1237: Light Pollution | Skeptical Sunday

1237: Light Pollution | Skeptical Sunday

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Jordan Harbinger: [00:00:00] Welcome to Skeptical Sunday. I'm your host, Jordan Harbinger. Today I'm here with Skeptical Sunday co-host, writer, and researcher Jessica Wynn. On The Jordan Harbinger Show, we decode the stories, secrets, and skills of the world's most fascinating people and turn their wisdom into practical advice that you can use to impact your own life and those around you.

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That'll help new listeners get a taste of [00:01:00] everything we do here on the show. Just visit jordanharbinger.com/start or search for us in your Spotify app to get started. Today we're talking about light pollution. We've managed to foul up the air, poison the water, make the world so loud. Some people need therapy for noise and apparently we've even managed to pollute darkness itself.

Even if you do look up from your phone, chances are you don't see much, but is what you're not seeing. Also, pollution. What has trading the stars for streetlights done to us here to explain what lighting the world is doing in the shadows? Is writer and researcher Jessica Wynn. So if we ruined darkness, it feels like Earth is just a planet that always has the lights on.

Except you ever see those photos from space where like North Korea's dark and the rest of the world basically is, it's totally dark.

Jessica Wynn: Right? The one good thing,

Jordan Harbinger: right? Yeah. The like the one good thing is they're like, Hey, we don't have light pollution. It's like, well, there's a reason for that, but how does one pollute nothing?

Jessica Wynn: Well, that's the problem we've made. Sure. Darkness is not nothing. So light [00:02:00] pollution is excessive or misdirected. Artificial light, basically. Light that goes where it's not needed. When it's not needed, and in a way that causes harm. So out of all the forms of pollution, light seems to get the least attention probably because it just feels pretty normal.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Nobody's complaining about a light bulb the way they do about a plastic straw choking a sea turtle.

Jessica Wynn: Right? Right. But it's all around us. Literally. Humans normalized it pretty quick. I'm a blackout curtain person myself. And while it doesn't feel like that's fighting pollution, it actually is, when you look above cities and towns, the stars are gone in their place is this eerie vacant haze we hide from called Sky glow.

Jordan Harbinger: Sky Glow sounds like a scented candle that you get at Target or maybe a vape flavor.

Jessica Wynn: It does. It does, but sky glow is the dome of light You see over cities when you're [00:03:00] hundreds of miles away on the freeway or up in a plane, and it's spreading fast. The night sky is brightening seven to 10% every year because of human actions.

Jordan Harbinger: Oh wow. That's a lot. At that rate, the stars are just vanishing, right, right before our eyes essentially.

Jessica Wynn: Absolutely. If you live in any city today, you probably still haven't seen the Milky Way.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Not just a candy bar folks. That's an actual galaxy that's around us for many people don't know.

Jessica Wynn: Right, right.

And seeing it in a truly dark sky is spectacular. I'm fortunate enough to live close to the Mojave Desert, and it really is amazing. You look up, you can see satellites, watch the International Space Station fly by and just really see the arms of the galaxy. It's humbling and it's pretty trippy.

Jordan Harbinger: I have to admit.

Look, I don't live in a big city anymore. I live in the suburbs, but I've lived near big cities and I've lived in big cities for much of my life. Now I travel to places like the [00:04:00] Sahara Desert and stuff, you know, or, or some crazy place in Bhutan. And you really can see the sky because there's no light pollution in the middle of the Sahara Desert, right?

There's sand dunes, there's no cities anywhere near you, and there's really no light pollution. And you can look up and you're like, wow, is it cloudy? And that's stars reflecting and someone will be like, that's literally the galaxy. That's just, yeah, that's just the universe. And you're like, oh my God, the universe.

I forgot that we're kind of like a part of that whole thing. Usually the most celestial object I see is the glow of a seven 11 sign somewhere.

Jessica Wynn: I think that's for a lot of people. And that loss is part of it. Light pollution has consequences for our health, for wildlife, for energy, but it also robs us of something deeply human, our connection to the cosmos.

It definitely has major effects

Jordan Harbinger: because if we can't Instagram the Milky Way, does it really exist?

Jessica Wynn: Just in the Sahara? Yeah. Mm. But I [00:05:00] mean, this isn't just about stargazing. So light pollution is a byproduct of progress. So conquering darkness with the invention of artificial light, it brought unintended consequences.

Were still uncovering. So historically it was much dimmer in the 18 hundreds, not that long ago. You know, most towns actually turned off their gas lamps, especially around full moons, because the moonlight was enough. The jump from oil lamps and candles to electricity and LEDs happened quickly. Within a hundred years.

The Milky Way has. Disappeared for 80% of Americans and one third of the world.

Jordan Harbinger: We don't think about it. But yeah, the light bulb isn't that old. We're pretty new to 24 hour light.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. And it's really reshaped civilization. So before the invention of the light bulb, and you may have come across this in classical literature, it's talked a lot about in the [00:06:00] Canterbury Tales, people actually had what's called a second sleep.

The majority of people went to bed right after sunset, but they woke up around midnight to have a snack, spend time with family. Hang out with neighbors if they were close enough, maybe a little sex, and then go back to bed until dawn.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, of course they did. Nothing says family bonding, like eating snacks in the middle of the night instead of shame tiptoeing to the fridge like we do now.

It does make me feel better about my very occasional 2:00 AM peanut butter habit, but uh, a little bang, a little waken bang, and then back to sleeve. Sounds good to me too. I mean, maybe I'm telegraphing me who doesn't Yeah. Doesn't enjoy that. Right. And

Jessica Wynn: those habits were real, it was our natural rhythm. So people used twilight as an ideal time to make some.

Family memories.

Jordan Harbinger: That's creepy. Maybe not always. So family friendly.

Jessica Wynn: Well, you gotta, you gotta make the families first, I guess. That's

Jordan Harbinger: right. This is a weird side note, but like, you know, you read those old books [00:07:00] and it's like three families lived in one room in London because everyone was poor and like was covered in coldest all the time, basically.

And you're like, wait, how did they have four adults, or you know, six adults or whatever, and then like eight kids in two rooms. Where did they get privacy to make those kids? And then the uncomfortable truth starts to dawn on you that kids were just there while that was happening. Right. And possibly the other adults too.

