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The End of Night
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The End of Night discussion
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Becky
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Aug 01, 2015 04:43PM
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To get the discussion going, I thought I would share them with you.
Do you have any significant memories from childhood regarding light --bright lights?
Have you ever experienced "real darkness"? Can you describe how you felt- what was it like?
I lived near Phoenix, AZ in the 70s, and I recall a huge sweeping light that would cross back and forth across the sky at night. I was a kid, and I am not sure what this light was for. Parents may have said it was related to airplanes. It was like a search light or a spotlight, but nowadays I don't thin they use these lights anymore.
Darkness--
Does darkness have sound or lack of sound? I ask, because although there are night sounds - the coyote and the barn owl in our area, there can also be a deep stillness present in darkness -- a vast silence that I don't feel in daylight.
I can remember staying in forest service cabins in Alaska, and walking out onto the deck at night. It was Southeast Alaska, and often the sky was covered by clouds. But, I do remember the utter blackness, and I realized that even our bedroom has lights - clock lights, night lites...always light present even if in a tiny form.
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We had to walk about 2 miles out of the park (through heavy trees) and down the road to get to a pay phone back then and the first night there, we headed down during a new moon. I have never experienced utter darkness like that while among the trees. You literally could not see your hand in front of your face. We slid our feet along the road to make sure the path was still below us and another man passed by us - we only realized he was there when he called out a hello as he was going by. Truly unnerving!
As a lifelong city-dweller, I have never experienced real darkness outdoors. The first time I went camping in the New England woods what moved me was not the darkness, but the stars. I had never seen the night sky so full of stars!
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Becky- thanks for sharing your experience. I think complete darkness is unnerving. probably it's genetically conditioned for us to fear what lies in the dark, because we rely so much on sight. The idea of another person being there and not realizing it is creepy.
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Hi Susan- Yes, I bet that was thrilling to see so many natural lights up in the sky. I have lived mostly in the country, and I for get how the city creates a light that blocks out the stars...
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Has anyone in your family taught you about stars--do stars hold any fascination for you?
My husband's mother taught him about the stars and he got me interested when we first met- but then we moved to Southeast Alaska for 16 years, and watching the stars fell away , because it was cloudy so much of the time. This book is getting me interested again. But, as a young person I was not particularly drawn to thinking about what was up in the night sky. :(
I don't see the stars but I often moon gaze. On a clear night the moon is beautiful.
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Yes, I agree about the moon. It has a soft glow that reminds me of the way I suppose the gas lamps look like in London. Chapter 2 is about the lighting in London and Paris. This book is surprising me for how humanities based it is. Bogard is touch upon literature, art, archictecture...all is regards to light..
Back to the moon-- have you ever walked outside at night
with only the moon to light your way?
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Questions- have you ever seen Paris or London at night? What do you remember about the lighting? What impressions?
Comments:
This book reminds me a little of Message from Martha the book we read some months back about the passenger pigeons. Bogard is like Avery in that Bogard is on a journey- he's traveling all over the world to explore the story of light and darkness. It's quite delightful; I love being introduced to new topics and see how an author shows the reader that topic from a variety of perspectives.
Question:
Where is the most beautifully lit city you have ever seen?
What is the most magical lighting you remember seeing?
I'm surprised by how many memories of lighting this book brings up for me. I didn't think these memories were important to me, but as I read about lighting of some very famous places, my own memories of special lighting come back. Interesting and fun.
I didn't realize Charles Dickens wrote essays though it doesn't surprise me, but I'd like to read his essay about walking through London at night in the 19th century. Bogard refers to this essay and other essays written by well known authors in the book.
I haven't started the book yet, bu your comments bring back so many memories, I cannot put them all in one posting. I worked for a while as a guide in a commercial cave, so I have experienced total darkness by turning out all of the lights. It is unlike anything you have ever (not) seen.
I have seen the Perseid Meteor shower in New Hampshire, but the Chattanooga skies seem to never cooperate.
Moon gazing - absolutely. Love the full moon and all the other phases. I watch it regularly. I also remember seeing it through a telescope, and seeing a feature known as the terminator for the first time. Do a web search on the Terminator as an astronomical phenomenon.
