# Sun, Pacific Ocean and boiling
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303
**Category:** Factual Questions
**Created:** [July 12, 2013, 11:55am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303 "2013-07-12T11:55:59Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 2
### Author:  [@dracoi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/dracoi)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2013, 4:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/21 "2013-07-12T16:43:54Z")
The time to boil should also be slowed down by things like the [Leidenfrost effect](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leidenfrost_effect). The ocean would spend a lot of time surrounded by an insulating layer of steam.
But I’m also not so sure we should be using the sun’s energy output to measure the time of boiling. The sun’s surface is relatively cool and not very dense, but we’re still talking about a material that starts out at thousands of degrees, and the water would be denser than the sun’s surface and therefore would tend to sink into even hotter layers.
I certainly don’t see it lasting 1.9 days when you take this into effect… but it is probably a lot longer than a few seconds.
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### Author:  [@md2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/md2000)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2013, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/22 "2013-07-12T16:51:15Z")
Scale of the universe:
[http://www.lyricsdepot.com/monty-python/galaxy-song.html](http://www.lyricsdepot.com/monty-python/galaxy-song.html)
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### Author:  [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2013, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/23 "2013-07-12T16:51:50Z")
> [@scr4](#):
>
> I get 1.9 days, by scaling MikeS’s result by the ratio of the surface areas of the Sun vs Pacific Ocean.
You can’t do that division, unless you’re shielding the Earth with a Pacific-ocean shaped cutout (“dodging”, in photoprocessing terms) to keep light from the rest of the surface of the Sun from “slanting in” and heating the ocean from all other angles. If you’re close enough to the sun to be considered “dropping the Sun into the ocean”, it’s gotta be a factor.
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### Author:  [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2013, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/24 "2013-07-12T17:10:26Z")
> [@gnoitall](#):
>
> You can’t do that division, unless you’re shielding the Earth with a Pacific-ocean shaped cutout (“dodging”, in photoprocessing terms) to keep light from the rest of the surface of the Sun from “slanting in” and heating the ocean from all other angles. If you’re close enough to the sun to be considered “dropping the Sun into the ocean”, it’s gotta be a factor.
Yes I can. If the Sun is close enough to completely fill the sky, the energy emitted per unit area of the Sun is the same as the energy received per unit area.
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### Author:  [@scr4](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/scr4)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2013, 5:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/25 "2013-07-12T17:16:11Z")
> [@dracoi](#):
>
> … and the water would be denser than the sun’s surface and therefore would tend to sink into even hotter layers.
These calculations assume that the earth is brought to the “surface” (photosphere) of the Sun and suspended there. If it’s allowed to fall into the sun, you’re right, it will boil away much more quickly.
Also the calculation only takes radiative heating into account, and ignores conductive heating. That may be reasonable though, considering how tenuous the Sun’s atmosphere is.
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### Author:  [@Machine\_Elf](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Machine_Elf)
#### Post date: [July 12, 2013, 5:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/26 "2013-07-12T17:22:05Z")
> [@Colophon](#):
>
> Is that a reasonable thing to do? How does the energy requirted to raise the water from, say, 50F (a rough guess for the average temperature of the ocean) to 212F compare with the energy required to actually vaporise it?
As **MikeS** demonstrated - yes, it’s a reasonable thing to do. Vaporizing water takes a huge amount of energy compared to just heating liquid water up to the boiling temperature.
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### Author:  [@Tim\_T-Bonham.net](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tim_T-Bonham.net)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 6:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/27 "2013-07-13T06:10:51Z")
To get an idea of the size of the sun, look at [this picture](http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/image/1307/ar11785_peach_2320.jpg) of the current sunspots. See the yellow pebbly-looking background? Each of those ‘pebbles’ is about 1,000 km wide – about 1/3 of the US or about the whole continental Europe. See how many of them there are? And that’s only a picture of a small part of the sun. It’s real big.
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### Author:  [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 6:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/28 "2013-07-13T06:29:33Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#):
>
> …
> The power output of the sun is [3.9 x 10[sup]26[/sup] W.](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_luminosity)
> …
>
> [sub]Someone check my math…[/sub]
Not your math, but your logic: the figure you cite is the omnidirectional power output of the sun, “realistically”, how ever you look at it, you would rapidly reach a point where half or more of that output would be directed away from the earth and into space, so your figure is a bit shorter than what the actual result should be.
