Question:

Why does the moon shine at night?

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I know that you are probably going to say that it's cuz the sun is on the other side,but if the sun is on the other side shouldn't the moon be covering it.

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  1. It is lit up by the Sun. But only half of the Moon is lit by the Sun. The other half is, as you say, on the other side, in the dark. That is why the Moon goes through phases. At half moon we are seeing half the lit part and half the dark part. At full Moon, the sun is behind the Earth and shining directly on the face of the Moon. In extra special cases, the Earth actually gets in the way and causes a lunar eclipse, but usually Earth is not quite exactly between the Sun and Moon. If you look at the where the Moon is and where the Sun is, you can see how it works. Crescent and half Moons are often seen in the daytime. Starting in about a week from now you will start to see a crescent Moon in the west just after sunset. Each day after that the Moon will get higher in the west, the crescent will bet fatter and more easily seen before the Sun sets. Eventually the Moon will be a half Moon high in the sky at sunset. It will be easily visible before the sun sets. The you can easily see that the Sun is lighting it up, because you can see them both in the sky at the same time, and the lit up part of the Moon faces the Sun and the dark part faces away from the Sun.


  2. the reflection of the sun on the moon. the reason we can see differents phases of the moon are because the angle of the sunlight reflecting on the moon

  3. The reason the sun shines on the moon is because it's like a mirror.

    Or a reflection.

    If you shine a flashlight at a shiny rock at night. The rock will light up to a point. And if you have a bigger rock. The reflection will get bigger.

    And since the moon is not only a rock. It is also 1 part metal. And combined it will make a reflection. But it isn't too bright as it isn't a light source.

    In simpler words: Light go to moon and moon shine back.

    And if you were also wondering why you can't see as many stars at night when your in a city. That's because your pupils (The part of your eye that lets lights in) cannot adjust to brightness followed by darkness.

    Meaning, if you are in a brightly lit area, you cannot see something as darker than the area your in with darkness surrounding the dim light.

    Like, if it's night time. And your in bed. You open the door a little bit. Seeing darkness beyond the door. And you have a very dim light which is also small in size. You wont be able to see it if your room is brightly lit. But if you turn the light out you can see it.

    I hope this helped!

    --Wiiplay_ds

  4. Nope actually okay its kind of like three basketballs lined up in a line. Earth is in the middle, the sun on one side and the moon on the other. The moon and the other basketballs are not exactly aligned right so whenever the sun is shining on the other side of the earth it shines at the moon. Since the moon is much much smaller and not aligned exactly. Try it; like get three balls and line them up and then shine it at the first ball and I'm sure that the last one in row will be in the light if you have the right sizes.

  5. At night, when your mom leave the hall light on, it shines on the wall in your bed room. You don't see the hall light directly, but you do see the reflected light off the wall.

    The hall light isn't behind it, is it? No, its somewhere behind you relatively speaking. It works the same with the moon.  

  6. As someone said, 'Moon is more useful since it gives us light during night. Sun gives light during day when it is already bright'. I think this kind of logic is a waste of time that can be better spent on some useful (logical) ideas or thoughts.

  7. the moon shines as a resualt of sunlight reflecting off it, it shines all the time but the brightness of the atmosphere in the day really makes it hard to see except in the morning.

  8. The only source of light to cause the moon to shine is from the sun. If you look closely when the moon is large, but not full, you'll be able to make out a faint light from Earth shining on it.

  9. The sun shines light on it, which is reflected off the surface, just like the sun shines on the earth and gives us day.

    The moon "covers" the sun during the very rare event of a solar eclipse, this would be seen during the day, when the moon is "new".

  10. Sunlight reflecting off of it, and the sun is actually on the other side of the planet Earth,  When you see a crescent or half moon the darkened area is our shadow, a new moon is when the moon is entirely covered by our shadow

  11. The moon is reflecting light from the sun.

  12. Because it reflects the light which comes from the Sun!

  13. The moon does not shine.  It reflects light.  Just like your shoes.  You shoes do not shine.  You can't see them in absolute darkness.  Only when light hits them, and that light is reflected back to you.

    So what's the light source reflecting off of the moon.  That would be the sun.  

    The moon is more observable when it is in our night sky due to the nature of it's orbit.  When it's on the "day" side of the earth, very little to none of the part of the moon that is facing the sun is facing the earth.  This means most of what is visible of the moon is facing away from us, (think about a crescent phase, 50% of the moon is always illuminated by the sun, but we are only positioned to see a specific little sliver).

    The best time to see the moon during the daytime is when it is in gibbous, 1st, or 3rd quarter phases.  This is because enough of it is lit up to be visible in daylight, and because it's rise time is not exactly at sunset  (which would be the full moon phase).  So even though it is out during the daytime, it is not always visible, rarely noticeable, and the fact that most people just don't spend that much time looking up.

  14. its offset though.. i will try a diagram

    sun------->---------->---------moon

    -----------earth

    now, if we are on the right side of the earth, we can see the moon but not the sun, and the sun is still shining on the moon as you can see.

    make it a good day

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