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in theaters April 11th. Nobody

1:00

likes LED

1:02

headlights. Their

1:05

intensity, the

1:07

maximum intensity

1:09

that they

1:11

produce, actually

1:13

has increased.

1:15

When they sell

1:17

cars, they really want

1:19

a good safety rating,

1:22

which is more easy

1:24

to attain with a

1:26

super bright light. I

1:29

wish I understood. Does

1:31

somebody please just explain it to

1:33

me? And these days, I only

1:35

really get behind the wheel when

1:37

I'm out of town. So when

1:40

I noticed a change in cars

1:42

on the road, I thought it

1:44

was just me. But then we

1:46

got a call from Reed and

1:48

he also worried it was just

1:50

him. Am I going crazy or

1:52

does every new car on the

1:54

road have the world's brightest headlights?

1:56

I feel like whenever I'm driving

1:58

a night now, I'm constantly... having

2:00

to shield or avert my eyes from

2:02

people with giant flashlight strapped to the

2:04

front of their car. So I guess

2:07

I'm wondering why is this suddenly happening?

2:09

And are there any limits? Can people

2:11

just put whatever they want on the

2:14

front of their car and blind everyone

2:16

else? There's literally a subreddit dedicated to

2:18

this. And there are even scientists who

2:21

dedicate their time to setting it. Like

2:23

John Below. a research scientist at the

2:25

Light and Health Research Center at the

2:27

icon School of Medicine at Mount Sinai.

2:30

I'm not sure anybody has a dream

2:32

of becoming a lighting scientist when they're

2:34

a kid. It actually started out as

2:37

a summer job at the university where

2:39

I went to school and I actually

2:41

thought it was the lightning research center

2:44

which seemed a lot more exciting. I

2:46

was little disappointed when I learned it

2:48

was lighting, but as I learned more

2:51

about it, it really became something that

2:53

was interesting to me about... light that's

2:55

all around us and it affects not

2:57

only the way we see but the

3:00

way we sleep and a lot about

3:02

our health and well-being and it hasn't

3:04

gotten boring after 30 years. I'd love

3:07

to get your thoughts on the question

3:09

we got from our listener. Are headlights

3:11

brighter than they used to be? Well

3:14

there's two ways to answer that question

3:16

but fortunately for your listener's sanity the

3:18

answer is yes to both of those.

3:23

The first way has to do

3:25

with the color of LED headlights.

3:27

You've probably noticed that a lot

3:29

of them look a lot more

3:32

of a bluish white compared to

3:34

the yellowish white of halogen headlights.

3:36

Can we please go back to

3:38

the soft white headlights that they

3:40

used to put in cars? Because

3:42

I feel like now all these

3:44

new LED headlights are like these

3:46

bright blue blaring cold colored headlights.

3:49

If you look at them too

3:51

long, you're gonna melt. And the

3:53

way that we define light, the

3:55

definition of light, when we measure

3:57

it, is actually over 100 years

3:59

old, and it actually... discounts a

4:01

lot of the blue wavelengths, the

4:03

blue part of the color spectrum,

4:06

so in that sense, even though

4:08

the light meter may say two

4:10

headlights are equal, our eyes will

4:12

see the LED bluish one as

4:14

brighter. The second way to answer

4:16

that question is to actually use

4:18

the light meter and intensity of

4:20

headlights have actually increased over the

4:22

last 10 or 20 years. A

4:25

halogen ball puts out around a

4:27

thousand lumens. LEDs put out about

4:29

4,000 lumens or four times more,

4:31

but there are some aftermarket lights

4:33

that advertise an extreme 12,000 lumens.

4:35

And does that include LED lights

4:37

and non-LED lights that have gotten

4:39

brighter or is it just these

4:42

LED lights that are brighter? It's

4:44

actually both kinds of headlights, both

4:46

the halogen headlights and the LED

4:48

headlights have increased in their luminous

4:50

intensity. Headlights are getting brighter. they're

4:52

getting smaller and they're getting bluer

4:54

and all three of those things

4:56

increase discomfort glare. We think about

4:58

the reason we have headlights, they're

5:01

not to create glare to other

5:03

drivers, they're to help us see

5:05

things along the road so that

5:07

we can avoid colliding with those.

5:09

As we've paid more attention to

5:11

headlights and their ability to provide

5:13

visibility, it's become clear that... they

5:15

don't always do the best job.