Just like, all right. And there's no earbuds, there's no AirPods back then. Right. So it's like, Hey, don't you have to go for a walk? And they're like, it's two o'clock in the morning. Just get it over with. And they pull out like their little pamphlet that they're reading in front of the candlelight fire and, and you just like, I don't know, pretend they can't see you.

And Yeah. Yeah.

Jessica Wynn: Willpower to ignore it. Of course. Maybe for artificial light. We had way less shame. I don't know. Maybe.

Jordan Harbinger: I mean, imagine you live with like your sister and her husband and you're just like, cool

Jessica Wynn: in the Willy Wonka bed. Yeah.

Jordan Harbinger: In the, and like [00:08:00] there's three kids around and you're just like, yeah, let's play Jacks while Uncle Jack and Aunt Karen get after it.

I don't know. It's just so gross to think about. I

Jessica Wynn: guess we're getting a cousin. Yeah. Yep.

Jordan Harbinger: All right. That sounded like that was effective. Okay. Anyway, light bulbs or something.

Jessica Wynn: So maybe this is how, where shade came from because mm-hmm. Edison invented the electric light bulb in 1879, and that's when this rhythm started to change.

So by 1878, the first streetlight was installed in Paris, and then as automobile use grew, so did the number of lights around towns and cities. By the early 20th century cities started building shorter, more numerous streetlights to accommodate all the cars. And that's the grid we still live under. It's functional, but it's incredibly wasteful.

About 30% of all that outdoor artificial light just spills into the sky.

Jordan Harbinger: Really? A third of our lighting budget goes to [00:09:00] illuminating empty space. Yeah. Not a That's so wasteful.

Jessica Wynn: I know. And with that, we lost the night sky itself. So in most urban and even many rural areas, people can no longer see the stars the way previous generations could.

The natural rhythms of night and darkness, they've just been eroded,

Jordan Harbinger: which is wild. People navigated with guidance from the sky. Now we just can't get anywhere without GPS.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, and for most of human history, stars weren't decoration. They were infrastructure navigation, calendars, religions, entire civilizations organized around stories and mythologies based on the night sky.

Now most Americans can't even see the Milky Way. You know, we've just lost something we don't really have words for.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Now the closest most of us get is a planetarium field trip, or like a massive screensaver, I guess. I don't know.

Jessica Wynn: I've actually heard Neil deGrasse Tyson say that the first time he went somewhere out of New York City and saw the sky.[00:10:00]

He said, oh, this reminds me of the planetarium.

Jordan Harbinger: Right? Yeah. It should

Jessica Wynn: be the other way around, right? Yeah.

Jordan Harbinger: That's kind of the point. Yeah. That's funny. 'cause I was thinking Neil deGrasse Tyson and the Hayden Planetarium. 'cause when you go to a planetarium in, where's that? It's like in Harlem or something.

Like, you probably haven't ever seen any of those stars unless you've, your family, which lives in Harlem on New York, gets out of the city all the time because why would you have ever seen the stars? That's crazy to me.

Jessica Wynn: Sure. So you don't even know what you're missing. During the 1994 Northridge earthquake, Los Angeles lost power.

A hundred percent of the lights went out. So suddenly the night sky was visible, thousands of Angelenos called 9 1 1 because they thought the city was being invaded by UFOs.

Jordan Harbinger: One. Uh, please tell me that's not true. But two, what do you, what do you think the first, first, Hey, I need the police here because aliens are coming down from the sky and our little pew pews are gonna stop that from happening.

Jessica Wynn: They were probably just as scared. Yeah. [00:11:00]

Jordan Harbinger: Oh my God.

Jessica Wynn: But it, it's true. The city went dark. People looked up and there it was stars, galaxies, satellites, and that giant silvery cloud across the sky. That's the Milky Way. But they'd never seen it before. And there was just this collective freak out

Jordan Harbinger: that is both hilarious and horrifying.

Like, help, there's a galaxy over my house. Talk about some ignorant shit, man. Geez, that's really pathetic.

Jessica Wynn: It's just the perfect example of how light pollution has disrupted nature. And that was in the nineties. Los Angeles is brighter today. The sky glow is so intense. You can see it from 200 miles away in an airplane.

The stars are just completely washed out.

Jordan Harbinger: Forget the city of angels, right? It's a city of LEDs.

Jessica Wynn: Uh, and after thousands of years, the night sky is abruptly drowned by all our street lights, billboards, parking, lots, and stadiums, and they're all poorly designed lights just spilling in [00:12:00] every direction. So we break this light pollution into four types, sky, glow, light, trespass, glare, and clutter.

So first we mentioned earlier, sky glow. That's that bright dome of light you see over cities like. If you've ever taken a road trip, you can see the next city from hundreds of miles away.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. The Vegas glow, it's like a welcome sign. You can see it just shining. There's, it's weird, it's like there's an illuminated cloud in the sky just from the light shooting up from the city.

Jessica Wynn: Right. And it's kind of exciting, you know? But so then there's also light trespass, and that's when light crosses property lines like your neighbor's floodlight blasting through your bedroom window. Then there's glare. These are lights so bright, they actually make it harder to see. So think of oncoming high beam headlights at night.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, I'm convinced newer car headlights are just designed to blind and kill people. 'cause they're crazy bright now.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, they're outrageous. And finally [00:13:00] there's clutter. That's the mess of competing and redundant clusters of lights like billboards, neon and excessive street lamps. They're all fighting for your attention and creating visual chaos.

Jordan Harbinger: So in other words, we invented four different ways to ruin the night sky. That's impressive. Sky glow, trespass, glare and clutter. Collect 'em all, I guess. Right,

Jessica Wynn: right. And together they don't just erase the stars, they affect human health.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, I was wondering about that, but how does it affect health? I mean, I know I need a, like a night mask to sleep because even a little light bugs me.

But what, what else does it do?

Jessica Wynn: So our body's evolved with a natural day, night tempo and light pollution disrupts our circadian rhythm, and that suppresses melatonin, which is the hormone that tells your body it's time to sleep. That's linked to everything from sleep disorders and depression to obesity and heart disease.

