Anything with that many grammatical errors, I have to say.... no, not legit.

Rainbows, like convection causing hot pavement to shimmer and moiré patterns, are effects present in the visible spectrum. The eye picks them out, but so can a camera. If it was all in our head, we'd only be able to record them through illustration, or via Photoshop plugins.

The presence of moisture in a rainbow (or shimmering pavement/bbq grill, etc.) ensures their existence; with the right equipment and analog gauges, one could plot the presence or humidity patterns within a certain area, which would lend credence to the catalyst behind the action. With "dry" situations, like TV and computer displays, gamma levels and electrical measurement can "reveal" anything that colloquially be called a moiré; a well made light sensor could "find" similar patterns on printed paper or clothing.

What I gleaned from it was that staring at the sun during "safe" hours somehow activates more of your brain. Or something. Not sure where the barefoot part comes in.

Not worth my time to read, but from what I skimmed, it is nowhere near safe to look at the sun for those kinds of times. This is dangerous bullshit. Sure, there are some hazy sunsets that might be safe to look at for a few seconds, but not in general, not in an hour window around sunrise/sunset.

Without the gazing at the sun part, being outdoors and exposing yourself to natural light and the sky is good for your mental health, as many of us winter SAD people can attest. I can imagine being out at sunrise for a half hour or so would be good for setting your body clock.

wtf?

No really, wtf?

I was researching something similar lately. What does seem to be true, and what seems related, (and which might have been mentioned but I tuned out about halfway through the article), is that sunlight stimulates the pineal gland, and that the only way sunlight can get to the pineal gland is through the pupils. I have a professor who advises everyone to spend at least 15 minutes a day outside without glasses or contacts for this reason; the plastic and glass do block UV light (and who knows what else) getting to the pineal gland, and she's reasonably convinced that's one of the reasons we have such high rates of depression and anxiety.

But she does not advise staring directly at the sun.

And I have to say, I tried it on a limited basis, and regularly sitting outside in the daylight without contacts tends to make me a much more relaxed and happier person. There are of course nineteen-eleven correlating factors that might contribute to that, but I think getting some unfiltered light into one's pupils every now and again is probably good for one.

Or maybe more accurately, I think we've never looked at what sort of things our bodies are missing from not getting unfiltered light into our eyes. It's like the bit Michael Pollan writes about how we try to break food down into these bits of nutrition and then analyze those bits, without ever looking at what we're leaving out of the equation -- and we end up finding out that eating anti-oxidants in non-food sources is dangerous, for example. We just don't know enough to know what we're not studying, but we think we have food and nutrition "figured out."

Or all of the increasing cases of rickets and other Vitamin-D deficiencies that are now popping up because of the emphasis on everyone being covered by sunscreen at all times.

I guess what I'm saying is that I don't think we really have the health benefits of the sun all figured out in the way that we'd like to think we do. And I think there's probably a lot of whacko theories out there about it, but I bet that, within our lifetimes, some of those whacko theories on this topic are going to become part of mainstream science (in the way that whacko theories tend to do...)

Well, the article starts with various basic scientific errors, and continues onto wild mumbo-jumbo, so I would not describe it as 'legit'.

For instance, the claim that "[e]ven medical science agrees we hardly make use of the brain but about 5-7%" is baseless nonsense, while the idea that the brain is in some way "powered" by sunlight entering through the eye is absurd.

It probably is health-improving, and mood-improving if nothing else, to get outdoors more often, but not for any of the reasons this blog suggests.

er, I know this puts me into quackpot territory, but I've never had problems looking at the sun directly. And I'm the only person in my family that doesn't need glasses. I've had my eyes tested and aside for the occasional conjuctivitis (dust allergies), I'm fine.

I read of one other case in India who could see the sun directly and he was hailed as a medical miracle. Am I, too, or am I just weird?

(if it makes any difference, it's easier through a car window.)

It's hard to look at the sun directly. I mean I do it but boy do the eyes water.

Worst: Midnight sun hanging right on your head as you're trying to drive home at one in the morning is a b*tch, big huge bright flowing gold painful and reaching into the car slapping you straight in the face knowing full well that you're sleepy and no matter how straight that road is you'll want to veer off it because the sun is like standing on the middle of to road beaming laughter at you.

Yes yes, I pulled over and napped until it got dark. I then had to speed drive home before that crazy stalking sun got back up again. I like winter. I like the moon. The moon doesn't stalk me like that.

Yeah I'm having trouble making the connections. And I sure never heard it was safe to look AT the freaking sun. The barefoot on earth and general exposure to sunlight I totally buy - connection to nature within & without - I can see that.

That's really interesting, occhiblu.