AW: color of sun

[Cord Wiljes]

Don Rosa:
>>>...And the sun should be yellow. I've always wondered, even 
when I was a kid, why people think the sun is yellow. I think it's only 
because when we're lil' kids with crayons we don't want to leave the sun 
white in our drawings. 

Theresa Wiegert:
>> Actually, the sun *is* yellow! It's classified as a G-star 
(spectraltype), depending on its temperature and chemical 
composition. A warmer star would be blue, and a colder red. 

So if we make a spectral analysis of the sun it emits a little more 
electromagnetic radiation of wavelengths corresponding to yellow 
than of the other wavelengths. Is this visible with human eyes?
Probably only from far away, let's say from Alpha Centauri.

In any case the sun is not as yellow as crayons - or comic book yellow. 
Could it be that it looks more yellow near sunset, before it gets orange, 
then red and ultimately night falls? This would probably be due to diffraction 
of the sun's light in earth's atmosphere.

Another example: Water in small amounts (let's say in a bucket) is not 
nearly as blue as it is depicted in comic books. Water looks blue only if 
you have lots of it (like in an ocean).

What I have always wondered is why Chinese (or Asian people 
in general) are depicted as yellow. In reality their skin color 
is not a little bit yellow. It is exactly like the skin color 
of Europeans. 

Cord