I grew up in a rural place where we could see the texture of the milky way just stepping outside at night—it’s been fun taking friends who grew up in cities on wilderness backpacking trips and sitting out to watch the stars. There’s an awe to a true night sky that I think has real psychological impact.
I did also have a cool experience, deep in the backcountry at a high elevation camp some years ago: we went to sleep in a gale, the tent flapping all around, with a cloudy sky. I thought we’d get a big storm, but I woke up hot at 3am, the air totally still. I slid out of the tent and the sky was completely crystal clear. An incredible spread of stars. I watched for a while and noticed a reddish glow on the horizon. We were so far out and it wrapped around in all directions, so I knew it couldn’t possibly have been a town, but I was puzzled. I learned about airglow when we got out of the woods: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airglow
> There’s an awe to a true night sky that I think has real psychological impact.
I've only really experienced this once in my life. I was young teen, my family was visiting some family friends at a remote cabin. I woke up during the middle of the night and went out. It was a crystal clear winter night, and I was completely blown away at what I saw.
Once I had gotten over the shock, I thought "no wonder they called it the milky way". It was so bright, it felt like a new moon just smeared all across the sky.
Sadly not had the chance to experience that again. The then-remote cabin got swarmed by hundreds of others and so it's no longer pitch dark at night there.
I have it as a goal to get out in a really dark zone and see it again.
I love watching the milky way on a clear, dark night. There are so many stars. Countless stars. It makes me feel really small and all my troubles (and the world's troubles) so insignificant. I love that feeling.
For almost all of human history we lived with that true night sky.
I wonder if the psychological impact is really the absence of the true night sky that we have. Maybe the awe we feel at seeing the true night is what we’re supposed to feel? Something to think about.
For most of my life, I never quite “got it” about the night sky. It was pretty, but not THAT different away from cities.
I only recently learned that visual snow syndrome is a thing, and that most people don’t have it. For me, there is a faint background of multicolor static (analog TV on a dead channel, for those who remember that) on everything, all the time. Light washes it out, so it’s only in the deep dark that I’m absolutely surrounded by it. (It’s basically visual tinnitus, which in turn lead me to discover that I’ve also had auditory tinnitus my whole life, it’s just a soft static not a “ringing” so I never realized it was the same phenomenon.)
A long time ago, I had the privilege of being in an area with zero lights. It wasn't a dark sky preserve officially, but it really was one. The night sky was mesmerizing.
Unfortunately, I have never seen stars the same way again. Whenever I think I might see them, I encounter some light pollution which dulls them down.
Oh, what I'd give to experience darkness and to be under the stars.
(That's obviously a lie because I love my conveniences and give up the darkness and the stars for said conveniences every single day)
I live on a small farm a few miles from the closest town. It's not totally pitch dark, but on a clear night you can see the Milky Way and sometimes on my way back inside after doing evening chores, I'll just stand there staring up at the sky. It never gets old.
Does feel a bit eerie on moonless nights when the coyotes start howling though.
My city (low density suburb of Los Angeles) has outdoor lighting ordinances that spell out rules: all outdoor lighting must point downward, street lights are not allowed, holiday lights must be removed a week after New Years. There are also ordinances governing disputes--fees to get the inspector out at night, paperwork, etc.
If you want dark skies, take some friends to a city council meeting and make your case for similar ordinances. It's doable, even in a place like Los Angeles.
I'm fortunate to now live under Bortle 3 skies. I got a telescope when I was a kid and stayed hooked on amateur astronomy for most of my life. But back then I lived in the city with Bortle 8 or 9 night skies...I kinda lost interest in the hobby.
In 2011 I left the Dallas Fort Worth area and headed west, met a nice girl that lives on a 180 acre family farm and the night skies are amazing! You can see the dark voids (dense dust) snaking through the Milky Way.
Now, I'm saving money to build a small observatory out front, new telescope and a permanent pier to set it all on.
As a stargazer, I've long been annoyed by one particularly bright satellite. It seems to have a cycle of 29 1/2 days and covers about 1/2 degree of arc.
