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2024-12-24 20:21:43 UTC
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Martin Vermeer FCD on Nostr: Yes, it's what we visual folks refer to as the 'visible surface' of the Sun. So, ...

Yes, it's what we visual folks refer to as the 'visible surface' of the Sun. So, because of the scale height, this surface is a bit fuzzy, some +/- 100 km. Which is some 7000 x shorter than the radius of the Sun, which is why the solar disc's edge looks so sharp in the sky.

You can think of the visibility in fog: if it says that visibility is 200 m, that doesn't mean that the fog is a hard wall at that distance. It's fuzzy.