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I worked for a while as a guide in a commercial cave, so I have experienced tota..."
Hi Ray-- thanks for your comments, and you have had some interesting experiences. I'd like to know more about how it felt to be in total darkness inside a cave? To be a cave guide did you undergo any special training? Isn't there danger of people panicking?
Was it frightening at any point, or...
The idea of being inside cave in utter blackness seems unsettling. I think because it seems like you would lose all sense of direction and form. You would lose yourself it seems to me- almost entering the Buddhist idea of no-self. BUT, my comments are all imagination; I have never been inside a dark cave.
My best moonlight memories come from when I was a teenager. I had horses from when I was 8 until I went away to college. As kids in Virginia we rode often in the woods by moonlight. It was so wonderful. We could see well, and so could the horses. It was the time of relying on night vision. I continued doing things in darkness like playing basketball in darkness in college, but after college I got away from these night adventures (job...marriage...). I miss relying on my night eyes. I don't have them anymore.
In the book he talks about this- if you don't use them you lose them.
I recommended this book so I'm pleased that many seem to be liking it. I found it to be written in a very accessible style. Since I read it a few years ago I am hoping to reread soon to refresh my thoughts. There's good lecture by the author on c-span http://www.c-span.org/video/?321162-5... I'm 68 and have lived in the same spot for almost my entire life. Boy, has the night-time changed here. When I was a kid my street was pretty much rural. I can remember playing after dark in fields near the house loaded with fireflies (hardly see one or two fireflies of a summer now). We kids would play wolf and sheep in the meadow grass in what felt like total darkness. Gradually the area was built up until now I have a strip mall and gas station plaza within spitting distance with a parking lot full of lights blazing late into the night, glowing signs & security lights all within view of my bedroom window. I now need blackout curtains to have any sort of darkness in my bedroom and that's tough in summer as I hate air conditioning and need airflow from open windows. I don't think all my current broken sleep habits are caused by age. When I was a kid I could still see the Milky Way overhead but now I'm lucky to see only a few of the most obvious constellations.
Missing the dark in not so rural RI
Hi Sher:My total darkness experiences have never exceeded ten seconds or so. I have only shared that experience with small, select groups, and usually counted down to lights coming back on. You literally can see nothing at all in these experiences. It is not part of the tour in the cave where I worked. Training for guides is extensive.
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Phair- Great to hear from you and thanks for your comments and the link. I am gone until Sunday; I look forward to responding then! More soon- Sher
Does anyone know where I can find Ellen Meloy’s essay “The Flora and Fauna of Las Vegas” in pdf format?
On pages 36-37, Bogard wrote, "Does Van Gogh use his imagination? Of course—he’s said to have painted the scene in his asylum cell at St. Remy from studies he’d done outside and from memory—but this is an imagined sky inspired by a real sky of a kind few of the fifty million MoMA visitors have ever seen."However, I find it interesting what else I found while looking for a photo of the painting. Albert Boime, professor of art history, UCLA until he died, said that the painting was from what van Gogh actually saw:
"An analysis of Vincent van Gogh's The Starry Night by Boime convinced him that the images in the painting's night sky were not a fanciful artwork, but was the result of Van Gogh's observations of the sky from the window of the asylum in Saint-Rémy-de-Provence at 4 a.m. on June 19, 1889, the day he wrote his brother that he had completed the painting. In a 1985 lecture to the American Astronomical Society, Boime compared the positions of the moon and Venus that night and showed that they corresponded to the positions of the celestial objects in the painting, noting that the scene "tallies with astronomical facts at the time the painting was executed."" from https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alber...
I can see that this book will take me forever to complete.
Was van Gogh seeing more clearly in "The Starry Night" then most of us ever will?http://youtu.be/PMerSm2ToFY
Thank you! I was surprised, while searching, to not be able to find anthologies with specific essays. Which made me wonder if this wasn't more properly a chapter that has become famous. On the other hand, iPad searches are tedious and I may have overlooked many things. It is supposed to be in her book "Raven's Exile." But that is not on kindle.
