My father and his girlfriend are very skeptical about space and stuff, and they are asking “how does the moon have a shadow, even though the sun is closer to the moon?” I would try to answer but I’m not very knowledgeable when it comes to space
by PaintRippedOff
2 Comments
Sorry if this doesn’t make any sense, I’m not sure how to word it correctly either.
Are you talking about the dimmer part of the moon that is visible towards the top in your photo? If so, that is called “Earthshine.” It’s light that is reflecting off the Earth and bouncing back off the moon towards us. In this configuration, the Earth, from the moon’s perspective, is nearly full… so it’s very bright in the moon’s night sky. So that light is bouncing off the moon’s surface, and we can sometimes see it.
[https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/83782/earthshine](https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/images/83782/earthshine)