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Why is the sky blue?

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Re: Why is the sky blue?

#21

Post by zokier »

margalabargala wrote: post #12
RupertSalt wrote: post #6

Obligatory xkcd: "Sky Color" https://m.xkcd.com/1145/ Obligatory xkcd[2]: "Rayleigh Scattering" https://m.xkcd.com/1818/ Others?

The "Rayleigh Scattering" comic is really spot on. Air is blue. The reason air is blue is blah blah blah physics, see the article we're all commenting on, but at the end of the day air is blue. We don't demand the same elaborate physics questions for why a ripe banana peel is yellow.

Not really. If the explanation was "air is blue" then the naive expectation would be that sun would appear blue against blackish background, basically the image of sun is being filtered through the atmosphere; if sun is white and air is blue then white filtered through blue should be blue? But sun appears yellowish against blue background. So clearly something different is going on.

Re: Why is the sky blue?

#22

Post by jph00 »

jonahx wrote: post #11

Going to be that guy , even though I think this is a really nice work overall... But the winking and "cool guy" emojis are so grating. In general, technical explanations that apologize for themselves with constant reassurances like "don't worry" and "it's actually simple" undermine their own aim. Your job -- if you're making content for people with double digit ages -- is to make the explanation as clear as you can,…

No, your job is to help your reader get to the end of the text. That means writing in a way that most of your audience finds compelling, readable, and not intimidating.

Not all readers are the same, so you will fail at your job for some readers.

But few readers are emotionless automatons that need nothing but dry technical content, unless it’s a topic they are very motivated to understand.

Re: Why is the sky blue?

#24

Post by retroflexzy »

Back in my youth, after the Internet became common but before Wikipedia, I tried to discover the answer to this and came away disappointed again and again. Every article I could find simply stated "because light scattering", and barely much more.

How does scattering work? Why does light scatter? _What does scattering even mean in the context of light?_

Re: Why is the sky blue?

#26

Post by adornKey »

justin_dash wrote: post #8

For the sunset example then, a natural question (for me) is then why isn't the sky green in the transition from blue sky to red sunset sky?

You won't get a green sky, but at least there is a meteorological optical phenomenon called the green flash around sunset. To see it, I think, you have to know what you're looking for - and you need good conditions.

Re: Why is the sky blue?

#27

Post by erikdkennedy »

retroflexzy wrote: post #24

Back in my youth, after the Internet became common but before Wikipedia, I tried to discover the answer to this and came away disappointed again and again. Every article I could find simply stated "because light scattering", and barely much more. How does scattering work? Why does light scatter? _What does scattering even mean in the context of light?_

Yes! This is exactly why I wrote this article :)

Any other questions give you the same disappointment?

Re: Why is the sky blue?

#28

Post by dekhn »

IceCoffe wrote: post #15
nemo1618 wrote: post #13

Let's be real. The sky is blue because God thought it was a pretty color, simple as. All this stuff about wavelengths and resonant frequencies and human color perception got retconned into the physics engine at some point in the past millennium, that's why all these epicycles are needed.

Our lord Zeus always thinks of everything

His noodly appendage touches all.
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