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Posted by udit99 14 hours ago

Why is the sky blue?(explainers.blog)
431 points | 164 commentspage 5
signa11 11 hours ago|
didn’t cv raman prove just that via his raman-effect for which he got the noble prize ?
jabl 5 hours ago|
Kind of, but not really.

Rayleigh scattering is elastic (only the direction changes), whereas Raman scattering is inelastic (energy, that is color changes in addition to direction) scattering.

aaroninsf 11 hours ago||
Not discussed but should be:

Prior to the great oxygenation event, Earth's sky was not blue; it was likely red-orange, carbon dioxide and methane being primary components.

jonahx 12 hours ago||
Going to be that guy, even though I think this is a really nice work overall...

But the winking and "cool guy" emojis are so grating. In general, technical explanations that apologize for themselves with constant reassurances like "don't worry" and "it's actually simple" undermine their own aim.

Your job -- if you're making content for people with double digit ages -- is to make the explanation as clear as you can, not to patronize and emotionally hand-hold the reader.

jph00 12 hours ago|
No, your job is to help your reader get to the end of the text. That means writing in a way that most of your audience finds compelling, readable, and not intimidating.

Not all readers are the same, so you will fail at your job for some readers.

But few readers are emotionless automatons that need nothing but dry technical content, unless it’s a topic they are very motivated to understand.

jonahx 11 hours ago||
> That means writing in a way that most of your audience finds compelling, readable, and not intimidating.

I would agree with that. And I think emojis and unnecessary reassurances subvert that goal. It's fluff, it's more to read, and if the writing isn't already clear, they don't fix the problem.

> But few readers are emotionless automatons that need nothing but dry technical content

Nothing in my post argues for dry technical content.

Bartosz Ciechanowski's superb work, which may have inspired the author, gets the balance just right without any hand-holding asides:

https://ciechanow.ski/mechanical-watch/

nephihaha 6 hours ago||
Where I live, the sky is grey much of the time... Most of last week anyway!
alexander2002 7 hours ago||
This post is so good! You are a hero.
jama211 10 hours ago||
Brilliant, thank you
tehjoker 8 hours ago||
This is a really great piece, the bit at the end showing why IR works in smokey environments and guessing the planet's composition based on color was really good.
mvdtnz 10 hours ago||
Some of the demonstrations are not working correctly, at least on my machine (Windows + MS Edge). Any demo with a "reference image" is not correctly updating the reference.
halis 10 hours ago||
Nitrogen.
deafpolygon 10 hours ago|
Very well explained. I love the in-depthness of the article.
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