Ridge

Recently, I’ve started to think about protecting my eyesight throughout my career, and given that eyes are technology par excellence, I thought I’d blog about it.

Unlike a camera, the eye’s lens doesn’t move backwards and forwards to focus; instead, optical muscles compress or stretch the lens to accommodate light from different focal distances. I find that prolonged periods of near-focus inactivity, such as computer work, can upset the muscles’ natural antagonism and bias them towards short sightedness.

The only remedy I’ve found so far, which seems to correspond with the few authorities I’ve found, is to practice rapidly refocusing between medium to far objects for a couple of minutes. Switching between a medium-distance sign and a car in the distance seems to be the optical equivalent of stretching one’s legs after sitting for too long.