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Why Space Appears Black

I think you're asking why you don't see the stars.

Any imaging system only has a limited range ("dynamic range") over which it can usably detect what it's looking at. In other words, it has to have a maximum bright, beyond which everything is just imaged as bright white, and a minimum dark, with anything darker than that indistinguishable from completely black. Eyes, film cameras, and digital cameras are all subject to this limitation.

In order to image the things of interest (the Space Shuttle, the Moon, the Earth) the dynamic range of the imaging device has to be set to be appropriate for the target. Stars, even though they put out some light, are still too dark to be distinguished from the black background, so they aren't visible, nor can they be photographed while the camera is looking at something bright.

Also, space has no atmosphere, so the astronauts are working in essentially an empty vacuum. There is no material to refract or reflect light, except the Moon, the earth, and the spacecraft and astronauts. So that is what you see.

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8y ago

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