Jordan Harbinger: Edison didn't factor in [00:14:00] insomnia. Did he invent that too? I suppose

Jessica Wynn: maybe in a, in a way. I don't think he was necessarily considering how disruptive this would be to our sleep, but we really went nuts with artificial light right out of the gate before we considered any harm or realized what dramatic effects it would have.

You know, it just disrupts our biological clocks. Before the Eiffel Tower was built, Paris wanted to build what they called a sun tower, and it was this tall building with lights and mirrors that would shine light over the entire city constantly.

Jordan Harbinger: One sounds like a prison yard, but two. That's just such a bad idea.

Jessica Wynn: Such a bad idea. They didn't go for it, but that's how infectious the light bulb invention was. Luckily they went with the not as bright Eiffel. Or Paris might have just melted under a cloak of artificial light

Jordan Harbinger: that would cause insanity and some amazing suntan. But can you imagine the skin cancer rate in [00:15:00] Paris if they had sunlight and moonlight 24 7, just being blasted down onto that was clearly before they were like, Hey, maybe you shouldn't get a beach load of sun every single day of your life with no protection.

Jessica Wynn: It's wild to think of. We we're like bugs. We were just attracted to the bright, shiny light. You know, and it, it might explain what's happening today with how blue light messes with us. The kind of light from phones, tablets, LEDs, that's all especially bad on melatonin production. So our city might not be lit up, but we are shining lights in our faces regularly.

Every time you look at your phone or computer and that glow in your face at midnight tricks your brain into thinking it's daytime. That's why the no screens an hour before bed rule. It's just not wellness advice. It's biology.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, but we're all being gaslit by our phones to stay awake, and I think that's why so many people complain about sleep.

I guess I knew that because if I put my phone down and I'm like, okay, I'm done, and I put my [00:16:00] night mask on and stuff, I fall asleep within minutes. But if I'm on my phone just waiting to go to sleep, I could be up for 90 minutes, two hours, whatever it is,

Jessica Wynn: right? All of a sudden time goes by and light pollution is not understood as the root of what's robbing us of sleep.

It's not a coincidence that the rise in artificial light use corresponds with the rise of melatonin sales. You know, it's not just sleep either. Studies show women living in the brightest neighborhoods have significantly higher rates of breast cancer. The effects are proving to go well beyond

Jordan Harbinger: fatigue.

Now it's time to shed some light on our sponsors. We'll be right back.

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So, the invention of artificial light intended to make us more productive by lengthening our days, but it it shortened our nights. So it's making us sad and exhausted. Progress.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Right? And outdoor lighting affects entire neighborhoods. We want to believe it's about safety, but that's a myth.

Jordan Harbinger: Light does make the street safer at night.

Imagine walking around downtown somewhere. There's no street lights.

Jessica Wynn: Not really, you know, more light doesn't actually mean safer. Glare makes [00:20:00] roads and sidewalks more dangerous by creating deep shadows where people or animals hide. It also reduces visibility for drivers and pedestrians as anyone who drives at night knows, but shielded properly, aimed lights that improves visibility and safety.

Jordan Harbinger: We all have seen a, a neighbor with a light where you're like, do you really need that? And does it have to be aimed at my front window? And like you wonder if they're doing it on purpose or if they're just ignorantly thinking like, I can see really far now that I put this light on the top of my garage.

Jessica Wynn: They're fooling themselves into feeling safe. I think

Jordan Harbinger: in the name of security, we're blinding ourselves, which is very on brand.

Jessica Wynn: Right? Right. And studies show there's no strong link between brighter lighting and lower crime. The key isn't more light, it's smarter light. Smarter light means shielded, downward facing, and only as bright as necessary.

I mean, if you think about the crime rates, it would mean that out in the country, crime would be higher than [00:21:00] in the cities. So it just logically doesn't add up,

Jordan Harbinger: I suppose. I mean, there could be multiple reasons for that. Like sure, people know each other. It's harder to get away when you rob a farmhouse 'cause you gotta drive 20 miles.

Right? I mean there's all kinds of, who knows? Everyone before the 20th century looked up and saw heroes and monsters, right? You got the constellations. I look up, I see a freaking Verizon billboard. So our nighttime environment changed quickly in the scheme of history, right? 'cause the a blink human history and everything is lit up and electrified.

Jessica Wynn: Absolutely. And we're losing perspective. Psychologists and writers describe natural darkness as contemplative. Mysterious, even spiritual darkness slows us down. It gives us what Neil deGrasse Tyson calls the cosmic perspective.

Neil deGrasse Tyson: The atoms in your body are traceable, traceable to stars that have exploded across the galaxy and spread that enrichment into gas clouds that would later make star systems that have enough [00:22:00] elements like carbon, nitrogen, and oxygen elements of life in order to make planets and life upon it.

So for me, the deepest cosmic perspective there is, is recognizing that not only are we living in this universe, the universe is living within us, you are

Jordan Harbinger: so high right now.

Jessica Wynn: What he's saying there is, you know, without all that understanding, we gain from the night sky. We lose humility. Then we call 9 1 1 when we see the sky, we're all a part of

Jordan Harbinger: that.

Explains la No stars in the sky. No humility in the people down here.

Jessica Wynn: Oh, come on, I'm down here.

Jordan Harbinger: That's true. Now this makes sense and I will say that if you get out to the night sky and it reminds you of a trip to the planetarium, we're missing something about being human.

Jessica Wynn: Right? And there's another layer, like we mentioned.

It is about our sense of time. So before clocks and screens for thousands and thousands of years, people told time and made schedules by the stars and moon. [00:23:00] So when we lost that natural night cycle, we lost a piece of what humanity is built on.

Jordan Harbinger: Is that lost forever or is there a way to get that relationship to the universe back somehow?

Jessica Wynn: I mean, what's amazing is how quickly our bodies jumped back into that cycle. In my twenties, I lived outside a city for the first time, completely off the grid for about a year on the island of St. Croix. Very little light pollution there and sinking up with the night sky in all kinds of ways happened fast.

I mean, within the first month I felt physical changes.

Jordan Harbinger: Is that a euphemism for you synced up with all the other women on St. Croix? I don't really know. I'm

Jessica Wynn: telling you, every woman on St. Croix gets her period at the full moon.

