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Added link to etymology of the word planet (originally meaning wanderer).
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Mark Bailey
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You are correct. The Earth would always appear in approximately the same location in the sky, when viewed from a point on the lunar surface. And it would be seen to spin, the continents coming in and out of view over the course of an Earth day (24 hours). The sun would make it's way across the sky, from one horizon to the other over a period of about two weeks, to rise again in another two weeks.

This might sound odd, because the rock we live on spins pretty quickly relative to the most obvious points of reference. In general (assuming that you are viewing from a place not particularly close to one of the poles) the bodies we see in the sky rise in the East, and set in the West about 12 hours later. But if you take a little bit closer look, you start to see that this is not the whole story. Each night, the moon rises and sets almost an hour later than the night before. The stars that you can see at night shift over a period of one year. And the planets move in such strange patterns that before Copernicus (at least in Europe), they seemed to just be wanderingwandering.

And not everything appears to move accross the sky. As you mentioned, Polaris, the north star, seems to hang in one spot all of the time, though you can't see it during the day. But even taking all of this into account, the idea of a large planetary body just hanging in one spot all of the time in the sky, may still seem... um, alien. And to that, I might just say, we've been here on this one planet an awfully long time. It's bound to feel a bit like home.

You are correct. The Earth would always appear in approximately the same location in the sky, when viewed from a point on the lunar surface. And it would be seen to spin, the continents coming in and out of view over the course of an Earth day (24 hours). The sun would make it's way across the sky, from one horizon to the other over a period of about two weeks, to rise again in another two weeks.

This might sound odd, because the rock we live on spins pretty quickly relative to the most obvious points of reference. In general (assuming that you are viewing from a place not particularly close to one of the poles) the bodies we see in the sky rise in the East, and set in the West about 12 hours later. But if you take a little bit closer look, you start to see that this is not the whole story. Each night, the moon rises and sets almost an hour later than the night before. The stars that you can see at night shift over a period of one year. And the planets move in such strange patterns that before Copernicus (at least in Europe), they seemed to just be wandering.

And not everything appears to move accross the sky. As you mentioned, Polaris, the north star, seems to hang in one spot all of the time, though you can't see it during the day. But even taking all of this into account, the idea of a large planetary body just hanging in one spot all of the time in the sky, may still seem... um, alien. And to that, I might just say, we've been here on this one planet an awfully long time. It's bound to feel a bit like home.

You are correct. The Earth would always appear in approximately the same location in the sky, when viewed from a point on the lunar surface. And it would be seen to spin, the continents coming in and out of view over the course of an Earth day (24 hours). The sun would make it's way across the sky, from one horizon to the other over a period of about two weeks, to rise again in another two weeks.

This might sound odd, because the rock we live on spins pretty quickly relative to the most obvious points of reference. In general (assuming that you are viewing from a place not particularly close to one of the poles) the bodies we see in the sky rise in the East, and set in the West about 12 hours later. But if you take a little bit closer look, you start to see that this is not the whole story. Each night, the moon rises and sets almost an hour later than the night before. The stars that you can see at night shift over a period of one year. And the planets move in such strange patterns that before Copernicus (at least in Europe), they seemed to just be wandering.

And not everything appears to move accross the sky. As you mentioned, Polaris, the north star, seems to hang in one spot all of the time, though you can't see it during the day. But even taking all of this into account, the idea of a large planetary body just hanging in one spot all of the time in the sky, may still seem... um, alien. And to that, I might just say, we've been here on this one planet an awfully long time. It's bound to feel a bit like home.

Source Link
Mark Bailey
  • 1k
  • 1
  • 8
  • 16

You are correct. The Earth would always appear in approximately the same location in the sky, when viewed from a point on the lunar surface. And it would be seen to spin, the continents coming in and out of view over the course of an Earth day (24 hours). The sun would make it's way across the sky, from one horizon to the other over a period of about two weeks, to rise again in another two weeks.

This might sound odd, because the rock we live on spins pretty quickly relative to the most obvious points of reference. In general (assuming that you are viewing from a place not particularly close to one of the poles) the bodies we see in the sky rise in the East, and set in the West about 12 hours later. But if you take a little bit closer look, you start to see that this is not the whole story. Each night, the moon rises and sets almost an hour later than the night before. The stars that you can see at night shift over a period of one year. And the planets move in such strange patterns that before Copernicus (at least in Europe), they seemed to just be wandering.

And not everything appears to move accross the sky. As you mentioned, Polaris, the north star, seems to hang in one spot all of the time, though you can't see it during the day. But even taking all of this into account, the idea of a large planetary body just hanging in one spot all of the time in the sky, may still seem... um, alien. And to that, I might just say, we've been here on this one planet an awfully long time. It's bound to feel a bit like home.