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[–] 101 points 2 months ago (21 children)

What happens when you don't have regulated standards? That. The color of the light is also important. Brightest doesn't mean best.

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  • [–] 38 points 2 months ago (8 children)

    Yep. Higher frequency lights actually inhibit your ability to see details, making driving less safe.

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago (6 children)

    do you have a source for that? because it sounds completely insane

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  • [–] 25 points 2 months ago (5 children)

    Hot off the press: https://research.uga.edu/news/blue-light-has-a-surprising-effect-on-your-eyes-study-finds/

    But it's common knowledge that we have more green and red cones in our eyes so we're naturally able to perceive more of those wavelengths.

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  • [–] 14 points 2 months ago (4 children)

    oh lmao, i thought you were talking about the flicker frequency, but you mean short wavelength i.e. blue.
    Yeah that sounds less insane, though i still question how important it is compared to the benefits of photopic lighting.

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  • [–] 5 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    Waves have both wavelength and frequency. Increasing one decreases the other. High frequency light and short wavelength light means the same thing.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago* (1 child)

    i rarely hear people say "frequency" in regards to photons, though. You say "wavelength" because it makes more sense for the context of something that is generally instantaneous.

    "frequency" makes sense for things that change over time, but light almost always presents itself to us as a spatial wave, you see the wave-nature of light in diffractions and stuff as opposed to pressure waves (sound) where it obviously changes over time and is difficult to view in terms of space.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 months ago

    Sure, and you have radio waves and microwaves, but you also have VHF and UHF TV, ULF radio for submarines, and even radio stations are given by their frequency (even if people these days don't think about what those numbers refer to).

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  • [–] 8 points 2 months ago (9 children)

    I thought headlights in the US are strictly regulated with archaic standards. European headlights had a more sophisticated auto dimming and direction control, from what i remember.

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  • [–] 29 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Some things may be regulated, but others are a free for all where the manufacturer can do whatever sells their car. Otherwise there wouldn't be so many complaints these days of being blinded by the NOT high beams. And light bars should be illegal on a road, period.

    I don't know about inspections in other states, but in mine (that is reducing what they check starting next year for some reason) they make sure your headlights and brights come on. They don't do any check for aim or lumen output or anything else.

    If you've never seen them, Technology Connections on Youtube has had a few videos ranting about how bad the headlight situation is in the US.

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  • [–] 7 points 2 months ago

    Auto dimming headlights are great in principle but in my experience a pain in the ass! They don't dim early enough, especially when cars are rounding corners so you actually dazzle a lot more people. Then if you try to dip them early but the auto-dip gets there first you end up flashing the car ahead.

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  • [–] 10 points 2 months ago (3 children)

    Europeans also don't tend to have the headlights 1.50m or more above ground level, because anyone who isn't 'Murican still builds comparably normal cars and no useless "Trucks". Even though they also get worse and worse (fuck SUVs).

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  • [–] 13 points 2 months ago (2 children)

    It's getting worse in Europe too.

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  • [–] 2 points 2 months ago (1 child)

    Yeah, and the worst thing is that environmental policies might be to blame (to my knowledge).

    Larger vehicles have less strict emission rules. And because "the market" also wants cheap stuff and just making the car bigger is easier than reinventing the engine… a cynic might call this shift malicious compliance by the manufacturers.

    We can only hope this trend is reversable once EVs become dominant, those benefit from less size and weight.

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