Why is the sun as hot as it is?

Answer 1

At the sun's deep interior(400,000 miles deep!), heat(20million degrees Fahrenheit) & pressure(4 trillion pounds per square inch) act on 700 million tons of hydrogen, converting it to 695 million tons of helium....per second!!!!!! The excess 5 million tons of hydrogen that isn't turned to helium becomes pure radiant energy according to Einstein's famous equation, E=MCsquared,
where E=energy
M=mass
Csquared=(speed of light) times (speed of light)!

You can understand how much energy is created because the (speed of light)squared= 186, 284miles per second times 5280feet per mile times 186,284miles per second times 5280feet per mile is a seriously big number. When this number is also multiplied to the large hydrogen mass(5 million tons) converted to energy, the Energy unleashed by the sun is stupifyingly stupendous!!!!!!! The energy unleashed by the sun is the equivalent (& is the very same type of energy) of 11 billion 1 megaton nuclear(not atomic) weapons exploded per second. You might understand this huge energy amount better if you were to think of a square mile of terrain on the earth exploding 55 nuclear weapons per second.... continually & over every square mile of the entire planet earth!!!!!! Such power is unleashed in the sun but it doesn't hurt us(except when we get sun burns & long term cancers). Great processes work in the sun, in the space & electromagnetic fields around the sun & earth, & in the sun & earth's atmospheres, not to kill us, but to SUSTAIN life on earth. Wow, wow, wow.............WOW!!!!

Answer 2

The Sun is as hot as it is basically because of its mass—the weight of the upper layers of the Sun press down on its core, where hydrogen atoms fuse together to create energy, and that energy supports the weight of the upper layers. (Scientists call this “equilibrium,” basically meaning that the weight is “equalled” by the pressure.) If the Sun had more mass, the interior pressure would be greater, more hydrogen atoms would fuse, and the Sun would be hotter and brighter; it also would run out of fuel faster. If the Sun were less massive, fewer hydrgen atoms would fuse, and the Sun would be cooler and dimmer; it would live a shorter life.

The interior temperature of the Sun is measured in the millions of degrees; its surface appears to be merely thousands of degrees. That’s because the intense radiation created by the fusion in the Sun’s core heats all the layers of gas in between.

That’s as long as it stays in equilibrium… Eventually, the interior pressure will start to drop, and it won’t be able to support the weight of the upper layers of the Sun, and the surface of the Sun will expand and grow cooler. Eventually (i.e., about five billion years from now), the Sun will lose its outer layers, and we’ll be left with a “white dwarf,” which will appear hotter than the Sun does now.


Ryan Wyatt
Rose Center for Earth & Space
New York, New York

Answer 3

Because deep in the interior of the sun there is a nuclear reaction taking place which generates lots and lots of energy.

Answer 4

because the great xenu who created the universe while flying all over the place in dc8's forgot the turn off the stove in his other galaxy, that is what the sun is, a stove left on for billions of years.

Answer 5

because sun was born by nuclear fusion. It is hot because of the nuclear fusion and it is mostly helium.

Answer 6

NATURE BY IT SELF IS LIKE THAT.
WHY IS ICE AS COLD AS IT IS.
ALL TREES ARE GREEN BUT NOT THE SAME GREEN EVEN IN THE SAME TREE.
UNFORTUNATELY WE CAN'T GO NEAR THE SUN TO FEEL HOW HOT HE IS.
BUT WE CAN PUT A FINGER IN A FIRE TO SEE HOW HOT IT IS AND WHY.

Answer 7

Nuclear fusion.

Answer 8

you can also ask:
what's the temperature of fire?

and i'll tell you:
it depends on the fuel...

so you've got to know the gases that make the sun a big ball of fire...

Answer 9

b/c it's like one big ball of fire!

Answer 10

'cause it's formed by gas and fire. that way :P