Timeline for If Betelgeuse were to go supernova
Current License: CC BY-SA 2.5
6 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| May 10, 2018 at 11:27 | comment | added | Calmarius | I would expect it look like the diamond ring during a total solar eclipse, with shadow bands on the ground and stuff. I think it will be bright enough to hurt your eyes. | |
| Feb 17, 2011 at 14:52 | comment | added | Keenan Pepper | In other words, the supernova would be less bright overall than the full moon, but far more piercingly brilliant, since it would still appear as a single point. | |
| Feb 17, 2011 at 5:23 | comment | added | spencer nelson | Another way of thinking about this is that "magnitude" is a measure of luminosity, which is energy per second. It doesn't care about surface area of the object. That's a different quantity, the surface brightness. As you spread out an object over the sky, it will appear to get dimmer, not brighter, since the total energy available (the luminosity) stays the same, but it is divided over a larger area of your field of view. See en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surface_brightness | |
| Feb 17, 2011 at 5:20 | comment | added | spencer nelson | @Nick Bedford Actually, it works in the opposite direction - the brightness figure I quoted for the moon is the total, integrated over the entire surface, so a given point on the moon looks less bright than a -12.75 magnitude star. Somewhat counterintuitively, the angular diameter doesn't affect the total number of photons your eyeball receives. | |
| Feb 17, 2011 at 4:54 | comment | added | Nick Bedford | Would another factor be angular diameter? The Moon after all has an angular diameter of approximately 30 degrees which, to us, would likely make it seem rather bright. | |
| Feb 17, 2011 at 3:39 | history | answered | spencer nelson | CC BY-SA 2.5 |