When I first started driving in the 1960s, the only aftermarket car lights available were off-road light bars, fog lamps, ...
It is a pretty common first project to use an Arduino (or similar) to blink an LED. Which, of course, brings taunts of: you could have used a 555! You can, of course, also use any sort of oscillator, ...
Modern headlights have increased dramatically in brightness in recent years, and are necessary for driving safely at night.