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When they say ‘visible with the naked eye’, do they mean looking straight on or with peripheral vision? Because you can sense more light in your periphery, so t

When they say ‘visible with the naked eye’, do they mean looking straight on or with peripheral vision? Because you can sense more light in your periphery, so that might explain why it seems ‘more’ than about 4500 stars you can see.

tobiasSoftware 8y ago
Neither, they mean total stars you can count if you look all around the night sky. The article says that it's about 9000 stars total, but then the ground blocks our view of the half of the stars that are on the hemisphere on the opposite side of the world.
barbegal 8y ago
No you genuinely can't see more than ~4500 stars. I think we imagine that we can see more stars because we see a lot of photos taken using long exposures that can pick out more stars [1]. A 30 second exposure can bring out several times more stars than the human eye can see. [1] https://petapixel.com/2015/04/04/what-the-naked-eye-sees-in-the-night-sky-compared-to-what-the-camera-can-capture/ https://petapixel.com/2015/04/04/what-the-naked-eye-sees-in-...
- cynicalkane 8y ago
  I’ve been in parts of the country where there’s complete blackness in the new moon. I didn’t stop to count the stars, but it looked much more like the second picture than the first one. The Milky Way is astonishingly vivid and the stars are endless. The author of that article might claim the first picture is “real” in a physical sense, but even if it was, it ceases to be when transfered to a limited computer screen and viewed in indoor ambient light.
  - Retric 8y ago
    The second photo more closely matches what I see, though it looks more black and white than that. I suspect there is a wide range of night vision as I have watched people stumble around when I thought there was plenty of light.
    - edejong 8y ago
      Are you by any chance color blind?
      - Retric 8y ago
        No, but at night color becomes difficult to distinguish. It's not exactly black and white but really muted colors.
        edejong 8y ago
        That’s for everyone. Cones have lower sensitivity and more noise. Colorblind people have supposedly higher quantities of rods.
  - JohnDotAwesome 8y ago
    > I’ve been in parts of the country where there’s complete blackness in the new moon. I didn’t stop to count the stars, but it looked much more like the second picture than the first one. The Milky Way is astonishingly vivid and the stars are endless. I just got back from Exuma Island in the Bahamas. This is a decently remote island without much light pollution. It was by far the best star-gazing I've ever experienced. I've backpacked in Big Bend, Yosemite, and Yellowstone (and less notable areas), Exuma takes the cake for looking at the heavens. I say all of this because the picture on the left seems much more representative of the _best star-gazing conditions I've ever witnessed_. The Milky Way was big and beautiful; It caused my S.O. and I to sit outside for 1.5 hours just staring. But it still looked more like the first picture. Maybe you were mis-remembering, or maybe your vision is just better for these sorts of things. Either way, I want to know where you were to see the second picture.
  - Camillo 8y ago
    I've been out in the middle of the savannah in Kenya, with no artificial lights around, and it looked worse than the picture on the left. Night sky photography is best understood as a creative art form, with only the faintest connection to what the sky actually looks like to human eyes.
Starwatcher2001 8y ago
Peripheral vision (or averted vision as it's usually called) is useful to master in astronomy, often used when looking at feint defuse objects like galaxies through a telescope. As you say, the rods at in peripheral part of the eye are better suited to low light. I'm not sure how well this might work with pointed sources of light like stars though.

tobiasSoftware 8y ago

Neither, they mean total stars you can count if you look all around the night sky. The article says that it's about 9000 stars total, but then the ground blocks our view of the half of the stars that are on the hemisphere on the opposite side of the world.

barbegal 8y ago

No you genuinely can't see more than ~4500 stars. I think we imagine that we can see more stars because we see a lot of photos taken using long exposures that can pick out more stars [1]. A 30 second exposure can bring out several times more stars than the human eye can see. [1] https://petapixel.com/2015/04/04/what-the-naked-eye-sees-in-the-night-sky-compared-to-what-the-camera-can-capture/ https://petapixel.com/2015/04/04/what-the-naked-eye-sees-in-...

cynicalkane 8y ago
I’ve been in parts of the country where there’s complete blackness in the new moon. I didn’t stop to count the stars, but it looked much more like the second picture than the first one. The Milky Way is astonishingly vivid and the stars are endless. The author of that article might claim the first picture is “real” in a physical sense, but even if it was, it ceases to be when transfered to a limited computer screen and viewed in indoor ambient light.
- Retric 8y ago
  The second photo more closely matches what I see, though it looks more black and white than that. I suspect there is a wide range of night vision as I have watched people stumble around when I thought there was plenty of light.
  - edejong 8y ago
    Are you by any chance color blind?
    - Retric 8y ago
      No, but at night color becomes difficult to distinguish. It's not exactly black and white but really muted colors.
      - edejong 8y ago
        That’s for everyone. Cones have lower sensitivity and more noise. Colorblind people have supposedly higher quantities of rods.
- JohnDotAwesome 8y ago
  > I’ve been in parts of the country where there’s complete blackness in the new moon. I didn’t stop to count the stars, but it looked much more like the second picture than the first one. The Milky Way is astonishingly vivid and the stars are endless. I just got back from Exuma Island in the Bahamas. This is a decently remote island without much light pollution. It was by far the best star-gazing I've ever experienced. I've backpacked in Big Bend, Yosemite, and Yellowstone (and less notable areas), Exuma takes the cake for looking at the heavens. I say all of this because the picture on the left seems much more representative of the _best star-gazing conditions I've ever witnessed_. The Milky Way was big and beautiful; It caused my S.O. and I to sit outside for 1.5 hours just staring. But it still looked more like the first picture. Maybe you were mis-remembering, or maybe your vision is just better for these sorts of things. Either way, I want to know where you were to see the second picture.
- Camillo 8y ago
  I've been out in the middle of the savannah in Kenya, with no artificial lights around, and it looked worse than the picture on the left. Night sky photography is best understood as a creative art form, with only the faintest connection to what the sky actually looks like to human eyes.

Starwatcher2001 8y ago

Peripheral vision (or averted vision as it's usually called) is useful to master in astronomy, often used when looking at feint defuse objects like galaxies through a telescope. As you say, the rods at in peripheral part of the eye are better suited to low light. I'm not sure how well this might work with pointed sources of light like stars though.