Yes jeff I have seen those videos of sensor getting damaged by a laser on YouTube so I always knew that lasers are really bad for our camera sensors but i guess the damage happens because the laser light is already a pinpointed one and it is very easily focussed towards the sensor than a sun.
But with a flashlight all i was worried about was the intensity of the brightness of the light since I thought all those bright lumens can be damaging to the sensor.Also the link above points out that those sensors that were damaged by the lasers were all attached to a lens.
So does that mean any bright source of light which is passed directly towards the sensor is far more forgiving than the one passed through a lens?Is that right?Also what if the light source is also very very close to the sensor?