A solar system with a star like your own sun and a planet like Jupiter has been discovered 90 light years from us. If the star is just as bright as our sun, how does it compare in brightness to the other stars in our night sky?

Background information: Light from the sun takes 8 minutes to reach the earth. The magnitude system for stars and other astronomical objects in our sky is designed so that a difference of 5 magnitudes represents a factor of 100 in brightness, with the larger numbered magnitudes being the dimmest. The dimmest stars seen with the unaided eye in a dark sky are about magnitude 6; the brightest stars (other than the sun) about 0. The planet Venus at times is magnitude -4, the full moon -14 and the sun -27.

(In reply to solution?!? by SilverKnight)

As Brian Wainscott proceeded, the idea was to use the magnitude system to show that the star is not quite bright enough to be seen with the unaided eye, or if the numbers turned out differently, how bright relative to other nighttime stars and planets.

Posted by Charlie on 2003-09-18 15:26:44