• Question: why is the sun the only star that can be seen in daytime

    Asked by anon-200929 to Rosemary, Oliver, Leigh on 4 Mar 2019.
    • Photo: Leigh Kesler

      Leigh Kesler answered on 4 Mar 2019:

      The Sun is very close to the Earth (from an astronomical perspective). The Sun is 150 million kilometers away (or 8 light-minutes). The next closest star is Proxima Centauri, which is 4000 BILLION kilometers away (or 4.2 light-YEARS). Since the Sun is so close, when our side of the Earth is facing the Sun, its light drowns out the light from all of the other stars. At night, when our side of the Earth is facing AWAY from the Sun, the light is blocked and we can see the much dimmer light from the far away stars.

    • Photo: Oliver Gordon

      Oliver Gordon answered on 4 Mar 2019:

      Leigh gave a pretty good answer 🙂

      All I could add is that there’s a lot of stars that we should be able to see at night, but can’t, because of streetlights and so on (astronomers particularly dislike the white ones). If you ever go camping, stay up at night and have a look.

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