I hope I dream about magnetic cows and awake tomorrow morning in a world purged of stupid icon bracelets.

Hear hear!! I thought I was the only one who thinks icon bracelets are disrespectful, irreverent and unnecessary.

[Salpy]

I tried to mail festal but it doesn't deliver the mail so I'm guessing the mail user/address has been deleted.

The website has not been updated in a long time.  The company has a new e-mail address:

festalcreations@verizon.net

I can't say for sure, but I have the impression they will mail to Europe.  I would e-mail them at the new e-mail address to ask for sure.

[Suryoyutho]

Salpy, thank you!

Shanghaiski, I hear you. If I buy one I probably won't use it like most other people. I don't even wear a cross normally.