5:18

And so headlight intensities have actually

5:20

been increasing in intensity in part

5:22

because of things like the Insurance

5:24

Institute for Highway Safety Safety Ratings

5:26

that when they first started coming

5:28

out about 10 years ago, we're

5:30

giving headlights. Pretty poor grades in

5:32

terms of their ability to help

5:35

us see things at night. When

5:37

the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety

5:39

first started evaluating headlights in 2016,

5:41

only two out of the 95

5:43

vehicles tested got the highest rating

5:45

of good. About half of the

5:47

models we tested don't have adequate

5:49

headlights that provide enough visibility for

5:51

the driver. Okay, so LED and

5:54

non-LED lights are brighter, both... low

5:56

beam and high beam, but for

5:58

the purpose of this conversation, let's

6:00

focus on LED lights. That's the

6:02

industry standard, right? That's right. More

6:04

than 90% of all new cars

6:06

have LED headlights only. So halogen

6:08

headlights are going to be going

6:11

away pretty quickly. And LEDs are

6:13

much more efficient than halogen headlights,

6:15

so they use less energy and

6:17

that corresponds to fewer vehicle emissions

6:19

and things like that. That's a

6:21

good thing. But because they're more

6:23

efficient, LED headlights can actually end

6:25

up having more light. And some

6:27

of that light actually ends up

6:30

in other drivers' eyes or in

6:32

their rear view mirrors. Do you

6:34

see these headlights? Ten times brighter

6:36

than the sun. Are there other

6:38

factors coming into play when we

6:40

talk about the brightness of headlights

6:42

and drivers? We're driving more pickup

6:44

trucks and SUVs than we were

6:47

in earlier years, and so headlights

6:49

have gotten higher off the ground

6:51

than they used to be. If

6:54

you are a victim of these

6:56

bright headlights, I apologize. I don't

6:58

mean, I can't do nothing if

7:01

I buy the truck like that.

7:03

And all the requirements for headlights

7:05

are relative to the headlight itself.

7:07

So that means headlights are pushing

7:09

more light into the eyes of

7:11

drivers, especially drivers who are driving

7:13

passenger cars and sedans. Their eyes

7:15

are lower to the ground, and

7:17

now they're looking at headlights that

7:20

are higher mounted off the ground.

7:22

What's happening because it feels like...

7:24

ring lights for your headlights. Another

7:26

factor is the fact that low

7:28

beam headlights are very sensitive to

7:30

the way that they're aimed. And

7:32

when you shine your lights on

7:34

a garage door, for example, you

7:36

see a broad horizontal band of

7:39

light with a pretty dark area

7:41

above and a bright area below.

7:43

That bright area is supposed to

7:45

be aimed slightly downward so that

7:47

you're lighting up the road, which

7:49

is what we want to see.

7:51

If those headlights are even missing

7:53

just a little bit upward, that

7:55

bright band of light is now

7:58

going to be shining into other

8:00

driver's eyes. that headlight aim, especially

8:02

when they're pointed slightly upward, can

8:04

really increase the amount of glare

8:06

by a lot. John, thank you

8:08

so much for confirming that our

8:10

listener Reed is not losing it.

8:12

Yes, lights are indeed brighter than

8:14

ever, but they're also appearing brighter

8:17

than ever. We're going to say

8:19

goodbye to John for now, but

8:21

when we're back, we'll find out

8:23

who's responsible for these bright

8:25

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lows.com/terms, subject to change. Looking

10:09

at why headlights are so

10:11

bright these days, it's a

10:14

question that's literally tormented our

10:16

next guess. Mark Baker. He

10:18

says that his intense experience

10:20

with headlights led him to

10:22

a diagnosis of mild autism

10:25

and changed his life. He

10:27

now runs an organization to

10:29

protect people from the impacts

10:31

of LEDs. The Soft Lights

10:33

Foundation. How did you get

10:36

involved in this? Like what

10:38

inspired you to, you know,

10:40

take this up? It's not

10:42

really like an inspiration, it

10:44

was more like a disaster.

10:46

So I used to be

10:49

a middle school math teacher

10:51

and when these LED headlights

10:53

started coming out, I remember

10:55

vividly this new thing appeared,

10:57

the Cadillac, and they had

11:00

daytime running likes. I was

11:02

assaulted by this LED light

11:04

that I'd never seen anything

11:06

like it before, and it

11:08

was a white light. but

11:11

some kind of a weird

11:13

intensity that felt like it's

11:15

indescribable, really. It sort of

11:17

looks like a hot oven,

11:19

but with a blue color

11:22

to me, and it was

11:24

really emotionally disturbing. So those

11:26

headlights and other LED lights

11:28

knocked me out of being

11:30

a teacher, I just, I

11:33

couldn't get to work anymore

11:35

without suffering these impacts, these

11:37

neurological, psychological impacts. So many

11:39

people don't see it, but

11:41

other people can actually consciously

11:44

see it, so they're driving

11:46

around. seeing Flickr, Flickr, Flickr,

11:48

Flickr, Flickr, and that's of

11:50

course really disturbing. I understand

11:52

you've had Quite a few

11:54

people sign a petition about

11:57

this. Could you talk about

11:59

that a little bit? I

12:01

would love to. We've notified

12:03

the government. They have copies

12:05

of this petition. But just

12:08

recently we exceeded 70,000 signatures.

