What is the difference between "North" "True North" and "Magnetic North"?

Question

And which east does the sun rise in?

Answer 1

True north is a constant and refers to the geographic North Pole. Magnetic north tends to shift and refers to the pole of the Earth's magnetic field. In mid 2002, true north and magnetic north were approximately 590 miles apart.

TRUE NORTH: bearing is adjusted for local magnetic. declination. MAGNETIC NORTH: bearing is NOT adjusted for local. magnetic declination

The North Pole, also known as the Geographic North Pole or Terrestrial North Pole, is defined as the point in the northern hemisphere where the Earth's axis of rotation meets the Earth's surface. It should not be confused with the North Magnetic Pole.

The North Pole is the northernmost point on Earth, lying diametrically opposite the South Pole. It defines latitude 90° North, as well as the direction of True North. At the North Pole all directions point south.

There doesn't seem to be a separate definition for North.  I think it is more often used as pointing towarg the geographic North Pole, although compasses would point toward the magnetic North Pole.  

I can't find anything certain about which east the sun rises in, but you have the problem of the 23.5 degree tilt of the Earth's axis and what geograhic coordinates we are observing from.

Answer 2

"True north" means the direction you'd point yourself in to reach the north pole.  In other words: get out your globe.  Pick a random point on the globe.  True north is the direction you'd have to move your finger to move directly toward the top of the globe.

Now, as it turns out -- lucky humans that we are -- the Earth has a magnetic field, and if you line up a piece of metal with that field, it almost always points "almost" north.  This observation is very useful for navigation.  Unfortunately, the magnetic field doesn't always point exactly towards the north pole.  "Magnetic north" is the direction that your compass tells you is north.

In different places around the world, it just so happens that magnetic north lines up better or worse with true north.  Here's a map of the relationship of magnetic north to true north in the United States:

http://lib.store.yahoo.net/lib/thecompas...

As you can see, for people who live along the black line that cuts through Illinois and Mississippi -- they got lucky!  Magnetic north points exactly towards true north.  As you go further East, magnetic north starts pointing further and further west.  As you go west, magnetic north points further and further east.  I live in Seattle, where as you can see from the map, magnetic north points more than 18 degrees east of true north.

Answer 3

"North", by itself, usually means true north.  Magnetic north is the direction that compass needles point toward.  The direction of magnetic north changes depending on where you are.  You can get maps showing which way magnetic north is -- see the first link.

True North is the pole that the Earth rotates around.  If you want to be exact, it's the place where it rotated about back around the year 1905.  Since then, it's moved a few dozen meters.  If you want to be SUPER-exact, it's the place where people in the 1920's thought it was back in 1905.