Shortform is dedicated to quick, interesting reads. If you are looking for some tiny nuggets of knowledge, easy entertainment, maybe a laugh or two😂. Shortform is designed for consuming content when short on time, energy, or waiting for a bus that’s always infuriatingly late.
When we look up from the surface of the Earth, the Sun and Moon appear roughly the same size.
This is because of a remarkable coincidence: our local star, the Sun, is roughly 400 times wider than the Moon but is also 400 times farther away when viewed from the Earth’s surface.
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This ratio makes them look almost identical in the sky.
We get proof of this when the Moon covers the whole of the Sun during a total solar eclipse. It won’t always be like this, as the Moon is very slowly moving away from the Earth, and at some time in the distant future, the Moon will be too small in the sky to cover all of the Sun.
Total solar eclipses do occur on other planets in the solar system, but Earth experiences a perfect size match between the Sun and the Moon.
Shortform is dedicated to quick, interesting reads. If you are looking for some tiny nuggets of knowledge, easy entertainment, maybe a laugh or two😂. Shortform is designed for consuming content when short on time, energy, or waiting for a bus that’s always infuriatingly late.
