OUR MOON: ACCIDENT or MASTERPIECE?

I promised we’d look at the question asked by one of my students: “Why does the ‘Man in the Moon’ always look the same?”   She was talking about the monthly Full Moon - but is she right?

Yes, the Moon  completes one spin in the same time that it completes one orbit, only ever letting us see the ‘face’ and never the far side.                                                         

The moon has synchronous rotation - its orbital period is 27.321582 Earth days and its sidereal rotation period is also 27.321582 Earth days – exactly the same!   No-one knew what the far side of the Moon looked like until the Russsian space-probe Luna 3 orbited the Moon and transmitted mankind’s first images in October 1959.

Talking about the Moon - its gravity, position and orbit is perfect for it to also:

·         Stabilize Earth’s axial rotation

·         Regulate our ocean currents and our climate (Have you heard of climate change?)

·         Produce awesome Total Solar Eclipses- unique in our solar system...in fact, unknown anywhere else in the universe!

·         Produce ‘blood red’ Total Lunar Eclipses

·         Influence  the growth of plants and trees

·         Influence animal feeding habits, especially nocturnals

·         And of course - clean our beaches!

 

(Don’t forget, from 400,000 kms away it sometimes sets the scene for that romantic evening, helping us get home without a torch.)

 

In case we think we’ve got the Moon all figured out, just to complicate things it behaves dynamically in an eccentric orbit that produces libration – the ‘Man in the Moon’ appears to get the wobbles!

Despite all that, we are expected to believe that the Moon came about by sheer accident when some huge asteroid crashed into Earth from who knows where and all the debris somehow just  joined together…………………….”uh?”

(On the other hand, the Bible says that God said to king David that the Moon is His faithful witness in the sky.)             

Now then ……is the Moon just a very convenient accident or is there some design in this?

Acknowledgements:                                                           
nasa.gov   
wikipedia.com                                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

Monique Copelin (12), Beechwood, NSW, Oz                                                                                                                                                                                            

Photo credit:  Rogelio Bernal Andreo / Deep Sky Colours