Jordan Harbinger: Do they howl?

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Yeah. We, we howl and just get set off to the woods and run around.

Yeah,

Jordan Harbinger: just throw your bras on the beach and like start dancing around a fire. Now the, but there is something, like I said, you go to the Sahar Desert or with this [00:24:00] Wayfinders group that I'm in, or you go to Bhutan, look, you're already in the middle of nowhere, right? You're in Bhutan or you're in Patagonia or so, but there's a couple, there's always a couple nights where it's like we are on a mountaintop and you can see everything and there's nothing up here but our tents and it's a six hour hike up this thing.

Then you start looking at the stars and you do some activity and you're like, wow, this is like a spiritual experience that early humans probably had all the time.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. We treat it as a vacation now.

Jordan Harbinger: It's true though. My shoulders drop, I'm more relaxed. People are telling stories. You feel a little bit more like in the zone, even though you're exhausted and filthy and you're more mindful of everything.

But I never really connected that to the problem of artificial light. That's certainly part of it though, right? Of course. Because you see a flashlight and it's, it's like jarring. Right? But, and no one's using their phone or anything. You're like, oh God, they need a flashlight to pee. Right. But the full moon, it's like magical.

It really is.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. And you understand how bright that moon is when you're out there. Psychologists even describe natural darkness as [00:25:00] essential for mental health. Studies show that disrupted sleep is linked to several mental health disorders like insomnia, depression, anxiety. We're never completely in the dark.

We just lose all that sense of space and time. So that's a lot of the reason people are so anxious today.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, I've noticed that at the, at the casinos in the middle of the night. So light pollution makes us disoriented in space and time. It's like a sci-fi villain,

Jessica Wynn: and people have adapted to all this light pollution in extreme ways.

But blackout curtains are the most common tool used to fight lights.

Jordan Harbinger: People literally have to buy heavy drapes just to mimic what used to be normal darkness. I have those, by the way, the blackout curtains. Great. Purchase.

Jessica Wynn: Same. I don't think I could sleep without them. And blackout curtains. They were invented in 1939 during World War II because the allied leaders believed city lights made it easier for bomber [00:26:00] planes to hit their targets when the homes were illuminated.

So Britain enforced blackout regulations. After the war, these evolved into what households use today for sleep and privacy,

Jordan Harbinger: and a whole industry now sells us back the night. Big curtain is thriving. Thanks a lot, Hitler. I mean, okay, this might not make the top five biggest reasons to dislike Hitler, but the point stands, I guess.

Yeah,

Jessica Wynn: it's probably in the top 10.

Jordan Harbinger: I'm not sure now. It's so true. Maybe checklist of okia might object to this particular, yeah, something

Jessica Wynn: to add to the list at least. But yeah, light blocking products are a huge market. In 2023, the global market reached over $40 billion and it's expanding rapidly, increased screen time, and health concerns that drives the wellness community into the market, while energy efficiency and urban planning drives governments into it.

So it includes everything from sleep masks, double [00:27:00] blinds, tinted windows, that filtered tape you can buy for your screens. And then there's specialized industrial and medical light blocking technology, even to blue light blocking glasses. The global market for blue light blocking glasses alone was estimated at almost $3 billion in 2024, and it's projected to reach 6 billion by 2034.

Jordan Harbinger: That's wild. Imagine explaining to somebody in the 18 hundreds that we lit up the entire planet so intensely that we now buy special glasses to filter out the lights that we made would not compute. Yeah. Yeah. I love blue blockers. Like I said, I've been wearing 'em for years. I just figured it was kind of like a dorky, biohacker thing, but they do help me sleep at night and they help me get off my phone because I'll wear these in the evening and then it's like, okay, I'm getting tired.

And I go to bed, and then maybe I'm doing Duolingo or something on my phone, and I'm just like, I can't keep my eyes open with these things on. I take 'em off, put my phone away, and go to [00:28:00] sleep. If I don't wear them, like I go on a trip and I forget them, or I just, I'm too lazy and they're in the kitchen and I'm already in bed and the bed's warm.

So then it's like, oh, and I'm looking at my phone and it's like two hours goes by and I'm like, I should go to sleep, but I'm not tired. It's one o'clock in the morning or something. She's like, what happened? And the answer is no. Blue blockers. I mean, it really makes a huge difference. Do they look cool?

I've got a brand that I like called Swanee's that my friend James Swanwick. Came up with, and I'll link to it in the show notes. It's swanwick sleep.com. It's not a sponsor or anything, but he, he makes them, and they don't look dorky because the original ones, they are kind of like these dorky, weird wraparound, you looking goofball things that if you wore them, people would be like, what's up X-Men?

What are you doing here with that? But these just look like, oh, you have daytime glasses that have slightly yellow or orange lenses. What? What's that all about? Those are cool.

Jessica Wynn: You're a fashionable biohacker. That's right.

Jordan Harbinger: Yes.

Jessica Wynn: But yet those glasses are fighting pollution. They're based on the same idea as light pollution filters [00:29:00] used in astronomy and astrophotography.

So astronomers, they have to use filters to cut out certain wavelengths given off by mercury vapor and LED lighting, so they can actually see the stars. Mercury vapor is what gives off those amber tones. So filters, target and remove reddish wavelengths and that that happens pretty easily.

Jordan Harbinger: I see. So that's different than the LED filters?

Jessica Wynn: Yes. That's trickier. LEDs cover most of the spectrum of light, so it's hard to filter them without dimming, just everything. Some older filters even blocked high pressure, sodium light, which just made. Everything. Look, pitch black. They weren't exactly safe for walking around, but the technology has advanced.

So you can walk around with yours on, right?

Jordan Harbinger: What? By blue blockers?

Jessica Wynn: Yes.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, of course. They're just glasses.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. I mean, in my head I'm thinking it's just,

Jordan Harbinger: yeah, no, it's not a [00:30:00] helmet that has wires attached to the back. It's basically just night shift mode for your eyes. Relatively simple device. The, the lenses are high quality.

You wanna get high quality 'cause you don't want distortion, you don't wanna get a headache. It's just, it's good for screen time. It's good for improving my sleep. That's really it. It's, I have tons of these things.