OMG, it is so bright that it blots out all but the brightest stars. Something needs to be done about this.
I bring my hammock on vacation so I can sleep under the stars. It's always one of the most enjoyable aspects of the trip, even though I'm asleep for most of it.
I know fellow stargazers who keep local dark spots secret for fear of drawing attention to them because they are that rare. Places that are dark and legal to be all night are even rarer (public boat ramps are a good place to look). It might be different on the US west coast where there's a lot of public land.
The one big reason I would love to live in the past or have a time machine is to see a true night sky. Sick of the light washed-out and satellite specked one we have now.
words can't describe how much I hate how everything is covered with white hospital LED lamps instead of the warm orange lamps that gave that 'night' feeling.
such a sad state of affairs. everything good must end I guess.
You’re forgetting about how crime thrives in darkness. Better street lighting has helped reduced crime over the years. Better lighting has also reduced nighttime traffic accidents.
> there are plenty of dark places just outside your city
In the eastern half of the US and the western 3/4 of mainland europe, there are very few spots that are below bortle 4. In these regions of the world, people in big cities (i.e. most people) would still need to drive 1-2 hours just to get to bortle 4, let alone below that.
The issue is that so much of night time lighting is wasteful and excessive, not that lighting doesn't enhance the world for humans.
I know for a fact that just putting old school light shutters on streetlights so they don't leak into, say, bedrooms and stay focused on pavement and sidewalks, and dimming them off hours, would be a huge change that doesn't diminish utility at all.
> a huge change that doesn't diminish utility at all.
It does though, by redirecting funds & human effort that could be used for more lighting.
Here's a counter-anecdote though, to give you hope.
In Bondi in Sydney there's a lighting upgrade underway on the beach promenade; the plan was circulated so I got to take a look. As you hoped they indeed did deeply consider throw angles and what's lit & unlit, and ran a competitive tender to choose among many vendors, settling on one they lauded for their flexibility in offering products that can throw at specific angles and leave specific areas unlit. In the plan published for public comments they specify the exact angles needed with diagrams and everything. So it's possible! It requires public servants to go above and beyond, which does happen, just not all the time and not in all the places. But it does happen!
I once saw motion activated streetlights that went from dim to bright as cars approached. It seemed very futuristic, and I wish a lot more places had them.
Story time! I used to live in Bahrain, which is an archipelago. When I was a kid my family and friends took a boat out to Umm Jaleed Island (nicknamed Bird Poop Island) for the night. Zero light pollution, we had tents but chose to stare up at the stars and get pinched by crabs, enjoying the quiet.
grew up in dubai in the 80s, and we went to a beach in fujairah once which had not just a wonderfully starry sky, but the most amazing bioluminescence in the ocean. don't think i've experienced both things together since then.
To be honest, I think this is a very unbalanced take. Better illumination stops crime and traffic accidents and I'm not willing to pay with human lives to see the stars obviously. The effect on wildlife and plants is certainly to be considered but this article is from the U.S.A. and I live in a country with far better illumination than that place and I've seen stories multiple times from foreigners who moved here and noticed that immediately, they stopped being afraid at night because the country is so well-lit and crime numbers are low as a consequence.
Human lives are a big price to pay to see some stars.
I grew up in a rural place where we could see the texture of the milky way just stepping outside at night—it’s been fun taking friends who grew up in cities on wilderness backpacking trips and sitting out to watch the stars. There’s an awe to a true night sky that I think has real psychological impact.
I did also have a cool experience, deep in the backcountry at a high elevation camp some years ago: we went to sleep in a gale, the tent flapping all around, with a cloudy sky. I thought we’d get a big storm, but I woke up hot at 3am, the air totally still. I slid out of the tent and the sky was completely crystal clear. An incredible spread of stars. I watched for a while and noticed a reddish glow on the horizon. We were so far out and it wrapped around in all directions, so I knew it couldn’t possibly have been a town, but I was puzzled. I learned about airglow when we got out of the woods: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Airglow
> There’s an awe to a true night sky that I think has real psychological impact.
