The Deep Science Of Blue Light Toxicity, & Why LED Trashes Your Health with Dr. Alexander Wunsch #278

Dr. Alexander Wunsch is one of the world’s foremost experts on everything light. If you’ve been listening to the show for a while, you know how passionate I am about biohacking my environment, and light is a big part of that, and it was a dream of mine to have Dr. Wunsch on the show to help me clear some things up.

Because there is a lot of conflicting information out there about whether you should avoid sunlight and the risks of living indoors, where we’re bombarded with artificial light. So, Dr. Wunsch is here to clear up any misconceptions and teach us what we need to know to optimize our health and the health of our families.

This information is also particularly pertinent to maintaining your physical, mental, and spiritual wellness during this period of time when people all around the world are spending more time at home than usual, exposing themselves to even less natural light and even more toxic light.

After listening to this episode, you will understand why our light environment is just as important as our air, food, and water — and you are going to look at your blue-blocking glasses (or the people you have made fun of for wearing blue-blocking glasses) in a whole new light.

06:00 — What is photobiology?

• Photobiology is the science of light acting on biological organisms
• Its critical role in human healing and health
• Our circadian rhythm: how to manage it and why it matters
• Sunlight played a paramount role in the development of life, starting 3.5 billion years ago
• “Junk light”

10:45 — The different types of lighting we are exposed to & how they affect us

• The color spectrum of daylight Vs. the color spectrum from artificial lights
• Why incandescent bulbs weren’t as bad as LED or fluorescent lights
• How blue light exposure wrecks our eyes, brains, and sleep
• Why short wavelengths of light have the greatest effect on our cellular metabolism
• The more ultraviolet radiation in the environment, the more stress put on your cells
• Why it matters that your skin is also susceptible to blue light
• Why blue-blocking glasses are critical at night
• As soon as the body detects more blue light in its environment, it starts producing more stress hormones — and this is perfect in nature but horribly damaging in our artificial environments full of blue light
• Were blue lights put into school and work environments to increase productivity? And did they know about the harmful effects?

20:37 — Did offices, schools, factories, hospitals, and big-box stores adopt artificial blue lights knowing about their harmful effects? Or did they just want to save money?

• “Light sells”
• The role of light in our industrial and economic history, going back to the first Industrial Revolution
• Trading short-term productivity for long-term harm
• It’s hard to tell just how damaging our artificial environments are because we don’t have any good control groups anymore
• The parallel development of light bulbs and electricity

35:40 — The legislation that made selling incandescent bulbs illegal (to save energy) & the legislation that was passed to make it legal again

• Did we actually need to ban incandescent bulbs for the environment? Were they unsustainable?
• What the healthiest lightbulbs on the market are and how to find them
• Incandescent Edison Light Bulbs
• Incandescent (Non -LED) Mini Christmas Lights
• Red Light Incandescent Bulbs

47:30 — A deep dive into the negative biological effects of blue light

• The biological history of melatonin
• As long as we see the colors of the sunset (clear color discrimination), we are in an environment that is too bright for our bodies to repair themselves
• Melatonin’s role as a signaling molecule
• The most surprising and common sources of blue light in our day-to-day environments
• After we’ve been exposed to blue light, how long does it affect our biology?
• How long do we have to be exposed to blue light before it disrupts our biology?
• What you can do to mimic natural light in your home
• The ridiculous degree to which our indoor lights are brighter than the moon

01:06:50 — Why LED and fluorescent lights suck so bad & the difference between the two

• Our body experiences discomfort if the light environment is different from what it expects as a result of evolution
• How does flickering light affect us?
• How flicker reduces productivity by a startling amount
• How toxic lighting negatively impacts your eyes
• Why dark mode is extremely beneficial
• The Kindle Oasis Reader allows you to change the color temperature of the screen
• BLUblox glasses
• Programs you can install on your computer and phone to make them less damaging
• Iris computer blue-blocking software
• It’s better to have a good e-reader in dark mode than to read a book in artificial light
• The Irlen Institute

01:25:40 — Why we need a direct connection to outside

• The more daylight you can get, the better
• How windows and glasses ruin sunlight and turn it into junk light
• Why Dr. Wunsch prefers controlled exposure to sunlight over things like cracking your car window open
• The benefits of sungazing at dusk and dawn

01:36:35 — The mercury photons coming from fluorescent bulbs

• Dr. Wunsch’s hypothesis about what they’re doing to our bodies

01:42:00 — The hierarchy of indoor lighting: is any of it not junk?

• The worst is cold light — fluorescent and LED — especially when they have a high color temperature
• LEDs can vary quite a bit
• Incandescent is better
• Running incandescent bulbs on a direct current will also eliminate fl