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Asked by ruthimd to Betul, Bridget, Ceri-Wyn, Maria on 23 Jun 2010 in Categories: General.
Question: Why is space balck if the sun makes the Earth light? Shouldn't it make some of the space around it light too?
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Bridget Waller answered on 23 Jun 2010:
But light needs to reflect off things..if there is ‘space’ then there is nothing to illuminate – it will just continue to travel until it runs out of energy. Does that sound right? Bit physicsy for me.
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Betul Arslan answered on 23 Jun 2010:
It actually does, but that’s not the way we see it. Space is not really black either, we see it black because there are not many stars around us, the biggest star is the sun itself thus that’s the light we see.
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Ceri-Wyn Thomas answered on 23 Jun 2010:
That’s a great question ruthmd. The reason we see the sun’s warm yellow light on Earth is because the molecules in our atmosphere intercept the light travelling to Earth’s surface and it gets reflected so we see it in all directions. In fact, all the objects on our planet’s surface reflect some of the sun’s light and that’s why we see colours (objects absorb light too and we don’t see those wavelengths/colours when we look at the object). In space there are no objects to reflect the sun’s light apart form planets and moons and asteroids etc. There are nowhere near enough molecules in space itself to reflect any of the sun’s light to our eyes which is why it looks black! The sun generates it’s light and heat through the fusion of hydrogen into helium and that creates huge amounts of energy- but once that light leaves the sun it needs things to bounce off in order for our eyes to detect it. Hope that helps!
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