AMA #6: Eye Health, Why We Yawn & Increasing Motivation

This is the free 20-minute preview of a premium AMA episode, and it focuses entirely on eye health. Huberman explains why balancing near and far viewing matters, citing animal and human studies showing that excessive close-range viewing lengthens the eyeball and drives myopia. He details behavioral tools including getting two hours of outdoor sunlight daily, smooth pursuit and near-far eye exercises, and the role of vitamin A, lutein, zeaxanthin, and astaxanthin in eye nutrition and supplementation. He closes with Glenn Jeffrey's University College London research on early-day red light exposure offsetting age-related vision loss in people over 40.

• Claims myopia is rising dramatically worldwide, driven by unprecedented amounts of close-range screen viewing.
  00:03:04
• Says badly myopic people won't cure their condition with these tools, but those just noticing decline can balance near and far viewing to help.
  00:09:50
• Discloses the podcast is not affiliated with any eye health supplement companies despite anecdotal reports of enhanced vision.
  00:25:01
• Admits he personally does not take lutein, zeaxanthin, or astaxanthin at this time.
  00:27:04
• Reveals he has a lifelong muscular weakness in one eye that lets him deviate it on command, a trick he used on his sister as a kid.
  00:27:34
• Highlights Glenn Jeffrey's red light research as 'spectacular' for offsetting age-related macular degeneration.
  00:30:13
• Says the Huberman Lab podcast may at some future point partner with a red light company, so he won't name any now.
  00:32:18

• The front-to-back length of the eyeball is physically shaped by how close or far you view things, especially during development.
  00:04:39
• Classic occluder experiments in chickens, mice, and humans show exclusive close viewing lengthens the eyeball and causes myopia.
  00:05:42
• Large clinical trials show children who get two or more hours outside daily have much lower myopia incidence.
  00:10:21
• Sunlight's benefit for myopia seems to come from activating melanopsin retinal ganglion cells, not just looking at distant objects.
  00:11:22
• The eye's lens has no blood vessels because it needs light to pass through cleanly; the manatee is a rare exception with a vascularized lens.
  00:15:03
• Smooth pursuit eye exercises, done a minute or two daily via YouTube, can help maintain visual acuity.
  00:16:37
• It's vitamin A, not carrots per se, that matters for vision, via the phototransduction cascade in the retina.
  00:21:17
• Studied lutein dosages for eye health run 10 to 20 milligrams per day, obtainable from food sources like egg yolks.
  00:25:31
• Brief red light or near-infrared exposure can reduce reactive oxygen species in photoreceptors.
  00:30:45
• In people 40 and older, viewing red light around 650 to 720 nanometers early in the day offset some vision loss in studies.
  00:31:16

Books, products and media the guest or host genuinely endorsed here — with the buy link.

Affiliate link — we may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.