why is the sky blue? Seriously?

Question

why is the sky blue? Seriously?

Answer 1

Sunlight is made up of all the colors of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet. The gas molecules in the atmosphere interact with the sunlight before the light reaches our eyes.



The gas molecules in the atmosphere scatter the higher-energy (high frequency) blue portion of the sunlight more than they scatter the lower-energy red portion of the sunlight (this is called Rayleigh scattering, named for the physicist Lord John Rayleigh). The Sun appears reddish-yellow and the sky surrounding the Sun is colored by the scattered blue waves.



When the Sun is lower in the horizon (near sunrise or sunset), the sunlight must travel through a greater thickness of atmosphere than it does when it is overhead, and even more light is scattered (not just blue, but also green, yellow, and orange) before the light reaches your eyes. This makes the sun look much redder.



A musch better and detailed explaination is availabe at the following websites :



http://www.sky-watch.com/articles/skyblue.html

http://world.std.com/~mmcirvin/bluesky.html

http://webexhibits.org/causesofcolor/14.html

Answer 2

Sunlight is made up of all the colors of the rainbow: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet. The gas molecules in the atmosphere interact with the sunlight before the light reaches our eyes.



The gas molecules in the atmosphere scatter the higher-energy (high frequency) blue portion of the sunlight more than they scatter the lower-energy red portion of the sunlight (this is called Rayleigh scattering, named for the physicist Lord John Rayleigh). The Sun appears reddish-yellow and the sky surrounding the Sun is colored by the scattered blue waves.



When the Sun is lower in the horizon (near sunrise or sunset), the sunlight must travel through a greater thickness of atmosphere than it does when it is overhead, and even more light is scattered (not just blue, but also green, yellow, and orange) before the light reaches your eyes. This makes the sun look much redder.

Answer 3

this question has been asked 100 times, but the answer is: The short answer is that the Earth's atmosphere (mostly nitrogen and oxygen) is very good at reflecting the blue light that comes from the sun, while it absorbs the other colors. This is also why the sky will look most blue directly across from the sun (because the light has to travel farther through our atmosphere to get to that point).

Answer 4

All the colors in the rainbow had a chance at first, but blue has the shortest light wave. So while all of the other colors made it, they were absorbed by the nitrogen. When the blue finally made it, the sky turned blue. It was sort of like a cosmic fusion, but I wouldn't want to confuse you.

Answer 5

This is Called "Raman Effect". It was dicscovered by a Noble Prize winner, Sir C.V.Raman. It says that the earth's atmosphere reflects,disperses and refracts blue more than any other color. That is why it 'Looks' blue.