Is it yellow because from Earth it usually looks yellow to us? Or is it white because the sun gives off all wavelengths of light (white light)? Or is it some other color?
In: Planetary Science
Anyone that says they know what color a star is, is misinformed at best, lying at worst.
What we humans see, here in earth’s atmosphere, is not accurate. Saying starlight is white is also partially wrong, as it contains all wavelengths of electromagnetic spectrum, something we humans only see about 4% of.
Starlight is full spectrum light, at max intensity, our eyes, and most of our optical sensors, get washed out in high intensity light, so things become white. When we look at things through other lenses or wavelengths, like xray, nearferred, violet, ultraviolet etc… we see stars as many different colors.
For a five year old, the best explanation is starlight is too bright to define a color, and the earth’s atmosphere absorbs some light making it appear more yellow to our eyes.
Latest Answers