Two thoughts on darkness...-I can relate to what Phair said about the changes in her neighborhood. We often walk in our neighborhood at night. Twenty years ago, during new moon you could barely see your hand in front of your face. The moon shadows during full moon were vivid and I could read a book by the full moon. Now, lights from surrounding growth and new houses in the neighborhood with "accent lighting", security lighting, and strings of party lights have made the truly dark nights a thing of the past. Even camping in state parks, campers put up strings of party lights and leave on "porch lights" on RVs. I was glad to see something posted about dark skies at one campground, but I wish they'd prohibit the lights.
---also, one memorable experience was a full day in an undeveloped cave. We ate lunch in a large "room" and spent time in there with all headlamps off. Our lights were pretty insignificant as we moved through passageways that we half imagined in the limited light which was so easily overwhelmed by the darkness. We all felt pretty euphoric when we emerged late in the day.
Regarding the Van Gogh painting Starry Night, I once heard it was a rendering of the aura, or altered perceptions preceding an epileptic seizure. I have never since seen any evidence that this is true.
This video shows that they have mathematically quantified the luminence in the painting and it is correct compared to actual turbulence. Gotta watch it. Makes me wonder if there isn't a benefit to being insane at times. The phenomenon shown in Starry Nights is not found in his earlier paintings.
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Wow- what a great idea Rach to go to Las Vegas with the ideas of chapter one in mind. My folks live in Vegas, so I have been there many times. I hope to see the Luxor next time and look at in this light. :) (Were you able to see any of the birds or bats being drawn to the Luxor light that the author spoke of in the book?) And your comments about the Hoover Dam tainting the river as wild and needing to be tamed (very pro dam) are spot on. It's neat to be reading another book that I can talk with my family about and really relate to it in some way in general life. Sounds like you are doing a bit of that too!
I had a house full of musicians this weekend, and one of them was telling me how he grew up on a remote farm in Washington. It was pitch black at night and quiet on the farm. As an adult he says he has trouble sleeping in anything less than pitch black.
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Phair- I mentioned this in another post, but your problems sleeping might very well be because you grew up sleeping in much greater darkness and your body doesn't adjust well to the greater light. A friend was telling me last night that once he moved from his parents rural very dark farm in his twenties, he found he needed to use dark blinds and keep electronics off at night, or his sleep was disturbed. Thanks for sharing that story.
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-I can relate to what Phair said about the changes in her neighborhood. We often walk in our neighborhood at night. Twenty years ago, during new moon you could barely se..."
Patti- I was interested by what you said regarding feeling euphoric when you emerged from the cave later in the day. It seems like --from your post-- that there was a small amount of light and not the utter and complete darkness Ray wrote about.
It occurs to me that one of the reasons we may feel so elated after we make our way through a partially lit experience may be because we are "able" to do just that.
Relying on night vision and making our way is thrilling. At least that is what we experienced when we used to go horseback riding in the woods at night. Thanks for commenting.
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Very Interesting video Andree. This reminds me a bit of the way Jackson Pollock's works have been analyzed for fractals. Thanks for sharing the links.
Sher wrote: "Andree wrote: "This video shows that they have mathematically quantified the luminence in the painting and it is correct compared to actual turbulence. Gotta watch it. Makes me wonder if there isn'..."oh my I've forgotten the Pollock stuff. Shame on me. I'll have to go back and re-read it.
In a previous part of my life, I presented planetarium programs for school groups and the general public. I found that more than three programs in day proved to be exhausting. I attributed this to daytime spent in the dark.
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so these comments/questions are about 7 --Light That Binds , Fear that Enlightens.
How do you rate the level of light where you live--in your city or town or homeplace can you think of any examples where lighting is too bright? If you get a chance observe how your town or city is lighted next time you go into town at night and report back with your observations. Is the lighting insufficient? Too much?
If you are like me you have never even thought about it!
I found it interesting though to think about lighting in relationship to crime. Bright, bright lights create dark spots where it is impossible to see.
