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We’re forgetting what darkness feels like

211 points · 125 comments · pseudolus

  1. thaeli · · focus · HN ↗
    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.)

    1. svachalek · · focus · HN ↗
      So you're living in the opening of Neuromancer: "The sky above the port was the color of television, tuned to a dead channel."
      1. LeoPanthera · · focus · HN ↗
        That sentence has changed meaning twice, depending on what generation you are, it's either "snow", solid blue, or a screensaver.
        1. AndrewDucker · · focus · HN ↗
          Kids these days don't even know what a channel is ;-)

          (Well, except for YouTube channels)

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