Jessica Wynn: I'm all in. I'm all in. I'm getting them. But health insurance should cover blue blockers for everyone at this point.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah.

Jessica Wynn: Another fix though, is just in better light design. You know, we all shuffle around dodging light pollution. People rearrange their furniture away from windows when new intrusive lights or signs are installed in their neighborhood. It's like the classic Seinfeld episode when the Red Neon Kenny Rogers roasters sign.

Oh, yeah. Blasts into Kramer's apartment. There are over 60 chapters of the International Dark Sky Association across the country. They won't shoot out bulbs, but they do lobby city councils and right ordinances when the lights outside homes are unbearable.

Jordan Harbinger: [00:31:00] I mean, that's kind of weak that they don't shoot out the bulbs.

But what do I, I don't make the rules. I suppose maybe they wanna not get arrested, but nothing will radicalize you faster than a Walmart parking lot lamp just blasting into your apartment or your hotel room. That's,

Jessica Wynn: it's true. Yeah. But some people do move away from cities justifying darkness. And if you're stuck in the city, a lot of windows are now bricked up in homes because people just couldn't handle the light outside.

Jordan Harbinger: So there are not only climate refugees, there are light refugees. Realtors must love this, you know, great kitchen, lovely yard. Ignore the neighbors death ray across the street. Oh, that thing's never on. I don't know, even that's strange. Maybe living in a cave will come back in style.

Jessica Wynn: Oh, I'd love a cave.

Cool. Dark uninviting, that's my vibe. But instead, buildings are being designed with just fewer windows, which is a bummer of a solution. But darkness has even become a luxury product. There are dark [00:32:00] sky hotels where people pay hundreds of dollars a night for the chance to see stars. Resorts advertise natural darkness as an amenity.

I go to one in Northern California at least once a year. Shout out to Wilbur Hot Springs up in Williams. They have no lights, no wifi, no radio waves. 24 hours there feels like a week's vacation.

Jordan Harbinger: That sounds terrific, but it's wild that we have commodified nighttime. What an evolutionary circle when we are redoing architecture to cope with street lamps.

But I can pay hundreds of dollars a night for a vacation package. Whose selling point is the sky? I don't know, man.

Jessica Wynn: There are glass igloos scattered around Finland, Norway, and Sweden that are on my bucket list. There's no artificial light. And you're just under the Northern Lights. That has to be wild.

Jordan Harbinger: I've seen those. They look incredible. I keep imagining time traveling back 150 years and explaining that in the future, people pay to look up at the [00:33:00] sky. The sky didn't change. We just erased it. That's so crazy.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. Or imagine going back and describing a projector that throws the night sky on your walls.

You can buy for 50 bucks. That would not compute, and the impacts go way beyond humans. There's a whole field called sensory ecology that studies how artificial light affects animals. Sea turtles, fireflies, migrating birds, they're all disoriented by artificial light and some are killed. Wow. How

Jordan Harbinger: did

Jessica Wynn: lights

Jordan Harbinger: actually kill birds?

Jessica Wynn: So migrating birds travel at night and they're guided by stars. Bright city lights lure them off course, and millions die every year crashing into buildings or some other horrible end. An unintended effect of the nine 11 tribute in light memorial beams in New York City is that they trap thousands of birds annually, and a lot of them die.[00:34:00]

They get confused. They circle the lights for so long that they can eventually just drop from exhaustion. It's so bad that ornithologists are introducing ways to save birds every nine 11 because the memorial coincides with the height of migration season. Same with the Luxor in Vegas. Same with lighthouses.

A lot of offshore rigging locations. There are just mountains of evidence that show beams of light mess up migratory birds.

Jordan Harbinger: So our tribute to the tragedy is killing thousands of birds. That is really dark and unfortunate. Ugh.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. And it's not just giant light beams. Cities keep approving decorative lighting and spotlights that are purely aesthetic.

The worst is in Portland, Oregon. Sorry, Portland. I know you're going through it, but where the Oaks amusement park was unfortunately built is next to a bird sanctuary and migratory bird park, and this [00:35:00] year they put up a new 135 foot tall ride that will shoot up eight LED spotlights into the sky because it looks cool.

The city has an ordinance that lights should be downward. But the park filed an exemption and the city was like, oh, cool. Approved. But these lights have no safety purpose. They're purely aesthetic. So it sets a precedent that recreational ambiance outweighs conservation. As of the summer of 2025, it was still being protested.

Recently, the city said the park will minimize, but not eliminate their light pollution. So it's a strange thing to insist that decorative lights are more important than birds.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah, nothing says family fun. Like killing thousands of migrating wildlife. Man, Portland, come on man. Hey, we wanna shoot lights into the sky and kill tons of endangered birds.

Cool. Also fentanyl. Totally fine. Shoot it up anywhere and everywhere. I mean, I don't know, maybe some laws are [00:36:00] okay to enforce. Maybe look into that guys.

Jessica Wynn: You know, and the frustrating part is it's fixable, right? Again, just shield the lights, aim them down. Use warmer tones. We don't have to be choosing between safety and stars.

And it's not just our airborne friends, either. Sea turtle hatchlings once followed, moonlight to the ocean. Now they often get drawn inland by artificial lights and crawl toward parking lots or neighborhoods and die.

Jordan Harbinger: I'm so modern. I rarely think of the moon as a light source.

Jessica Wynn: I think for most of us.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah,

Jessica Wynn: but diminishing moonlight with artificial light is hindering our amphibian friends too, like frogs and toads, it disrupts their mating habits.

You know, they rely on darkness to M

Jordan Harbinger: can hardly blame them. I think I would do it with the lights off too, if I was a frog. Yeah, I

Jessica Wynn: think, I think I've been there with some guys who are part frog because I turn the lights off sometimes, but too much light and their mating calls go unanswered. Same with [00:37:00] insects, you know, we've all seen bugs drawn to light bulbs that's actually doing more damage than we think.

It disrupts firefly mating signals and they literally can't find dates because their bioluminescent signals get drowned out. Those moths swarming bulbs that's stolen energy from an ecosystem where they should be pollinating or otherwise stuck in a web as food. So insect populations have plummeted in the last 20 years.