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### Author:  [@the\_O](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/the_O)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 2:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/29 "2013-07-13T14:27:59Z")
Not to hijack, but how many Gigabybes of flashdrive memory can I fit into the Pacific Ocean? I mean, I have an 8GB flashdrive and it measures 1" x 1/2" x 2", but my friend has a memory stick that is different.
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### Author:  [@Ludovic](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ludovic)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/30 "2013-07-13T14:46:42Z")
> [@Frazzled](#):
>
> Your question is backwards. The sun is many many many many many times larger than the Earth. You can’t drop it into the Pacific Ocean, rather you would drop the Earth onto the sun. The Pacific Ocean in those cases would be gone in milliseconds, and the Earth not much further behind.
And the sun wouldn’t get wet, the water would get Sun instead. Because it’s a gigantic nuclear furnace.
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### Author:  [@beowulff](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/beowulff)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 3:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/31 "2013-07-13T15:33:40Z")
> [@the\_O](#):
>
> Not to hijack, but how many Gigabybes of flashdrive memory can I fit into the Pacific Ocean? I mean, I have an 8GB flashdrive and it measures 1" x 1/2" x 2", but my friend has a memory stick that is different.
Just do the damn math.
The volume of the Pacific ocean is 6.7 x 10^23 cc (from [here](http://www.chacha.com/question/what-is-the-volume-of-the-pacific-ocean-in-cubic-centimeters)).
An 8GB flash drive that measures 1" x 1/2" x 2" has a volume of 1 in^3 or 16.4 cc.
So, 6.7 x 20^23 / 16.4 = 4.08 x 10^22 8GB flash drives will fit into the ocean. That means that the Pacific ocean will hold 3.27 x 10 ^23 GB of data. But, it’s pretty clear that this figure is way too small, since one can buy 32GB flash drives that are much, much smaller than the one you own.
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### Author:  [@fumster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/fumster)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 5:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/32 "2013-07-13T17:12:48Z")
I’m interested in hearing from the OP if it was just a joke, or that he thought the sun was smaller than the earth.
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### Author:  [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 8:14pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/33 "2013-07-13T20:14:44Z")
> [@fumster](#):
>
> I’m interested in hearing from the OP if it was just a joke, or that he thought the sun was smaller than the earth.
Me too. I’m curious to know what his original thoughts were on the scale of things.
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### Author:  [@Exapno\_Mapcase](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Exapno_Mapcase)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 8:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/34 "2013-07-13T20:59:59Z")
If an elephant lies on a bacteria, does it get squashed? (from Zen on Fifty Cents a Day)
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### Author:  [@Ethilrist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ethilrist)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 9:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/35 "2013-07-13T21:20:42Z")
Don’t be silly; here on the west coast, we see the sun set into the Pacific all the time. Takes about 3 minutes, and then it’s out, only to be reborn the next morning as it rises over Mt. Diablo.
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### Author:  [@eschereal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eschereal)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 9:40pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/36 "2013-07-13T21:40:35Z")
> [@Ethilrist](#):
>
> Don’t be silly; here on the west coast, we see the sun set into the Pacific all the time. Takes about 3 minutes, and then it’s out, only to be reborn the next morning as it rises over Mt. Diablo.
Not really. It never touches the ocean itself, at least not around here, it always goes behind a bank of clouds on the horizon. I have never seen it touch the water, not once.
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### Author:  [@Tangent](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tangent)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 10:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/37 "2013-07-13T22:11:52Z")
[The sun sets in Arizona actually, near Flagstaff.](http://i.imgur.com/VFmoa.jpg)
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### Author:  [@Munch](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Munch)
#### Post date: [July 13, 2013, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/38 "2013-07-13T22:13:38Z")
doublepost
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### Author:  [@CheeseDonkey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CheeseDonkey)
#### Post date: [July 16, 2013, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/39 "2013-07-16T01:52:41Z")
> [@fumster](#):
>
> I’m interested in hearing from the OP if it was just a joke, or that he thought the sun was smaller than the earth.
You got me.
I just wanted to see if people would try to answer the question seriously or not.
I’m impressed.
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### Author:  [@Colibri](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Colibri)
#### Post date: [July 16, 2013, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/sun-pacific-ocean-and-boiling/663303/40 "2013-07-16T02:30:32Z")
> [@CheeseDonkey](#):
>
> You got me.
>
> I just wanted to see if people would try to answer the question seriously or not.
>
> I’m impressed.
**Moderator Note**
**CheeseDonkey** , don’t abuse this forum by asking questions you know the answer to. This constitutes trolling. No warning issued, but don’t do this again. This is closed.
Colibri
General Questions Moderator
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