I live on 200 acres, and the other farms in this regions are all 160 plus acreage. At night I can see a glow from our town , which is 15 min away (population 16,000), and I have one neighbor who has a massive light that sits way up on a pole. The light is so strong it illuminates his house, barns, and the outbuildings where he has birds. His place is so far off that in daylight I cannot see any of his buildings, but at night I see his mega-star broadcasting across the valley. This guy also has a huge summer party each. The theme is "protect our right to have guns." He hires a live band, and the music flows through our valley for 5 hours on this one night each summer. At a little after 10 p.m. the band shuts off. No one complains since he always quits the music at 10 p.m. But, it is remarkable to me that the guy who has the arsenal is also the guy who seems to fear crime the most around here-- and I guess he feels better having the mega-light. But, how well does it really protect him? I share this story, because it seems to relate to Bogard's discussion about lighting and fear.
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He goes on to comment how "accepting" our fear of the dark "is to know a fear that enlivens and,. . . enlightens" (88,91). We "push away our fear" with more and more lights, " and by pushing away our fear, we are a little less alive"( 91).
I've been ignoring this, but I've realized Bogard makes some good points. At night I hide away in my well-lit farm house while a different world , a world I know little about comes awake on the prairie and oak savannah. I get inklings of the unknown when I hear the terrible cry of the barn owl and yipping choir of coyote. But, their strange sounds are just the surface of what goes on at night around our farm.
I keep telling my spouse I'm going to sleep outside, but I haven't done it yet (it has been a year). What holds me back?
Do you embrace the dark as much as you can? Would you like to be out in the dark more often, or...? Really- have we lost something important by not experiencing darkness more often?
It strikes me that maybe 50% of the natural world is lost to us when we don't know and experience what goes on outside at night. What do you think?
Rach wrote: "This book has gotten me thinking about light/dark as it relates to spirituality and religion. Light is a common theme in most religions. Lighting candles, light as a metaphor for god, etc...."I don't think so. Candles are a symbol for that light and are used so well in our ceremonies that people understand it (especially on Christmas Eve when all unnatural light goes out and then candles are lit). It is a powerful metaphor still.
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http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-wa...-..."
Agreed! We have two fires in our area that may obscure what I might see, but I plan to take a look anyway. Around here they say the peak will be Thursday night I believe....Pacific Northwest.
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I wonde..."
Rach: I think it's a thoughtful question, and one I considered during our evening walk last night. By "our" I mean me and the three dogs on the farm.
I thought about it then got into the hammock under the huge elm tree and wrote down some ideas in my journal.
The importance of dark and light as metaphors in spirituality probably will never dim. I think dark and light as symbols are tied into the earliest examples of humanity. Worship of sun and fear and respect for the night.
But, more interesting to me is the Eastern idea of yin and yang. Yin is associated with (dark), negative, female, creativity, irrational, and Yang the active masculine positive energy (light). In the Eastern perspective both are necessary for complete being, and I think Bogard also argues this (we must have a balance of light and dark in our lives). We interpret light as more good --as progressive and so on, but the dark holds the mysteries that captivate and inspire us. Just that the dark holds the mystery makes it so attractive and necessary to be fully alive as Bogard puts it. Again, Bogard suggests that when the balance is altered then we live less fully.
That which is held in light is revealed, but that which is dark is yet to be revealed.
I think Bogard does a great job repeatedly giving examples of the tension between wanting to enter and embrace darkness and the fear of darkness that makes one what to get out of the dark.
When he walked into Walden's Pond is one example.
I love it that he keeps going out into the dark and doing things even though he is often afraid. :)
Rach wrote: "Sher, great point about yin and yang and the balance we need between light a..."Instinctual. The predators out in the dark are formidable. We don't go out in the dark here in the woods of northern Vermont without huge torches and guns if we have to go any distance from house. Deer don't like dark, either. They bed down as close to the house as possible. Humans can't see in the dark as cats and canine and bears can. We have the disadvantage and are vulnerable. So we learned to build fires for night protection. The light from those fires messes up their night vision and their pupils can't adjust quickly enough so that they are vulnerable in those few moments.
It is dark as anything here at new moon (tomorrow) . But I can read by the moon on cloudless full moons.
I've had some misadventures in the night here. Light can save your life.
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Why do you all think humans develop a fear of darkness? I don't think it is an instinctual trait -- when my fa..."