I had to read this seriously a thousand times when I was writing this because it's so hard to believe, but the research shows that our insect population has reduced by 80% since the dawn of artificial light. And according to the night sky resource Center, light pollution is the leading cause of that.

Jordan Harbinger: So artificial light is cock blocking the entire animal kingdom.

Yikes.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, big time. And not just bugs and frogs, nocturnal mammals like [00:38:00] bats, raccoons, even cats have their natural clocks disrupted by light pollution. So foraging patterns, mating rituals, and other survival behavior, it's all thrown off. Coastal light pollution affects marine ecosystems too. Artificial light disrupts plankton behavior, which throws off the entire food chain.

So fish that rely on darkness for predator avoidance, they get confused and breeding cycles get disrupted.

Jordan Harbinger: I've seen fishing boats that use light to attract animals as well. You ever seen that? It's crazy intense. It's super bright. I think they're fishing for some kind of squid or something out there, and

Jessica Wynn: it's amazing how many of them come towards the light because

Jordan Harbinger: yeah,

Jessica Wynn: what that light is doing is confusing them into thinking they're going to a feeding area.

In nature, it's known as positive phototaxis. In fishing, it's known as a catch. I guess

Jordan Harbinger: the cosmic perspective is about feeling small in a vast universe, hard to do when your neighbor's flood light could signal aircraft. [00:39:00] Let's take a brief sponsored look at the bright side. We'll be right back.

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All the deals, discount codes, and ways to support the podcast are searchable and clickable at Jordan harbinger.com/deals. Now, for the rest of skeptical Sunday, we've managed to even pollute the ocean with light as if all the trash chemicals microplastics weren't enough from boats and from the shore.

That's kind of impressive in the worst way possible.

Jessica Wynn: I [00:43:00] know, and here's something people don't realize. Light pollution hits poorer communities hardest. So lower income neighborhoods, they often get the cheapest, worst fixtures installed. So unshielded, blinding lights that blast everywhere because the city went with the lowest bidder.

Meanwhile, wealthier neighborhoods can afford to lobby for better lighting or even pay for upgrades themselves.

Jordan Harbinger: So not only do poorer communities deal with more pollution in general, they also get blinded by their own streetlights.

Jessica Wynn: Exactly. And those communities often lack the resources to push back.

They don't have dark sky advocacy groups or lawyers to fight bad lighting ordinances. So they're stuck with glaring lights that disrupt sleep, waste energy, and just create more problems than they solve.

Jordan Harbinger: Oh, good. We found a way to make inequality visible from space,

Jessica Wynn: pretty much. And we're losing more than just the view.

So professional astronomers are struggling. [00:44:00] Major observatories built decades ago in once dark locations are now surrounded by sky glow. The Griffith Observatory in Los Angeles is a big advocate for light pollution awareness. The stored observatory in Tucson works really hard to keep its skies dark.

Other observatories have relocated sometimes to entirely different countries just to escape light.

Jordan Harbinger: Scientists are literally fleeing their own observatories. That's kind of bleak. Yikes. It

Jessica Wynn: is the Mount Wilson Observatory near la. It's where Edwin Hubble discovered the expansion of the universe. One of the most important discoveries in human history.

It's now barely usable because of LA's Sky glow. You know, new telescopes are being built in places like chilies, Atacama Desert, and the mountaintops of Hawaii. But even those are at risk as development creeps in. So we

Jordan Harbinger: might end up knowing less about the universe because we're addicted to artificial [00:45:00] light and we can't figure out how to aim our lights downwards.

That's very on brandand and very frustrating.

Jessica Wynn: I know. It really is. We're literally dimming our understanding of the cosmos,

Jordan Harbinger: but artificial light is a cheap way to keep people awake and productive. Right. Is there a truth to that at least? Like, are we getting more done? I don't know. Yeah,

Jessica Wynn: it's not cheap though.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: The International Dark Sky Association estimates at least a third of all outdoor lighting is wasted. That's over $2 billion a year in the US alone, and all that wasted energy is the CO2 equivalent of nearly 10 million cars. So we're paying extra to ruin our sleep, confuse wildlife, and just erase the stars.

Jordan Harbinger: Great. So we're footing the bill for our own cosmic lobotomy. Yeah. Should we move out to the countryside? Is that the solution?

Jessica Wynn: I mean, unfortunately, light pollution isn't just a city problem. It's spreads for hundreds of miles. Even national parks aren't immune.

Jordan Harbinger: Oh man. [00:46:00] Is this really becoming a problem everywhere?

Jessica Wynn: I mean, it is. And it's not just in the us. Light pollution maps show it all over the world. I, I recommend looking them up because it really shows you how intense the problem is In Scotland. Galloway Forest Park, which is the largest forest in the uk, they earned dark sky status in 2009. But recently a company proposed an energy park right next to it with nine wind turbines each taller than the Empire State Building.

And then each of those would have a red aircraft warning light blinking on top. Locals, they don't have much say in the plans. And those wind turbine lights are, are problematic and there's always pushback and debates about how often they should blink the best color temperature. Is there a way they can be replaced by radar?

Jordan Harbinger: That's tricky. You need those lights for flight safety.

Jessica Wynn: Of course, you do. The FAA cares more about air safety than light pollution, [00:47:00] understandably. But some systems can now use radar, so lights only turn on when planes approach. The details get debated heavily and some cities are trying. Pittsburgh recently passed a dark Sky ordinance in 2021, but implementation is messy.

It doesn't cover lights on bridges, which, as you know, Pittsburgh is basically made up of bridges. So neighborhoods are fighting over brightness settings. Is it too bright? Is it too dim? No one agrees. I mean, how do you handle one neighbor thinking it's too bright and the person across the street thinks it's too dark?

It's really complicated.

Jordan Harbinger: There needs to be some lighting standards, I guess. I don't know,

Jessica Wynn: you'd think. But brightness and lumen levels vary from town to town, block to block, door to door even, and cities install lights at maximum brightness usually. And then once they're up, it's almost impossible to dim [00:48:00] them later.

Transportation departments often make those calls with little to no community input, and I think this is the heart of a lot of local problems. It comes down to a bad policy process.

Jordan Harbinger: I'm sure that light pollution experts aren't asked to get involved with city planning. Actually, I don't know, are they?

Jessica Wynn: It doesn't seem like it.