I've only really experienced this once in my life. I was young teen, my family was visiting some family friends at a remote cabin. I woke up during the middle of the night and went out. It was a crystal clear winter night, and I was completely blown away at what I saw.
Once I had gotten over the shock, I thought "no wonder they called it the milky way". It was so bright, it felt like a new moon just smeared all across the sky.
Sadly not had the chance to experience that again. The then-remote cabin got swarmed by hundreds of others and so it's no longer pitch dark at night there.
I have it as a goal to get out in a really dark zone and see it again.
I love watching the milky way on a clear, dark night. There are so many stars. Countless stars. It makes me feel really small and all my troubles (and the world's troubles) so insignificant. I love that feeling.
For almost all of human history we lived with that true night sky.
I wonder if the psychological impact is really the absence of the true night sky that we have. Maybe the awe we feel at seeing the true night is what we’re supposed to feel? Something to think about.
For most of my life, I never quite “got it” about the night sky. It was pretty, but not THAT different away from cities.
I only recently learned that visual snow syndrome is a thing, and that most people don’t have it. For me, there is a faint background of multicolor static (analog TV on a dead channel, for those who remember that) on everything, all the time. Light washes it out, so it’s only in the deep dark that I’m absolutely surrounded by it. (It’s basically visual tinnitus, which in turn lead me to discover that I’ve also had auditory tinnitus my whole life, it’s just a soft static not a “ringing” so I never realized it was the same phenomenon.)
So you're living in the opening of Neuromancer: "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."
That sentence has changed meaning twice, depending on what generation you are, it's either "snow", solid blue, or a screensaver.
A long time ago, I had the privilege of being in an area with zero lights. It wasn't a dark sky preserve officially, but it really was one. The night sky was mesmerizing.
Unfortunately, I have never seen stars the same way again. Whenever I think I might see them, I encounter some light pollution which dulls them down.
Oh, what I'd give to experience darkness and to be under the stars.
(That's obviously a lie because I love my conveniences and give up the darkness and the stars for said conveniences every single day)
I live on a small farm a few miles from the closest town. It's not totally pitch dark, but on a clear night you can see the Milky Way and sometimes on my way back inside after doing evening chores, I'll just stand there staring up at the sky. It never gets old.
Does feel a bit eerie on moonless nights when the coyotes start howling though.
My city (low density suburb of Los Angeles) has outdoor lighting ordinances that spell out rules: all outdoor lighting must point downward, street lights are not allowed, holiday lights must be removed a week after New Years. There are also ordinances governing disputes--fees to get the inspector out at night, paperwork, etc.
If you want dark skies, take some friends to a city council meeting and make your case for similar ordinances. It's doable, even in a place like Los Angeles.
I'm fortunate to now live under Bortle 3 skies. I got a telescope when I was a kid and stayed hooked on amateur astronomy for most of my life. But back then I lived in the city with Bortle 8 or 9 night skies...I kinda lost interest in the hobby.
In 2011 I left the Dallas Fort Worth area and headed west, met a nice girl that lives on a 180 acre family farm and the night skies are amazing! You can see the dark voids (dense dust) snaking through the Milky Way. Now, I'm saving money to build a small observatory out front, new telescope and a permanent pier to set it all on.
One of the most effective ways you can personally help protect night sky is by installing downward facing lights with caps!
No need to waste energy lighting up the sky; direct it toward what you need illuminated.
Also, the company the article mentions is Reflect Orbital.
Love the idea of harnessing more sun, but really disturbed by the potential destruction of darkness that it could cause when deployed at scale.
Life on Earth evolved with the night.
As a stargazer, I've long been annoyed by one particularly bright satellite. It seems to have a cycle of 29 1/2 days and covers about 1/2 degree of arc.
OMG, it is so bright that it blots out all but the brightest stars. Something needs to be done about this.
https://satellitemap.space/
It got 1000% worse when street lights went to LEDs. And in my area, they didn't even use warm colored LEDs - they are harsh bright white bulbs.
