August 6, 2007

Today 80 and Sunny takes some science quotes from David Carle’s book, “Introduction to Air in California” 2006, Univeristy of California Press

“Blue is scattered twice as effectively as green light and about four times more than red light. Violet is actually scattered the most, but our eyes are not very sensitive to that range; we perceive blue better.”

How could anyone prove that you don’t see a purple sky? You could say you are more sensitive to violets and you were just born that way.

“…Without atmospheric gases and their abilities to scatter sunlight, our sky would be as black as outer space[he cannot be talking about Los Angeles], where light passes through but is not made visible by encounters with air molecules… Deep blue skies are dry and clean, free of smoke, dust, and haze. Water vapor and haze particles turn the sky whitish or gray because they scatter more light across the whole range of wavelengths…”

Which is why when we talk about the blue skies of Los Angeles we mean Dodger blue. It’s a scattered, fractal, gaseous version of deep mountain blue and it compliments our perfect 80 degree weather like the kind we had again today.