Jordan Harbinger: It seems like a bureaucratic issue, not a technical issue. It's not like we can't do it.

Jessica Wynn: Right, exactly. And some communities do have ordinances on the books, but enforcement is weak. There was a lawsuit brought in Connecticut this year because they had an ordinance saying that no state property should have lights on between 11:00 PM and 6:00 PM but it turns out the courthouse itself was not abiding and just keeping the lights on all night.

So instead of letting the building go dark after hours, the state courthouse just changed the ordinance to allow all lights on any state property to be deemed necessary.

Jordan Harbinger: Geez.

Jessica Wynn: It's an ongoing [00:49:00] case now.

Jordan Harbinger: So the courthouse is not complying with the law. Right. I don't understand why it's such a hard thing for the state properties to comply.

The case is almost hilarious because it's the actual courthouse. It's like, we're not following policy. We need some, and then, yeah, just like, what do you do about that?

Jessica Wynn: I don't know. Are they just that proud of the bill? I don't know what the rationale is. Yeah. But the courts are rewriting their own rules so they can keep the lights blazing all night.

I don't think regulators understand, or maybe they just don't care how problematic light pollution is. Yeah. Most don't know the wasted energy and increased operational costs for communities and businesses it causes. So in the policy world, there's a truism that most policies fail at the enforcement level.

So it's not that light pollution policy isn't there, it's just written poorly and then it's not implemented, so it shouldn't be hard. Just turn off the lights.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Hell make 'em automatic, right? I swear my parents had light [00:50:00] timers in the eighties.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. You don't really see those anymore, huh? I

Jordan Harbinger: mean, you don't need them.

They're all connected to your phone, whatnot. I mean, lighting issues are more litigious than I realized. Or maybe electricity's just so cheap. It's like, eh, screw it. Leave it on all night. I don't care. Yeah,

Jessica Wynn: and lighting issues are probably more common than people think. So in LA Tesla very recently built a diner,

Jordan Harbinger: like a restaurant for Tesla restaurants, OHEY dokey

Jessica Wynn: during construction, and this is right in the middle of the city.

It's not off the beaten path or anything.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay.

Jessica Wynn: But during construction, the security lighting was aimed at the neighboring residences so intensely. The locals tried to take action. One lady said, quote, the light flashing is so bright into the apartments that even with curtains closed, it feels like you're at the world's worst rave

Jordan Harbinger: because that's what we need.

The Tesla Diner,

Jessica Wynn: that's what it's called, by the way. Mm-hmm. You could get a Tesla burger in a cyber truck [00:51:00] box. Oh man. It's been a nighttime nightmare after construction too, because it's opened 24 hours and since it opened, there's two giant, they're huge LED screens that show movies, and it also has this thick, bright ribbon light around the roof's facade, and it just lights up the entire block.

Complaints have been pouring in. I mean, there's an apartment building just so close to it. It's like Kramer's apartment. It has to be infuriating.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Would you like fries with your insomnia? Why California? That's so crazy.

Jessica Wynn: I know. Well, in 2023, Gavin Newsom vetoed a responsible lighting bill for government buildings.

I can't find a reason why beyond aesthetics, so politicians just don't grasp that. Some of this is instantly solvable. Light pollution is one of the rare environmental problems that doesn't need a 30 year recovery plan or a global summit. We don't have to be so afraid of the dark.

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. Tell [00:52:00] that to my kids.

All right, so let's talk about the future. Where does this go? Are we going to start putting LED billboards in space?

Jessica Wynn: Oh man. Don't give anyone ideas, but you're actually not far off. So there are already proposals to use. Satellites for advertising, literally beaming ads from orbit. Companies have talked about projecting logos onto the night sky using satellite constellations or laser technology.

I guess think about the Batman signal. The science community refers to it as satellite pollution.

Jordan Harbinger: So you're telling me that we're gonna turn the cosmos into Times Square? No, thank you. My goodness. Yeah, I know,

Jessica Wynn: I know. And and satellite pollution, it's already a problem. Starlink and other mega corporations are adding thousands of satellites that reflect sunlight and create streaks across telescope images.

So astronomers are furious because these satellites are pretty much photo bombing, their [00:53:00] observations of distant galaxies. And if current trends continue, if every city keeps getting brighter seven to 10% per year within a generation. Natural darkness will only exist in the most remote locations, like the night sky will be functionally extinct for most of humanity

Jordan Harbinger: extinct.

So we're driving darkness extinct like it's a species.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah. I mean, that's not hyperbole. And once kids grow up, never seeing stars, never experiencing true darkness. They're losing something fundamental about being human. There's a sense of wonder that humility, we talked about the perspective, it just all disappears.

Jordan Harbinger: So you're saying the solution to this existential crisis is literally flicking a light switch, though. This is where you're supposed to give us hope. Right, because so far I've learned that we've turned the Milky Way galaxy into a screensaver, and people are breaking up windows, like medieval monks,

Jessica Wynn: light pollution's here to stay.

But cities can adopt [00:54:00] smart lighting and see immediate results. It can be simple, just point the lights down, use fully shielded fixtures, use warmer bulbs instead of harsh blue LEDs, and simply turn off the lights when you don't need them. Communities that have adopted these changes, they see immediate results.

Jordan Harbinger: Okay, so changing bulbs is a good start at the personal level.

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, I mean, it's better than nothing. Motion sensors, light curfews, and low intensity lights are effective. And there's lights out programs in places like Chicago and other cities enforcing dimming skyscraper lights during migration season to save birds.

Other places have dark sky tourism, like in central Idaho's, dark sky reserves whose mission is to bring back the Milky Way.

Jordan Harbinger: That's encouraging that there's at least some awareness there.

Jessica Wynn: Definitely there's some awareness and there's momentum behind these dark sky movements. Cities, parks, even [00:55:00] businesses are starting to realize that smarter lighting saves money and it makes streets safer.

So grassroots groups are pushing these ordinances. Like in New Jersey, there's a dark sky advocacy group that was able to get a light pollution ordinance passed in June of 2025. And apparently Philadelphia has its own moonmen. There are these two brothers who set up telescopes on busy and touristy streets.

So strangers can look up and they're spreading awareness. They call it sidewalk astronomy.