I miss the 70s/80s/90s era of street lights where they were warm and easy on the eyes.
I feel like its a huge part why I barely see insects outside any more. Seeing bugs waste their life flying around a street lamp is pretty sad
I bring my hammock on vacation so I can sleep under the stars. It's always one of the most enjoyable aspects of the trip, even though I'm asleep for most of it.
I know fellow stargazers who keep local dark spots secret for fear of drawing attention to them because they are that rare. Places that are dark and legal to be all night are even rarer (public boat ramps are a good place to look). It might be different on the US west coast where there's a lot of public land.
The one big reason I would love to live in the past or have a time machine is to see a true night sky. Sick of the light washed-out and satellite specked one we have now.
Take a trip to Alaska, northern BC, Norway, etc.
There's a particular observatory in Hawaii that is supposed to be amazing.
I'm sure there's plenty of other spots!
words can't describe how much I hate how everything is covered with white hospital LED lamps instead of the warm orange lamps that gave that 'night' feeling.
such a sad state of affairs. everything good must end I guess.
I think actually we're forgetting how economically valuable light is and how much lighting at night improves human lives.
While also - paradoxically - forgetting that there are plenty of dark places just outside your city if you're willing to drive to them.
Perhaps it's in service of baiting you to click.
Who is forgetting that? Complaining that I can't see the fucking stars doesn't mean I don't understand that having lights let's me see in the dark.
You’re forgetting about how crime thrives in darkness. Better street lighting has helped reduced crime over the years. Better lighting has also reduced nighttime traffic accidents.
> there are plenty of dark places just outside your city
In the eastern half of the US and the western 3/4 of mainland europe, there are very few spots that are below bortle 4. In these regions of the world, people in big cities (i.e. most people) would still need to drive 1-2 hours just to get to bortle 4, let alone below that.
The issue is that so much of night time lighting is wasteful and excessive, not that lighting doesn't enhance the world for humans.
I know for a fact that just putting old school light shutters on streetlights so they don't leak into, say, bedrooms and stay focused on pavement and sidewalks, and dimming them off hours, would be a huge change that doesn't diminish utility at all.
> a huge change that doesn't diminish utility at all.
It does though, by redirecting funds & human effort that could be used for more lighting.
Here's a counter-anecdote though, to give you hope.
In Bondi in Sydney there's a lighting upgrade underway on the beach promenade; the plan was circulated so I got to take a look. As you hoped they indeed did deeply consider throw angles and what's lit & unlit, and ran a competitive tender to choose among many vendors, settling on one they lauded for their flexibility in offering products that can throw at specific angles and leave specific areas unlit. In the plan published for public comments they specify the exact angles needed with diagrams and everything. So it's possible! It requires public servants to go above and beyond, which does happen, just not all the time and not in all the places. But it does happen!
I once saw motion activated streetlights that went from dim to bright as cars approached. It seemed very futuristic, and I wish a lot more places had them.
Light doesn't need to be aimed up into the sky to function. You need to spend more time in the world.
Story time! I used to live in Bahrain, which is an archipelago. When I was a kid my family and friends took a boat out to Umm Jaleed Island (nicknamed Bird Poop Island) for the night. Zero light pollution, we had tents but chose to stare up at the stars and get pinched by crabs, enjoying the quiet.
grew up in dubai in the 80s, and we went to a beach in fujairah once which had not just a wonderfully starry sky, but the most amazing bioluminescence in the ocean. don't think i've experienced both things together since then.
To be honest, I think this is a very unbalanced take. Better illumination stops crime and traffic accidents and I'm not willing to pay with human lives to see the stars obviously. The effect on wildlife and plants is certainly to be considered but this article is from the U.S.A. and I live in a country with far better illumination than that place and I've seen stories multiple times from foreigners who moved here and noticed that immediately, they stopped being afraid at night because the country is so well-lit and crime numbers are low as a consequence.
Human lives are a big price to pay to see some stars.
Lights don't have to be aimed up into the sky to function. Crime and traffic accidents aren't higher in towns with dark-sky ordnances.