The moon? i can't seem to understand how we only see one side of the moon. does the moon spin?

Question

do you mean the U.S. sees one side and the other side of the world sees the other?

Answer 1

no, everyone in the world sees one side. its because the moon rotates on its axis, and orbits the earth at the same rate... it makes a complete orbit and a complete revolution about every 27 days. thus we only see one side. the other side is known as the "dark side of the moon" but its not any naturally darker than the side we see. its actually the "far side of the moon".

Answer 2

time for an easy experiment....

get a volley ball, a tennis ball and a lamp.....

put an X on the tennis ball and keep that  facing the volleyball at all times.....

shine the lamp at the two.... move the tennis ball slowly around the volleyball....notice that part of it is in shade... when the ball is between the light and the volleyball, the x part is in shade. (a 'new moon to us on Earth)..... but the 'backside' is lit up...right?....

move the tennis ball to the other side of the volleyball... now the x is brightly lit... (pick it up so it'snot in the shadow of the volleyball.. we're not doing eclipses!).... that would be a full moon to us here on Earth....

did that help?.. I hope so...

Answer 3

it is because the moon rotates on its axis just perfectly timing it with its orbit around the earth.  that is why we only see one side of it.

Answer 4

The Moon does rotate, it rotates at a rate that is in synchronization with it's motion around the earth so everyone on Earth sees the same side of the moon. Basically the moon rotates once for each orbit it makes around the earth.

Answer 5

Simple,Sir Arther,simple.Just as we see only our side of the football  placed at the centre before the match begins!

Answer 6

The whole world sees only one side of the moon, because it is tidally locked. It does rotate, but it does so in the same time it takes it to revolve around Earth.

Answer 7

i also want to no how the moon works

Answer 8

Instead of a (slightly) lopsided sphere, picture the moon as a short sausage with the heavier end pointing toward the earth.  As the 'sausage' orbits the earth only one end points toward the earth (during each monthly orbit) and you never see the other end.  During each complete orbit of the moon it has pointed to every possible direction on a compass rose and has completed one spin (but not on its axis).

Answer 9

take the hands of a friend and spin around together.

one of you is the earth, the other is the moon.

that is what the earth and moon are doing.....dancing.

Answer 10

the moon spins on its axis, but it also orbits the earth. the time to complete one spin and the time to complete one orbit are the same, so the moon always shows (approximately) the same face to the earth. this picture shows one full month and you can see that apart from a slight rocking motion, you always see the same face:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Lunar...