How Big Is The Sun?
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The Sun and the Moon are about the same size when you look at them in the sky, though that’sjust thanks to the coincidence that the Sun is about 400 times farther away than the Moonand also about 400 times bigger. Another fun coincidence is that the radius of the Sunis about twice the distance to the moon, so if you put the sun where the Earth is,the Moon would be just over halfway to the surface of the Sun.The Sun is also so big that it takes light over 4 and a half seconds to travel acrossits face – though I don't know whether that says more about how big the Sun is, or howslow light is, or both.What about the scale of other solar system objects? Well, here are Pluto and Charon comparedto the Earth and the Moon.And Jupiter; which, as a rough rule of thumb...
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The Sun and the Moon are about the same size when you look at them in the sky, though that’sjust thanks to the coincidence that the Sun is about 400 times farther away than the Moonand also about 400 times bigger. Another fun coincidence is that the radius of the Sunis about twice the distance to the moon, so if you put the sun where the Earth is,the Moon would be just over halfway to the surface of the Sun.The Sun is also so big that it takes light over 4 and a half seconds to travel acrossits face – though I don't know whether that says more about how big the Sun is, or howslow light is, or both.What about the scale of other solar system objects? Well, here are Pluto and Charon comparedto the Earth and the Moon.And Jupiter; which, as a rough rule of thumb...
