Purposely looked at 50mw laser...

[Benm]

I'm not sure how much of this story is true, but for the concept it does not matter:

Unsafe exposure to light -does not guarantee- permanent eye damage. 50 mW is a power level where it would be very likely with a beam directly into the eye, but not guaranteed nor obvious per se.

Compare it do driving a car into a a concrete overpass support at 40 mph. This would generally be a very bad idea, chances are high that you'd systain major injuries, but then again plenty of people have made that mistake and walked away from it without a single broken bone.

So driving into concrete pillars would be considered unsafe, but not a foolproof method of suicide, just like looking into a 50 mW laser is not a foolproof method to permanently blind yourself.

 

[Lux Nitida]

I'm not sure how much of this story is true, but for the concept it does not matter:

Unsafe exposure to light -does not guarantee- permanent eye damage. 50 mW is a power level where it would be very likely with a beam directly into the eye, but not guaranteed nor obvious per se.

Compare it do driving a car into a a concrete overpass support at 40 mph. This would generally be a very bad idea, chances are high that you'd systain major injuries, but then again plenty of people have made that mistake and walked away from it without a single broken bone.

So driving into concrete pillars would be considered unsafe, but not a foolproof method of suicide, just like looking into a 50 mW laser is not a foolproof method to permanently blind yourself.

I see where you are coming from but no one is talking about permanent blindness here just eye damage of some kind. If he shined 50 mW into his eye for 5+ seconds as claimed he has permanent damage. Now whether his brain compensated for it, maybe, but I think it is far more likely that he is either trolling or the laser was no where near 50 mW. If it was, it didn't enter his eye and at 5+ seconds I call BS that anyone could hold a laser in their eye for that long at any power without attenuation.

 

[VisibleGreen]

I'm not sure how much of this story is true, but for the concept it does not matter:

Unsafe exposure to light -does not guarantee- permanent eye damage. 50 mW is a power level where it would be very likely with a beam directly into the eye, but not guaranteed nor obvious per se.

Compare it do driving a car into a a concrete overpass support at 40 mph. This would generally be a very bad idea, chances are high that you'd systain major injuries, but then again plenty of people have made that mistake and walked away from it without a single broken bone.

So driving into concrete pillars would be considered unsafe, but not a foolproof method of suicide, just like looking into a 50 mW laser is not a foolproof method to permanently blind yourself.

Well the only reason people survive fatal type crashes is because the damage was mostly caused elsewhere, namely the vehicles/obstacles.
With a laser in the eye the only thing to absorb the light is the eye. It is clearly not the same as a car accident...

 

[TaterMay]

Well the only reason people survive fatal type crashes is because the damage was mostly caused elsewhere, namely the vehicles/obstacles.
With a laser in the eye the only thing to absorb the light is the eye. It is clearly not the same as a car accident...

Bingo. There are so many more variables in a car accident. So many different areas and materials to absorb energy. If someone is shining a focused laser beam of 50mW directly into their unprotected eye, pretty much all of the energy is going into their eye until they blink. In this case, all ~5mW of the every. Lol.

 

[Benm]

Obviously the car accident was just an example to illustrate the difference between potentially bad outcomes and guaranteed bad outcomes.

As far as the brain compensating for any damage to the eye this would normally be a very good argument. On the other hand, if someone shines a 50 mW laser into their own eye willingly i'd argue that a fair amount of brain damage must be there to begin with, limiting whatever is left to compensate for anything

 

[lazeristasUVISIR]

I looked at my friends military 50mw green laser for at least 5 seconds and nothing happened

Looking into a 50-mW green laser beam for 5 s and no bad feelings - :gun: I don't believe this.

 

[JasonJ]

There seems to be more details to this claim than what meets the eye (yeah, that's right, I did that)!

I'm going with either troll, or underspec laser with brain adjusting for visual damage.

 

[Benm]

Underspec might be an option, but not a very practical one. Say it was underspec as badly as only 1/10th of advertised power, emtiting 5 mW of 532. This might be a more safe power level, but would still be so bright you could not stare into it for 5 seconds, unless you forcibly held your eyelids open.

The only 'safe' aspect of a 5 mW laser is that your blink reflex will shut the light out in a about quarter of a second. If you do anything to prevent that reflex from working properly (famacological, psychological or simply mechanical) the danger is still there.

1 mW would be the point where prolonged exposure would be without damage during several minutes - despite being very uncomfortable.

 

[VisibleGreen]

What do you guys mean by the brain compensating for eye damage? Does it fill in the image of what you're looking at or does it show a blurred after image?

 

[NightExplorer96]

What do you guys mean by the brain compensating for eye damage? Does it fill in the image of what you're looking at or does it show a blurred after image?

I believe the brain basically "fills" in what it thinks is supposed to be there based on the environment around you.

-Alex

 

[Benm]

It's that indeed, if you have a retinal burn that causes some information to be missing from your eye and hence optic nerve, the brain will fill in that gap. It is used to doing so with the perfectly natural blind spot we all have (the point where the otpic nerve goes through the retina making it unsensitive to light there).

The brain will also do this for damaged areas of peripheral vision to some degree.

However, when looking directly into a laser on purpose it may do damage to the fovea that the brain cannot that easily correct for. If the damage is to only one eye you will eventually adopt to this situation using infomration for the other intact eye. This process may not be that fast though, so you could expect some difficulty reading text and such in the months after the damage was done.

This type of recovery relies on having two intact eyes though, so if you pull this stunt twice you will have significant problems in real life situations after.

 

[mikeylee25]

I went to the doctor today, for annual checkup. I have 20/20 vision... I dont understand..shouldnt i be impaired in some way? Maybe its something i dont notice?

 

[NightExplorer96]

shouldnt i be impaired in some way? Maybe its something i dont notice?

You may be. It's just that after a year your brain has had time to "fix" your eye sight(in the way previously listed above), or it's possible you amazingly didn't suffer any damage which is unlikely, but possible.

The thoughts of having a laser shone into your eye is just like running your nails on a chalkboard, just makes me cringe.

-Alex

 

[Benm]

The 20/20 figures says -nothing- about damage to the peripheral sight. It is a measurement of how good the spatial resolution of your unaided eye is, and would be lower if you suffered from myopia as so many people do.

To assess laser damage you'd need to see an eye specialist that actually looks at your retina. If you have no symptoms i don't really see the need to do that, but a quick check up will not reveil laser damage in many occassions - it is not meant to check for something that specific.

 

[RedCowboy]

are you this guy? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3JcbTgS0d20

God we have a country full of idiots. Please everyone go to youtube and flag that video for dangerous acts....the moron actually suggested shining it on his eye and somewhere there is a kid who might try it. We seriously need to flag these kinds of videos and get them pulled. Believe me I fully support freedom of speech but this is like putting out a recipe for hemlock soup and not telling everyone it's a joke.

 

[RedCowboy]

I went to the doctor today, for annual checkup. I have 20/20 vision... I dont understand..shouldnt i be impaired in some way? Maybe its something i dont notice?

There is an old saying that what does not kill us makes us stronger, well that's not always true, many things are cumulative, that is they add up over time. How many boxers and football players are crippled and brain damaged years after they thought they got away with it? You may have future problems from damage you do today.
Don't ever do it again, there is nothing to be gained from it and everything to be lost.