Tinfoil Hat - Where did this expression come from?

[Hosnon]

I was watching "Friends" Season 1 w/my girlfriend last night and Phoebe gave a homeless woman $1000 (karma-related). The homeless woman offered her a tinfoil hat in return.

Is that the origin of the expression?

[geek tragedy]

1. Tinfoil has are supposed to reflect the mind control beams that the CIA

has installed in satellites in outer space.

[Hosnon]

7. Ah I see...so the "Friends" reference and the use by DUers are both

the result of an earlier cause.

Gracias.

[shoelace414]

2. I'm not sure of the origin but..

the tin foil hat is so the aliens can't read your mind.

but if you put the silver side on the inside.. it prvent your brain waves from leaking out and be able to be read.

[Chicago Democrat]

3. That movie.... War of the Worlds? where the aliens are invading

and one guy wear a tin foil hat to keep safe... its so funny! Not been around long

[wicket]

6. Signs

Signs with Mel Gibson and Joaquin Phoenix.

[Chicago Democrat]

15. That was a good movie

:)

[rkc3]

19. Try this review on for size (in my defense - never saw the movie).

http://www.thebestpageintheuniverse.net/c.cgi?u=signs

[Chicago Democrat]

20. Hilarious!!

droll!

[wicket]

31. LOL!!!!

:rofl:

[FtWayneBlue]

30. Also "Conspiracy Theory" n/t

[dogday]

27. Keeps the aliens out of your head

[Connie_Corleone]

4. From my understanding

The tinfoil hat is to keep aliens from reading your mind.

[Egalitariat]

5. I think it's from weirdos who think tinfoil hats will keep aliens

from controlling their minds. I see it from time to time in old SCI-FI movies.

[dooner]

8. more than you ever need to know about tinfoil hats here...

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

[beam me up scottie]

9. Check out Wikipedia

***************
Tin-foil hat
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.
(Redirected from Tinfoil hat)

A tin-foil hat, also tinfoil hat, is a piece of headgear worn for the purpose of protecting the brain from such influences as electromagnetic fields, or as a shield against mind control and/or mind reading. Actual tin-foil hats are very rarely used, since the injuries they might guard against are highly speculative, and their effectiveness in preventing such harm would be dubious even if the danger were plausible. Instead, the concept has become a popular stereotype and term of derision; in Internet culture, the phrase (sometimes as the abbreviation "TFH") serves as a byword for paranoia.
****************

more at:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinfoil_hat

[Jersey Devil]

10. The ultimate tinfoil hat website

And, by the way, "tinfoil hat" is slang for the highly scientific and quite effective "Aluminum Foil Deflector Beanie".

http://zapatopi.net/afdb.html

[RaleighNCDUer]

13. Oh, that is a wonderful site.

Thank you.

[Chicago Democrat]

11. from wikipedia

Tin-foil hats in pop culture
The paranoid centaur Foaly, in Eoin Colfer's Artemis Fowl series of books, wears a tin-foil hat to protect from mind-readers.
In an episode of The Simpsons, Bart (while paranoid under the influence of a drug to cure hyperactivity called "Focusin") wears a tin-foil hat.
In the film Lovesick, Dudley Moore plays a psychiatrist who gives a homeless patient some aluminum foil to "protect" the patient from the "mind control rays" his patient claims are bombarding him.
In Total Recall, the hero (Douglas Quaid, played by Arnold Schwarzenegger) wraps a wet towel around his head to stop outgoing radiowaves from a transmitter inside his head.
In Signs, the children and younger brother of the lead character wear tin-foil hats to prevent their minds from being read.
In the X-Men movies, Magneto wears a helmet that prevents Stryker's son (in X2) and Professor X (in X-Men and X2) from using telepathy against him.
Tin-foil hats are often referenced on Internet forums.

[Deep13]

12. The head-gear you reference is properly called ...

...a magnetic-deflective, aluminum folding helmet.

The Air Force buys them for about $800 each.

[RaleighNCDUer]

14. I first heard of them way back in the 70s.

But they didn't become chic until the 90s.

[Hosnon]

16. THANKS EVERYONE - Knowledge: +1; Ignorance: -1....nt

[truebrit71]

17. I remember seeing it referenced in an episode of Starsky and Hutch....

..way, way, waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay back......

[LongTomH]

24. I saw it in an old, old episode of McLeod

with Dennis Weaver. I think this was back in the '70s.

