(you can also wear clothes to block sun instead of sunscreen so you don't necessarily need sunscreen at all)

And fair, we don’t.

But a couple of things we do know that weren’t covered - egregiously so - is that aging is UV damage. Sometimes called photoaging, wrinkles, sun spots, discoloration, fine lines, grey hair, all of that shit that you associate with someone visibly looking old is sun damage.

So the picture that the article paints of some pasty nerds in offices shielding themselves from all UV and thus: they might as well be smoking… it doesn’t even touch on why people might be doing this.

Both kurgezadt and veritasium did some really great videos on photoaging and it’s worth checking out if this is new information to you.

Current guidelines for sun exposure are unhealthy and unscientific – research (2019) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31471416 - May 2022 (335 comments)

So this is just an unfortunate situation because I don't think there's a way of just getting UVB into you in a safe way.

Big surprise they all got skin cancer. Then they swung the pendulum all the way back and now preach 24/7 sunscreen and never letting the sun touch you.

- high blood pressure leads to a lot of deaths

- people that spend more time in the sun have lower blood pressure

- skin cancer is caused by sun exposure, but it kills far, far less people than high blood pressure

- people that spend more time in the sun have a lower rate of dying from skin cancer than people who spend less time in the sun!

Summary: more sun exposure makes you less likely to die on at least two fronts!

It's really very simple. You skin adapts to sunlight and doesn't burn if you increase your exposure gradually, and then you get some amazing benefits from it!