How can black things be shiny?

Question

Surely black is the absorption of light of all visible wavelengths? If that’s so, how can a black surface also reflect light enough to look shiny?

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General Physics RvTDLR 6 years 2 Answers 3760 views 0

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Answers ( 2 )

  1. Best Answer:  First ask yourself ‘what color is a perfect mirror?’.

    Answer – it is not any color. In the same ways that clear glass is not any color). A mirror reflects all wavelengths (colors) equally so that what you see is the same color as the object being reflected.

    Then ask ‘what is perfect black?’.

    Answer – it is something that absorbs all the light falling on it, irrespective of the wavelength of the light.

    A shiny black surface is simply a combination of the above. Think of it as viewing a perfectly black surface with a sheet of glass resting on it. You will get a bit of reflection from the surface of the glass, but everything that passes through the glass is absorbed by the black surface.

  2. Temperature is the physical manifestation of the energy state of a substance based in the kinetic energy theory which on a statistical basis behaves very close to the mathematical model.

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