Hi Rach:
I would agree with Andree -- instinctual, but I don't think all the instincts are present when a human is a baby. For that matter some bird species also have no fear when young. I have not had kids, but I have raised many animals wild and not-wild animals. A few years ago, a 30 day old Common Raven came into my care (long story), and that bird showed absolutely no fear whatsoever of me or other humans. The first change was it began fearing other humans, but not me. But as the bird matured and I was no longer hand feeding it, the bird began to slowly show signs of fear-- though its parents were not around to teach it fear, and I did not do things differently. Eventually by the time it was released back into the wild the bird showed all its instincts. Baby creatures that cannot care for themselves perhaps are programmed to show no fear and to be very still and calm. They can't protect themselves anyway, and the parents need to know what is dangerous.
So, a human baby may show no fear of dark or other things, but as it ages these fears begin to rise. How fearful they become as adults may well be the "nurture or learned part." My opinion!
It was interesting to me that when Bogard walked in the dark in wild places, so far anyway, he mentions the fear of another human not the fear of an animal. This really struck me.
What do we fear in the dark?
For me here it would definitely be a cougar. They are here, and we have seen them on our night camera.
p.s. did you get to see any meteors last night??? Too smokey here.
Anyone see the showers? What was it like?
Sher wrote: "Rach wrote: "Sher, great point about yin and yang and the balance we need between light and dark...."No meteors here. Nothing except water. Rain for weeks and weeks and weeks. We'll be floating by soon.
But interesting about the fear: we were talking about animal fear today in reference to this piece about black bears showing fear of drones but not of robots (like the robots they use in the Minnesota bear study). Bears are not afraid of large birds, so I thought they would be thinking that drones are something unknown of, unseen before, and fear the unknown. But J said no: if that were so, then baby bears would starve to death in the den because of fear. We need to know more about what they do and don't fear, what sort of sounds and vibrations come from drones, but I am still pondering it now. And have more to ponder with what you wrote.
Rach wrote: "Andree wrote: "Rach wrote: "Sher, great point about yin and yang and the balance we need between light a....."where we are, yes, it is dark. Town is 30 miles away. The village is only 3 miles down the road but it is mostly dark even tho they have some street lights. No glow in the sky. And the mountain behind us hides the glow from the nearest city. We are the northeastern 3 counties, isolated geographically and politically and meteorologically from the rest of the state. Low population density. It's wonderful. Lots of farms, logging, poverty.
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Bogard suggests we fear darkness because of its connection with death.
Two comments stand out, and both of these are quotes from Saetre "I think when we talk about fear of the dark, or our fear of dying, it really is fear not only of the unknown but fear of losing control" (183).
And, "if I had been quicker-witted when you said you don't think you know much about death [because Bogard hasn't been in the presence of someone dying] I would have said tell me what you now about darkness because the two are deeply linked" (183).
I am going to add a separate commenting more on this chapter. :)
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where we are, yes, it is dark. Town is 30 miles away. The village is on..."
Andree- Thanks for this detailed description of where you live. That each of us can share a bit of our own story and place, makes the discussion so much more interesting and fun! Plus, if we stick to the group over a long period of time, in some ways we get to know each other. And we all come from different backgrounds and different parts of the country (world?). Only the Internet gives us this opportunity. Though it takes a bit more work than all of us just meeting at the cafe downtown to discuss a book. :)
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Has anything about this book surprised you? Anything you have encountered that has led you to new places or made you question or think about things in a new way?
I'd like to comment on what has surprised and impressed me so far about Bogard's book.
He has done so much research and talked with so many people, and visited so many places to get material and experiences to write this book. It finally dawned on me that this is almost a memoir with the way he adds in so many personal stories related to the theme. We get many of his childhood and back stories, and he's able to relate them all to the theme of darkness and light.
And, finally -- I am surprised by how this book is about much more than just physical dark and light (sky, pollution, etc.) it's an exploration of everything dark and night as it is symbolized in humane experience.
