2024 01 19

The sun beyond a silhouetted tree on a property in Lee Center, Illinois. November, 2023. © Clayton Hauck

They Might Be Giants “Why Does the Sun Shine?”

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees

Yo ho, it's hot
The sun is not
A place where we could live
But here on Earth there'd be no life
Without the light it gives

We need its light
We need its heat
We need its energy
Without the sun
Without a doubt
There'd be no you and me

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees

The sun is hot

It is so hot that everything on it is a gas
Iron, copper, aluminum, and many others

The sun is large

If the sun were hollow, a million Earths could fit inside
And yet, the sun is only a middle-sized star

The sun is far away

About ninety-three million miles away! And that's why it looks so small

And even when it's out of sight, the sun shines night and day

The sun gives heat
The sun gives light
The sunlight that we see
The sunlight comes from our own sun's atomic energy

Scientists have found that the sun is a huge atom-smashing machine
The heat and light of the sun come from the nuclear reactions of 
hydrogen, carbon, nitrogen, and helium

The sun is a mass of incandescent gas
A gigantic nuclear furnace
Where hydrogen is built into helium
At a temperature of millions of degrees