12:10

Wow. So we have thousands

12:12

of comments and they talk

12:14

about their stigmatism and how

12:16

the light impacts their stigmatism.

12:19

They talk about how they

12:21

can't see. They talk about

12:23

how they stopped driving at

12:25

night. They're begging us to

12:27

do something. Yeah, does it

12:30

seem the government is paying

12:32

attention? The government is not

12:34

paying attention. I'm

21:07

Claire Parker. I'm Ashley Hamilton. And this

21:10

is Celebrity Memoir Book Club. And we're

21:12

thinking like monks this week. If you've

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ever thought Kevin O'Leary, Jeff Bezos, the

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founder of Headspace, those are men that

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are very, very monk-like, oh boy,

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you. He's written a book that tells

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you how to use your monk mind

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to become more like a billionaire monk.

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Pulling from three highly disputed years at

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an ashram. He's telling you stories of

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like when he was in eighth

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grade and got a bad grade on a

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test and how that was scary and how now

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reach your higher self the billionaire version of you

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think like a monk or listen to this week's

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episode of celebrity memoir book club out now. If

21:55

you've been online this week,

21:58

you've probably seen an unending

22:00

flood of those beautiful animated

22:02

studio gibly style images of

22:05

everything. Well

27:56

Tim, thank you so much for

27:58

that. Yeah, you're welcome I'm happy

28:00

to help. Remember John Below who

28:03

ended up having and loving a

28:05

job no kid dreams of? Being

28:07

a lighting scientist? I asked him

28:10

what solutions he'd suggest for the

28:12

bright lights problem too. There are

28:14

LED lights that are a warm

28:17

white color that would look very

28:19

similar to halogen lights and they

28:21

would be much more comfortable to

28:24

look at at night. So that's

28:26

one possibility. Another possibility and something

28:28

we probably should pay more attention

28:31

to is the aim of our

28:33

headlights. Headlight aim is something that

28:35

some states, but not most, actually

28:38

require as part of their safety

28:40

inspections. So you know, drivers could

28:42

ask their mechanic once a year

28:45

to have their headlight aim checked

28:47

and to adjust it if needed.

28:49

Is there any chance that we

28:52

could get something from... of federal

28:54

regulators that all automakers would be

28:56

required to do across the country?

28:59

Yes, the federal Department of Transportation

29:01

is very interested in the glare

29:03

question. They've been getting a lot

29:05

of complaints from the public in

29:08

the last 20 to 30 years

29:10

about glare specifically. And so they

29:12

have been looking into what might

29:15

be done. Certainly what could be

29:17

done is some upper limits on

29:19

the overall intensity from low beam

29:22

headlights. That's one possibility. Maybe some

29:24

restrictions on the height of headlight,

29:26

heights on vehicles is another possibility.

29:29

So there are some things that

29:31

could be integrated into regulations to

29:33

help reduce the glare issue. Before

29:40

we go, we wanted to go

29:42

back to Mark Baker, the guy

29:45

who says he was so incapacitated

29:47

by headlights that he had to

29:50

quit his job. He's obviously thought

29:52

a lot about helping people avoid

29:54

being triggered by overly bright headlights.

29:57

So there are basically techniques for

29:59

survival. You can get... blue blocker

30:02

type glasses with a yellow tint

30:04

or an orange tint it does

30:06

help the glare so they can

30:09

try that but it's really sort

30:11

of not safe because the way

30:14

LED light is it's a directional

30:16

light it's very intense and I've

30:18

tried them myself I basically can't

30:21

see so I don't use them

30:23

and so the empowerment comes from

30:26

from our listeners contacting the government.

30:28

Joining up with the Soft Lights

30:30

Foundation, contacting me, getting involved, and

30:33

let's fix this systemic problem. Thanks

30:35

so much to Mark Baker and

30:38

all our car and lighting experts

30:40

who helped us answer Reed's question

30:42

today. We're making a show soon

30:45

about post-high school graduation blues. If

30:47

you have a question about those

30:50

next steps, give us a call

30:52

at 1, 618, 845. This

30:55

episode was produced and sound

30:57

design by Hottie Milwaukee. It

30:59

was edited by Miranda Kennedy,

31:01

it was fact-checked by Melissa

31:03

Hirsch, and Patrick Boyd was

31:05

our engineer this week. I'm

31:07

your host, John Gwenhill. Talk

31:10

to you soon. Bye! by

32:00

Miranda Kennedy, it was fact

32:02

checked by Melissa Hirsch, and

32:04

Patrick Boyd was our engineer

32:06

this week. I'm your host,

32:08

John Gwenhill. Talk to you

32:10

soon. Bye!