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This chapter brings in so many interesting ideas---
Sleep and melancholy- the troubling and "unsettled" things that come up at night are necessary to work through or to be with. Recently I asked my spouse why he thought all the weird things happens at night. Let's say a friend has died, or I am dealing with a strong emotion toward someone or an event-- at night these feelings manifest themselves in some way (dreams, fretting, heart palpitations...). In the day, I can mask whatever the issues are and go about my day, and these feelings/struggles don't disrupt my day. But, at night whatever might be going on that is truly unsettling my soul comes up.
For example-- my spouse is many years older than myself; it is likely (statistically) he will go before I will. I feel like I could get by and cope well enough in the daytime, but it is the night that I fear the strongest emotions would come. We may make our greatest struggles psychologically during the "the dark night of the soul." And, Bogard covers this idea through a variety of angles in Bortle 3 (Know Darkness) chapter.
What has made an impression on you in this chapter?
The hope or the power in the night is that it is where the mystery is encountered and here if we can - we can resolve, work though, and create new beginnings out of this night, dark sky...
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Wow Rach! That is very cool- what an opportunity to be able to see the bats and to have this book create such a big impact.
I went to a Quaker meeting today, and after the meeting a group of ten of us talked about the issues in this book. Quakers are often very socially and environmentally active, and these folks all knew about the light pollution issues, but they had not read Bogard's book. An 80 plus year old Buddhist who was there was speaking with longing and reverence of what it was like to grow in the country...quiet, dark, stars. His face when he talked about this was so serene. This book has definitely made me think and question - a lot of things.
If you are ever in Eastern Tennessee, this is the place to watch bats. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nickaja...
When I was in college, a terrible thunderstorm swept through the area one summer morning. We were without power for about a week. It was inconvenient but I saw the Milky Way from my home for the first time in my life. Until something like that happens, you don't know what you have given up.
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That's a good point Moonlight- in this day and age we have to actively seek darkness or be forced to live without light like you experienced. It's not the same with light, because it is everywhere, but so true - we have to make an effort to embrace darkness and see what it holds for us.
Just finished chapter one and looking forward to viewing a darker night sky this weekend via a stay in a natural mountainous area. I appreciate the discussion here.
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Hi Sandy- Great to have you join us. I hope you enjoy the night skies this weekend and get to see some stars!
When I was little, I was deathly afraid of the dark and always had to have a night light in my room. After reading this book, I long to experience a Bortle One sky, with the Milky Way so close you could almost reach out and touch it. The closest I've come to that was on a fishing trip in Manitoba a couple decades ago. I don't remember ever seeing so many stars before or since. I agree with Andree. I think we do have an instinctual fear of the dark, having evolved in an environment where we were almost as likely to be prey as predators. We've been trying to banish the darkness ever since we discovered the secret of fire, with little awareness of the costs, as seems to be the case with so many of our interactions with the natural world. Kudos to Bogard for uncovering some of those hidden costs.
As far as urban lighting is concerned, I spent a few months studying in Vienna when I was in college and I remember the lighting there being very beautiful, especially in the city center and along the Danube. I loved walking along the Ringstrasse and by the Stefansdom in the evening. This could just be my own nostalgia talking, but it seems to me that the lighting there was more subtle than in most urban areas I've visited. I'm not sure if it would measure up to Bogard's standards. However, I am sure of one thing. His description of Las Vegas makes me absolutely certain in my conviction that it is the last place on Earth that I would ever want to visit.
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I recently finished our book, and I enjoyed reading and discussing it with you all. I'm off to Anchorage next week, but I wanted to mention some parting comments.
Bogard writes: "Beauty and mystery intangible qualities we all know are valuable but don't always know how to value" (254). I love this idea that protecting what is obvious like a tract of land, let's say, is important, but it's equally important to protect those things that express precious "intangible qualities" like darkness (Bogard 260). Intangible qualities make such a difference in our lives; they seem to be the other side of solid and like the yin/yang model we need both. But, we don't always think about protecting qualities. :)
One of my favorite quotes is from the Wendell Barry poem --"To go in the dark with a light is to know the light. To know the dark, go dark. Go without sight and find that the dark, too, blooms and sings, and is traveled by dark feet and dark wings" (qtd. in Bogard 271).
