this post was submitted on 26 Jun 2023
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Some possible factors, from reading similar discussions:
Tritium paint is radioactive and produces a pale green fluorescence on watches.
The Simpsons had a glowing green fuel rod in the opening. The rod would not have glowed green in reality.
Uranium glass fluoresces green under UV light
since 1) and 3) are things that maybe 10 people in the world even know about, it's probably the Simpsons yeah
In 2023, yeah, but remember that it isn't in 2023 that the association was made.
Tritium watches used to be a much bigger deal some decades back, as you could actually use the thing in the dark. Subsequent to that, battery-powered digital watches with a light became common, and then a lot of people just moved to using a cell phone to know the time.
As the linked WP article details, uranium glass also used to be more-common prior to the government locking up a lot of supplies of uranium. I've only seen uranium glass in person in museums, and in general, plastic has displaced a lot of glassware today.
Tritium is also still very popular for firearm night sights. And I'm sure some radium painted one used to be as well. The night sights on my SKS may have been radium paint or just regular phosporescent paint, or may have had tritium vials that fell off.
For a while there was a full set of uranium glassware in my local antique mall for sale but I think someone bought it.
I have a small tritium light source on each of my key chains. Extremely useful!
They come in various colors, even. I use blue for car keys, yellow for house keys, red for bike keys.
You really think only ten people in the world know about those? Maybe closer to one in ten.