Buddy Goin, age 11, of Houston, Tex.

How long does it take sunlight to reach the earth?

If our radiant sun suddenly shut down his furnace, we would not know about it for more than eight minutes. For the sun we look at is actually the sun as it was some eight minutes ago.

This is because the light from its shining face, traveling at about 186,000 miles a second, takes 500 seconds to travel across the millions of miles of space that separate us from the sun. The sunbeam that just hit the freckle on your nose set out from Old Sol eight minutes and 20 seconds ago.