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Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

benkuhn.net

211–220 of 317 posts

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#211
post #134

(Michael from f.lux): this kind of thing is necessary for most buildings, because otherwise people don't get a "day" signal when they spend time indoors. Most of us spend >90% of our time inside. However, we shouldn't mess with light levels like these (or even somewhat lower ones) without some limits, and the main one is some automatic timing to turn things down after it gets too late. Otherwise you will find yoursel…

Are there any lamp brands you can recommend that allow me to set the bulb temperature, but that don't require an internet connected hub and app on my phone? So RF or something.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#212
post #117

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I fit the pattern of "Non-24 Sleep-Wake Disorder", with my sleep and waking times drifting progressively later at semi-regular intervals. This is a disorder now? I thought that's just how humans worked. It's how I work, anyway - if nothing else (like work, or children waking up at 5:30am) forces me to get up at a set time, I'll slowly cycle through until I'm going to bed at sun-up and waking up at 3pm.

I also thought it was normal. Once for a couple of weeks I worked and slept as I felt like it. I ended up doing ~30h days. It was the best I’ve ever felt while being quite productive. Unfortunately it’s not an option to do that long term.

It's great as long as you have no need to deal synchronously with any other humans.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#213
post #195
post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A lot of them have very strict routines about going inside and using super-dark curtains at particular times. I've gotten to email some people above 60N and it is just what they do. In the old Aschoff "bunker" studies where people allowed to keep the lights on as long as they wished, they concluded the human clock was 25.1 hours. We know this isn't true if you provide a proper light-dark cycle, it's much closer to 24…

I grew up at 66N (Northern Iceland), for what it's worth blackout curtains are rare to nonexistent there in my experience. Sometimes bedroom curtains don't even cover the whole window, and during parts of the year it's daylight outside 24/7. When I've traveled there with foreigners who grew up at more southern latitudes with year-round "normal" day/night cycles I've sometimes had to tape black trash bags to the bedro…

In Spain we have lots of problems and room for improvement in many issues, but one thing I can be proud of is that the vast majority of homes have blinds that close completely and get zero light in. I often wonder why it isn't like this elsewhere, and especially in northern places where it would be especially convenient (I get that it's possible to adapt, but wouldn't it be nicer to be able to sleep in any position?)

Of course, the problem with this is that I'm totally spoiled and when I travel abroad (1), I can almost never sleep well. Hotel rooms in most countries have blackout curtains but if you're used to Spanish blinds, even those let a lot of light in from the edges. And don't get me started about LEDs...

(1) PS: Now that I come to think of it, I don't sleep well when I travel within Spain either... curiously, people's homes have blinds but hotels typically don't.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#214
post #177

Earlier quoted context omitted.

LEDs do not flicker.

Cheap led light systems do

Yeah, I get the impression there's a massive difference in quality between cheap and good LEDs, and it's not always easy to tell which is which. In theory, when done right, LEDs can have a perfect spectrum with no flicker. But many manufacturers cut corners.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#215
I can think of one more potential downside: light polution is bad enough already. In the author's case, 8x higher lux values. Insect population in Germany has dropped by about 75% since the 70's. A recent The Guardian article names light polution a key factor.

In principle, it's possible to shield your windows with thick curtains, but I know many people won't bother, some will openly boast them, and it may even lead to more of them being hung outside when people see how great they are.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#216
post #64
post #23

I always feel better with bright lights and have considered trying something like this before, however two things always stop me. 1) Concerns about eye damage. 2) Concerns about skin damage.

I was thinking about that. Putting a microsun in your peripheral vision? Can't that mess with your eyes in the long run?

I strongly, strongly prefer indirect light.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#217
post #158

> Isn’t using this much power bad for the planet? Coal has a carbon intensity of about 1 kg CO2e / kWh (source), so one coal-powered lamp-day produces 2 kg, approximately one-third to one-half of a cheeseburger (source). I don't think the author gets a cheeseburger everyday! And even if it is true, it adds on top of the cheeseburger.

And he starts with incomplete data, as only 40% of the energy in coal is converted to electrical energy. Then, from that 40%, additional 5% are lost in transmission and distribution, so what reaches his flat is around 38% of that, or 2.6 kg of coal per kWh.

So one his coal powered lamp day is already, assuming his other factors are correct, around 5 kg of coal(!) or almost 2 tonnes of coal per year! Which is a huge footprint. Imagine that the same guy would have to just unload that much coal, delivered to his house, once a year, and to feed his lamp every day, would he still consider it "nothing"?

Burning hydrocarbons roughly produces 3 times more CO2 in mass, resulting in 15 kg of CO2 for one of his "lamp days". In volume, it's even more easy to see the size of that all: a kg of CO2 has volume of more than half of cubic meter (0.56 actually), so his lamp day produces more than 8 cubic meters of pure CO2 per day or 3000 cubic meters of pure CO2 per year. Enough to fill 25 European city flats with pure CO2 (otherwise, in atmosphere there's only 0.04% of CO2 -- that's 400 ppm talked about here: https://e360.yale.edu/features/how-the-world-passed-a-carbon... ).

"But the atmosphere is huge" -- yes it is, but still the change of CO2 concentration affects us. There is an experiment that demonstrates the effect with ink:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=81FHVrXgzuA

We don't see CO2 with our eyes, but the molecules of it efficiently block the parts of heat emissions (it is just electromagnetic radiation, just like visible light is) which would cool our part of the atmosphere. So the heat around us increases, just like it's warmer under a blanket (we are practically under always thicker blanket, and we add to it with our actions, just like adding the droplets of ink in that video). Everybody should understand that much.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#218
post #134

(Michael from f.lux): this kind of thing is necessary for most buildings, because otherwise people don't get a "day" signal when they spend time indoors. Most of us spend >90% of our time inside. However, we shouldn't mess with light levels like these (or even somewhat lower ones) without some limits, and the main one is some automatic timing to turn things down after it gets too late. Otherwise you will find yoursel…

Are there any lamp brands you can recommend that allow me to set the bulb temperature, but that don't require an internet connected hub and app on my phone? So RF or something.

I believe IKEA's smart bulbs are local only, not internet connected: https://www.ikea.com/us/en/cat/smart-lighting-36812/

(I've been meaning to try them out but haven't done so yet, so I can't vouch for the quality in detail. Their stuff is usually solidly mid-range and very good value for money, though.)

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#219
I'm a little bit worried about the amount of <450nm blue light emitted by these things. Even if they look warm white, there still might be a very prominent blue peak. Blue light at about 420…430nm has a very prominent retinal phototoxicity, and prolonged exposure can lead to loss of vision.

Re: Rooms can be as bright as the outdoors

#220
post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do people in e.g. the arctic have these problems during the summer, when the sun never sets?

A lot of them have very strict routines about going inside and using super-dark curtains at particular times. I've gotten to email some people above 60N and it is just what they do. In the old Aschoff "bunker" studies where people allowed to keep the lights on as long as they wished, they concluded the human clock was 25.1 hours. We know this isn't true if you provide a proper light-dark cycle, it's much closer to 24…

I live at 59.3 and dark curtains are not too common, most house I saw have some kind of shades or fluffy curtains, both don't block light

> they concluded the human clock was 25.1 hours

You keep quoting questionable or out dated research, the 25 hours figure seems to be wrong [0]

> Early research into circadian rhythms suggested that most people preferred a day closer to 25 hours when isolated from external stimuli like daylight and timekeeping. However, this research was faulty because it failed to shield the participants from artificial light

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Circadian_rhythm#Humans

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