What colour is the sun?

[Hams]

I mean, everyone says it's yellow or white but if you stare at it you see green and purple. And if blue flames are hotter than yellow ones, why isn't the sun blue?

Discuss.

[Bloodshadow]

Now, if you think about it, colors don't really "exist". We don't really see the objects, we only see the light reflected off of it. If the sun is white, that's only because we see white light reflect off of it. The sun itself is actually colorless; so are everything in the universe.

[Kamietsu]

Now, if you think about it, colors don't really "exist". We don't really see the objects, we only see the light reflected off of it. If the sun is white, that's only because we see white light reflect off of it. The sun itself is actually colorless; so are everything in the universe.

Actually, objects absorb every color except for the ones they reflect. So the object itself wouldn't be colorless, but a blended color of every color except the one we see.

Also, if you see purple and green while staring at the sun, that might be a hint to stop looking directly at the sun.

The sun isn't blue, as we see it, because our sun isn't as hot as a blue star. Compared to many of the stars out there, ours is just average-ish.

[Ohmega]

Our sun is some kind of yellow. Or should I say it makes yellow light.
There are blue suns, but they are much hotter than our sund, there are also orange suns, they are cooler then our sun.

[Bloodshadow]

Actually, objects absorb every color except for the ones they reflect. So the object itself wouldn't be colorless, but a blended color of every color except the one we see.

Absorbing colored light does not make the object colorful. Colors don't really exist; it's all subjective. If we didn't have eyes, then there'd be no color.

[Kamietsu]

Actually, objects absorb every color except for the ones they reflect. So the object itself wouldn't be colorless, but a blended color of every color except the one we see.

Absorbing colored light does not make the object colorful. Colors don't really exist; it's all subjective. If we didn't have eyes, then there'd be no color.

If we didn't have eyes, we could not see the color that exists around us. But that's impossible to prove, i.e. if a tree falls in the forest and no one is around to hear it, does it make a sound?

[jmizzle7]

Colors exist just as differentiable sound frequencies exist. The only thing that is open to debate with regard to color is our capabilities of distinguishing between color ranges within our own visible spectrum. Just because we can't see infrared and ultraviolet color frequency doesn't mean they don't exist.

The original question isn't fair, because you would have to assess the color of the sun from a purely quantitative perspective directly from the source of light, which is, on average, about 92 million miles away from our planet. The color of the sun is a totally different thing than the color refracted from the sun's rays upon entering the earth's atmosphere.

[teffy]

Why don´t you google "solar spectrum" or "Fraunhofer lines".
The Sun has a continuous spectrum with absorption lines.

[YoYoBro]

Go here http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraunhofer_lines (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fraunhofer_lines) for more info.

[teffy]

And the website of wikipedia says the following,too
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sun)

"The Sun's color is white, although from the surface of the Earth it may appear yellow because of atmospheric scattering. Its stellar classification, based on spectral class, is G2V, and is informally designated a yellow star, because the majority of its radiation is in the yellow-green portion of the visible spectrum.In this spectral class label, G2 indicates its surface temperature of approximately 5,778 K (5,505 °C.), and V (Roman five) indicates that the Sun, like most stars, is a main sequence star, and thus generates its energy by nuclear fusion of hydrogen nuclei into helium."

[Pilchard123]

This discussion is almost as pointless as the one we have in my maths classes.

I love it!!

Seriously though, do you see the same blue (or green, or yellow, or any colour really) that I do?

[bobcamel]

Sun is made of hydrogen and helium. Both are see-through.