Jordan Harbinger: That is really cool. Free stargazing between a cheese steak joint and a dive bar.

Jessica Wynn: I know they're hilarious actually, if you wanna look at their videos on Instagram or something. But they started with thrift store binoculars and now they have real telescopes and their whole mission is simple to reconnect people in the city with the night sky.

So yeah, awareness exists and it seems to be on the rise. And action started way back in [00:56:00] 2001 when Flagstaff, Arizona became the first city in the world. To be designated an international dark sky city after changing every streetlight to Amber LEDs and the city still strictly regulates lighting to combat light pollution.

Jordan Harbinger: They can also go for Pyongyang, North Korea, where they just turn off the electricity at 9:00 PM every night. Well, they

Jessica Wynn: don't have the Grand Canyon, so That's true.

Jordan Harbinger: That is true. So does prevention seem to be the smartest form of action a town can take when it comes to this kind of thing?

Jessica Wynn: Yeah, for sure. I mean, places can prevent light from being introduced into pristine, natural environments and showing policy makers how it saves money.

That can be really effective. I don't think people know there are billions of dollars wasted on electricity every year. That could be cut just by reducing unnecessary lighting.

Jordan Harbinger: Light pollution kind of needs better pr, right? Or light. The anti light pollution needs better PR [00:57:00] if we want more people to know what the stars are,

Jessica Wynn: right?

Smarter lights, better policies, more awareness. I mean, what if instead of fireworks on holidays, there's days that turn out all the lights for the night, like power outage day or something?

Jordan Harbinger: Yeah. You might run into some ethical pushback there from hospitals, but I get the sentiment. Instead of putting up Christmas lights, just turn out every lights.

I remember there was something called like Earth Hour. Maybe they still see that somewhere. The WWF, the Wildlife Fund. They schedule an hour. Yeah. Sorry. Not the wrestling, right? Not the, yeah. An hour. It's an hour. Everyone's supposed to turn out the lights.

Jessica Wynn: I, that would be so fun. Like let's play 18 hundreds kids.

Yeah. You know, I haven't experienced that, but I can't wait to look into it. Let's play 18

Jordan Harbinger: hundreds and everybody go in one room and while Aunt Marge and Uncle Tom have sex in the corner. Well,

Jessica Wynn: we don't have to do everything like the 1800

Jordan Harbinger: Let's, yes. While we, we smear coal dust on your face and burn some oil lamps.

Bring back the brothels. Yes, yes, syphilis.

Jessica Wynn: But we did trade the mystery [00:58:00] of the night for 24 7 glare. Without considering these environmental and societal consequences, it's less about policy and more about how light has transformed our human experience, both positively and negatively. So dark sky doesn't mean dark ground.

It means the smarter, healthier lights that save money, protect nature, and give us the stars back. So darkness is not danger, it's balance. And society needs to reconsider how we use artificial light. Advocating for more mindful and efficient lighting practices that preserve the night sky and natural cycles.

There really is a mindfulness aspect to all of this. And as the sky diminishes, we forget how infinitesimal we are in the universe and at the same time how connected we are. So we just, we

Jordan Harbinger: need all that. We need to reclaim the stars, not just for science, but for wonder. So to, [00:59:00] yeah, tonight everybody go outside, look up, and if you can't see the stars, turn something off.

Just not this podcast. Well, it's rare that an environmental crisis comes with an actual off switch. So thanks for letting us up, Jessica. Thanks to you all for listening. Topic suggestions for future episodes of Skeptical Sunday to me, jordan@jordanharbinger.com. Advertisers, deals, discounts, and ways to support the show all at jordanharbinger.com/deals.

I'm at Jordan Harbinger on both Twitter and Instagram. You can also connect with me on LinkedIn and you can find Jessica Wynn on her substack Between the Lines and Where Shadows Linger, and we'll link to that in the show notes as well. This show is created in association with PodcastOne. My team is Jen Harbinger, Jase Sanderson, Tadas Sidlauskas, Robert Fogarty, Ian Baird, and Gabriel Mizrahi.

Our advice and opinions are our own, and I might be a lawyer, but I'm certainly not your lawyer. Of course, we try to get all these episodes as right as we can, but not everything is gospel, even if it is fact-check. So consult a professional before applying anything you hear on the show, especially if [01:00:00] it's about your health and wellbeing.

Remember, we rise by lifting others. Share the show with those you love. If you found the episode useful, please share it with somebody else who could use a good dose of the skepticism and knowledge that we doled out today. In the meantime, I hope you apply what you hear on the show so you can live what you learn, and we'll see you next time.

Here's a sample of my interview with astrophysicist Neil deGrasse Tyson. We talk about why an interest in science serves every field of expertise from law to art, what our education should ideally train us for. Here's a quick look inside

Neil deGrasse Tyson: Walt Whitman. When I heard the learned astronomer, when the proofs, the figures were ranged in columns before me when I was shown the charts and diagrams to.

Divide and measure them. When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture room, how soon unaccountable, I became tired and sick til rising and gliding out. I [01:01:00] wandered off by myself into the mystical, moist night air, and from time to time looked up in perfect silence at the stars.

It's the same curiosity you have as a kid, but I just have it as an adult. I've had it since childhood. You don't have to maintain it, you just have to make sure nothing interferes with it. So the counterpart to this would be, oh, sir, literate one. Why ruin what something looks like by describing it with words When I can see it fully with my eyes, your words just get in the way.

I'd rather my mind float freely as I gaze upon something of interest than have the writer step in between me and it and interpose his or her own interpretation. You don't know the thoughts that you're not having. What keeps me awake is wondering what questions I don't yet know to ask, because they would only become available to me after we discover what dark matter and dark energy is.

Oh, man. Because think about it. The [01:02:00] fact that we even know how to ask that question. That's almost half of the way there, but I wanna know the question that I can't know yet. What is the profound level of ignorance that will manifest after we answer the profound questions? We've been smart enough to pose thus far

Jordan Harbinger: for more, including how science denial has gained a global foothold.

What it'll take for the US to get to Mars before China and why it's dangerous for people to claim the Earth is flat. Check out episode 327 of The Jordan Harbinger Show with Neil deGrasse Tyson.