AutisticMapGuy
854
18
6
https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/LP_Stats/
Nov 21, 2025 3:23 PM
AutisticMapGuy
854
18
6
https://www.lightpollutionmap.info/LP_Stats/
BenderRodriguezz
Me choking and gasping: "So bright..."
lalwaysupvotecatsandTHT
This seems like more of a statistic of the percentage of people per country that live in or close to a city.
cousteau
Also population density, if I understood the metric right.
PowerPedant
What a ridiculous metric. So just add people and the light pollution goes down?
Easykehl
Depends on how many more outdoor lights get installed when those people get ‘added’.
I’m guessing the metric correlates with percent of rural/urban population and nations’ highway lighting standards.
AprilSpectrum
Per capital measurement is done to scale the measured data and conceptualize change needed.
Obviously places with fewer people *should* have less light pollution, but if people use a lot more light per person, that may not be the case.
And people who use light excessively, regardless of how many people their nation have, should change their habits.
cousteau
It's "radiance" (whatever that means, probably a unit of power; units undisclosed) per 1K people. Probably a higher population would generate more light, but yeah this looks suspiciously inverse population density related.
cousteau
Probably refers to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radiance but that's a weird measure. "Watts emitted per person" would be a less weird metric.
pinkguyismyhero
no it seems to be per 1k of population, There is more french than brits for example and a lot more germans than danes so you comment doesn't fit.
cousteau
It seems to have to do with area though (so population density).
AutisticMapGuy
Nope
swedeonamoose
It follows urbanization %'s fairly well tho
PowerPedant
But extending the value to the entire country makes no sense. Finland e.g. has some of the darkest skies in Europe.
PowerPedant
People don't glow, so yes.
blaghart
Fun fact, people do actually glow, our eyes are just too weak to detect it! https://www.sciencealert.com/you-can-t-see-it-but-humans-actually-glow-in-visible-light
PowerPedant
Good pedantry! They still don't contribute to light pollution though.
blaghart
Not pedantry, just a fun fact :)
blaghart
Congrats, now you know why "percentage" based metrics are how you lie about data.
FreelancerRexx
It's not really a lie but percent based metrics can be very misleading. Tbh, most data can be misleading if interpreted by someone ignorant or malicious (or a journalist).
In this specific case it's a completely pointless metric that means nothing.
blaghart
You know what it's called when something is misleading? A lie.
moonshadowkati
Where's the lie here? I'm so confused why anyone is upset by this map.
Tengenstein
The map infers that Spain has worse light pollution than the UK, when in fact its just an population map.
moonshadowkati
Belgium and Portugal have roughly the same size population, so why do they have such different numbers if it's just a population map?
blaghart
>where's the lie< How many people live in France. How many people live in Finland. Do you think there might be a reason going off of the "per 100,000 people" is inaccurate when you have TEN TIMES AS MANY PEOPLE in one place as another?
moonshadowkati
... That's what "per capita" means though. More murders occur in Canada than Baltimore City each year, but Baltimore is a much more dangerous place!
blaghart
Yes, because percentage based metrics are how you lie about data. More murders occur in Canada than Baltimore, so Canada as a country is, in fact, more dangerous than Baltimore. Yet you're trying to act like Baltimore is more dangerous
PowerPedant
There's no lie as such. The values are correct, just totally pointless.
moonshadowkati
Why are they pointless?
PowerPedant
They don't represent anything geographically meaningful.
A country with a single bright city and no population anywhere else will have a value as high or higher as a country evenly populated over its entire area. That's how Finland ended up where it is here.
blaghart
Because France has 10 times as many people as Finland. So Finland has far, far less light pollution than France does