Is Earth's Emitted White Light Continuous in Space?

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Homework Help Overview

The discussion revolves around the nature of white light emitted from Earth's surface and whether its spectrum would be continuous when observed from space. The subject area includes concepts of light, spectra, and observational physics.

Discussion Character

  • Exploratory, Conceptual clarification

Approaches and Questions Raised

  • Participants explore the definitions of white light and continuous spectra. Questions are raised about how the observed spectrum may differ from the original and what implications this has for the concept of continuity.

Discussion Status

Some participants are attempting to clarify the question and its terminology, while others are suggesting a pragmatic approach to describing the observed spectrum. There is no explicit consensus on the definitions or the nature of the spectrum being discussed.

Contextual Notes

There are indications of confusion regarding forum etiquette and posting guidelines, which may affect the flow of the discussion.

JB123
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If white light were emitted from Earth's surface and observed by someone in space, would its spectrum be continuous? Explain.
 
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Homework questions belong in the homework forums ; moreover, don't double-post. All this is explained in the posting guidelines of PF.
 
ok thanks. I just joined the site, I didn't know that.
plus, I wasn't getting any help in the other forum.
 
Start by making sense of the question.
What is white light?
What does continuous mean for a spectrum?

With my own vocabulary, the question looks strange. I would simply answer "yes" because the observed spectrum would certainly contain some continuous parts and therefore I would say it is continuous. But if you have a clear definition, you could do better.

I advise you to be pragmatic and simply explain how the observed spectrum would look like to the observer. Will it be different from the original white spectrum? And why? And how would it look like? ... and finally -if you want- decide about "continuous", but this is not the most important thing.
 

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