[Enraged_Ape]

34. That's where I first saw it too. Starsky and Hutch, 1975.

A killer wore tinfoil on his head to avoid mind-control beams.

[Igel]

18. My wife's parents have a tinfoil-hat wearing neighbor.

Some cell phone provider is putting up a tower to improve coverage in the back country area they live in; she's fought it for a couple of years, and finally lost.

So she's going to be moving soon. She's being "forced" to, since the "cell phone towers" are actually mind-reading devices and mind-control towers. And, as she says, the tinfoil she wears (literally) can't provide complete protection *that* close to a tower--they've altered tinfoil in the last decade to weaken it's anti-mind-control properties, you see--and she can't keep it on 24 hours a day. She'll have to move even farther from Apache Junction.

[pelagius]

21. Believing that someone is reading your thoughts...

...or that you are in contact with someone through some sort of otherwise normal technology (radio waves, cell towers, TVs, etc.) is a classic symptom of schizophrenia.

A close childhood friend of mine descended into this madness and it was quite heartbreaking to hear him describe himself as "the head of the head of the FBI" in contact with his agents through his electric toothbrush. It was also damn funny in a twisted way.

He had enough lucidity to commit himself to an institution when he got worried he was going to hurt someone. I visited every month for a year and then he was so far gone he didn't recognize me or anyone else. That was twenty years ago. He died last year at the age of 46 by his own hand.

[Igel]

23. Sorry to hear about your friend.

My in-laws' neighbors pleasant enough, as long as you don't mention the government, and functions well enough as a rural housewife. Her husband humors her, probably too much. He also mostly keeps her out of trouble.

[DistressedAmerican]

25. My Grandparents Live There. No Foil That I Know Of Though!

[DemonFighterLives]

22. Tinfoilhats are necessary to read and understand conspiracy theories

I typically use it for that. The freepers think all dems. believe CTs and are moonbats who wear tinfoilhats. Whatever they say, it sure beats believing lies. :tinfoilhat:

[oscar111]

26. sixties first usage?

i recall the

WHOLE EARTH CATALOGUE

had an entry where a fellow lined his apartment with aluminum foil to prevent mind damage from rays.

think it was in WEC

THE article did not call him crazy, reported it as straight news story.

is this the earliest source?

bet many crazos had the same idea independently as soon as radio-telegraphy came into existence, about ?? 1875.

Independent multiple invention is found often by cultural anthropologists, to the chagrin of "single-origin" fanatics .. such S.O. fanatics are often provincialistic RW types. Racists for example.

I find Reynolds Wrap works best.

{just joking}

[ElsewheresDaughter]

28. meow

[Straight Shooter]

29. I don't know, I swear I don't know.

Why do you ask? Are you with the CIA? :tinfoilhat:

[Minstrel Boy]

32. "Don't Call Me Crazy on the Fourth of July"

http://www-personal.umich.edu/~pell/

Excellent documentary about Robert Lansberry, which can be viewed online.

Crazy, or an experimental subject? I don't know. But the experiments exist.

[patcox2]

33. Genuine schizophrenics have amazingly similar delusions.

Many schizophrenics have very very similar delusions, they think that someone or something has implanted some kind of a mind-reading transmitter in their body (anus, teeth) and that it reads their thoughts and transmits their thoughts to some secret group involved in some kind of conspiracy, and they do, really, often beleive that by lining things with tinfoil, they can block the transmission of their thoughts and prevent the secret conspiracy from reading them.

[gauguin57]

35. If you haven't discovered "Coast to Coast" (late-night UFO show), you must

http://www.coasttocoastam.com

In the wee hours, I tune to the AM station in my area that airs right-wing wacko radio all day ... and get this GREAT show that talks about UFOs, paranormal happenings, crystal skulls, government conspiracies, Rosswell -- all kinds of stuff.

The callers are priceless, and the host, George Noory, validates EVERYTHING they say, no matter how far out.

Tune in, put on your tinfoil hat and HAVE A BALL!

A recent topic has been the inordinate number of pets escapting and winding up in humane shelters in the area of the New Madrid Fault (the mid-America fault that is supposed to have the potential for horrible quake damage (worse than the San Andreas)). George is sure the fault is about to blow, because the animals KNOW. If it does, I'm taking my tinfoil hat off and just let the aliens have their way with me!