SS COMPONENT

Aristotle's Theory of a Rainbow

The Greek philosopher Aristotle was Plato’s pupil as well as Alexander The Great’s teacher. He was born in Stagira, Greece and raised by his brother-in-law until he was 17 when he was sent to be tutored by Plato in Athens. When Alexander ruled, Aristotle asked for his own school to teach and it was called Lyceum. Aristotle taught biology, physics, botany, and zoology. Some more of his teaching were history: rhetoric, and literary theory. For logic he taught metaphysics. He also taught political theory and ethics in psychology. After Alexander died, Aristotle escaped to Euboea Island.

Aristotle’s theory involved the sun’s rays deflecting at an angle when it hits a point in a rain cloud. He said the rainbow shows in an arch because of the angle it deflects back to what we can see like the sun, for example. We see the sunset as a big arch because of the way the light is being reflected in a drop of water. The higher the sun the lower the arch, the lower the sun the higher the arch. There is a lot of geometry behind how the rainbow appears like the angle of elevation, and angle of depression. It depends on where you are in relation to the rainbow to how you see it.

Light rays are originally straight but can be reflected and bent into a rainbow. When the light hits at a lower angle through water in air it reflects to your eyes appearing in a certain angle. For the light to appear brighter its reflected in a straight line. Where the light reflects from points in the water in air it can create an arch shape of light/colors. The bending of the light into the shape of an arch is called refraction.

The rainbow/ light forms a semicircle because it is refracted onto the round hemisphere. The thickness of the rainbow depends on the top and bottom of the suns light or width of the shining light. In order for the rainbow to be seen the light has to be on the opposite side or it wouldn't work.