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Now the sun rises and sets in the same direction, an almost at the same time everyday with respect to the earth.
But this clearly isnt the case with the moon.its timing as well as direction vary a lot
please explain this phenomenon

2007-07-23 17:04:10 · 10 answers · asked by Kalpak I 2 in Science & Mathematics Astronomy & Space

10 answers

The Sun's time of rise and set will vary according to the season on Earth. The summer solstice being the longest day and the winter solstice being the shortest day. These are caused by Earth's 23 degree tilt or obliquity of the ecliptic.

The direction of sunrise and sunset will vary according to the 26,000 year wobble or precession of Earth on it's axis.

The Moon takes 27.3 days to orbit Earth. This causes it to appear to rise and set later each day and night.

The Moon is not on Earth's equatorial plane. Instead, it lies slightly more than 5 degrees inclination to the ecliptic. This is what would cause the Moon to rise and set in different locations from the perspective of Earth. This is a 18.6 year cycle.

Regarding one of the previous answers, this question was not about how objects are moving through space but about their perspective as seen from Earth. If we want to get technical, the Moon does not even revolve around Earth. They both revolve around the Sun in a barycentre. A common center of mass. As viewed from space, the Moon does not make circles around Earth but it's movement around the sun is snakelike or a wiggle shape. This question has nothing to do with moonlanding theories.

2007-07-23 19:46:20 · answer #1 · answered by Troasa 7 · 0 0

The direction of the moon is the same as is the sun; the earth, moon and sun all lie in the same plane. The timing differs for good reason- the moon revolves around the earth. Thus if you view the moon at the "new moon", it sets very soon after the sun, because the moon is lined up between the earth and sun. If you would come out the succeeding days, the moon sets about 50 minutes later each day. At the "full moon", the moon rises with the sun set, and sets with the sun rise.

2007-07-23 17:21:02 · answer #2 · answered by cattbarf 7 · 1 0

Wow, there are some guesswork answers coming here.

The passage of the sun, moon and stars across the sky is an illusion – the Earth revolves in a day so everything seems to whip across the sky in that day, in the opposite direction.

But during the course of a day, the moon has moved about 1/28th of its orbit around the Earth, so that next day, it is 1/28th of the total sky (about 13 degrees) away from its position the previous night.

No mystery – it is simple as that.

The mystery is how the heck people don’t realise the motion of those bodies across the sky every day is the Earth turning. Most people are still back in the Middle Ages. It’s astounding.

(Probably these people are the same ones who are gullible and ignorant enough to believe all that conspiracy stuff about faked moon landings)

2007-07-23 17:36:20 · answer #3 · answered by nick s 6 · 0 1

The moon's orbit is slightly inclined to the equator of the earth so the moon seems to rise at different points on the horizon. The time of its rising and setting depends on where it is in its orbit around the earth.
The earth is also inclined 23.5 degrees to its orbital plane so the time and location where the sun rises and sets actually varies quite a bit as the year goes along.

2007-07-23 17:24:38 · answer #4 · answered by steve b 3 · 1 0

The Earth used to rotate plenty quicker, an afternoon extremely lasted approximately six hours. by making use of making use of fact the formation of the Moon and the oceans the Moon has been dragging the water around, slowing the Earth's rotation with the tides and accelerating the Moon in its orbit, making it bypass extra away. thank you Petrusclavus What Naz says is 0.5 suitable for the incorrect reasons. If we now no longer had the Moon then the tidal bulge which it creates with its gravity could now no longer exist so the sea component could flatten out devoid of tides. by making use of making use of fact this tidal bulge is sweet on the equator then the water could bypass contained in direction of the poles because of fact it levelled out, inflicting sea component to drop on the ingredient of the equator and upward push on the ingredient of the poles. halfway in between it does no longer make diverse difference. it does no longer wash each ingredient away, it may purely reason coastal flooding contained in direction of the poles, and equatorial coastal factors could devoid of be conscious stumble on themselves to be inland.

2016-11-10 05:40:03 · answer #5 · answered by ? 4 · 0 0

The Moon's orbital rotation is in the same direction as the Earth's axial rotation, but it orbits at a slightly slower rate than the Earth's rotation. If it's orbit was the same as the Earth's rotation, it would stay in the same spot and would never appear to move.

2007-07-23 17:13:27 · answer #6 · answered by Foxfire 4 · 0 1

Since the earth rotates around the sun and the moon rotates around the earth, and the earth is much smaller than the sun, the moon rotates much more often around the earth than the earth rotates around the moon in the same period of time.

2007-07-23 17:11:17 · answer #7 · answered by Armon92 3 · 0 1

You know how you said, ALMOST the same time every day. Yeah, the moon goes through that same cycle, only it repeats every 28 days instead of 365.25 days. Exact same process, speed up due to the different properties of the earth and moon.

2007-07-23 17:21:50 · answer #8 · answered by billyjoebob1992 1 · 0 1

There isn't really a moon cause its all done with smoke and mirrors. Gotta go the goverment is hot on my trail.

2007-07-23 17:08:26 · answer #9 · answered by fxstc111 1 · 0 1

Due to elliptical shape of the earth.

2007-07-23 18:55:54 · answer #10 · answered by pihoo 2 · 0 1

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