Moon tidally locked to earth, not the sun

[Michael Boddie]

There is no "dark side of the moon". When referring to relative moon locations, refer to them as the side facing the earth and stop reinforcing the idea there's a dark side.

 

[akashrao]

oh! okay

 

[Brandenburg]

oh! okay

Physicist are amazing huh?

 

[Wolfshadw]

While you are factually correct, it just sounds better than the alternatives. I mean out of these three:

The Side of the Moon that Never Faces Earth
The Other Side of the Moon
The Dark Side of the Moon

Which one sounds like a cool album title?



-Wolf sends

 

[akashrao]

I know why you tread the dark side of the moon. Opening lyrics.

 

[Helio]

While you are factually correct, it just sounds better than the alternatives. I mean out of these three:

The Side of the Moon that Never Faces Earth
The Other Side of the Moon
The Dark Side of the Moon

Which one sounds like a cool album title?



-Wolf sends

Kryptonite! [Great song.]

It's perhaps a good example of how labels are accepted. A hard scientific one can be too cold for enjoyable use. Things that are "dark" can mean things simply unseeable, like the back side of a tidally-locked satellite. But it is also misleading since dark more often means "without light", and the back side is illuminated by the Sun as much as the side facing us. Actually, we see a little less since only the front size encounters darkness during a lunar eclipse, so over time, the total light encountered is greater on the "dark" side. The the brighter dark side wins, and, finally, an oxymoron. This is the stuff lyrics are made of. [I just watched the Maltese Falcon yesterday, for those who might recall Bogart's last line.]

 

[Wolfshadw]

Another colloquialism would be "In the dark" which of course means unaware or unknown. For most of human history, we were "in the dark" about the far side of the moon.

-Wolf sends

P.S. Kryptonite is a great song, but I was referring to the Pink Floyd album.

 

[newtons_laws]

While you are factually correct, it just sounds better than the alternatives. I mean out of these three:

The Side of the Moon that Never Faces Earth
The Other Side of the Moon
The Dark Side of the Moon

Which one sounds like a cool album title?



-Wolf sends

There is a fourth alternative - the Far Side of the Moon

 

[Helio]

For most of human history, we were "in the dark" about the far side of the moon.

And the slang of that would combine the two into the "dark side of the Moon". This is an accurate phrase if the context is clear that it's about knowledge (lack of) not illumination, which is too often not the case. Pedantry can be important if allowing ambiguity would be imprudent.

P.S. Kryptonite is a great song, but I was referring to the Pink Floyd album.

Yes, I was adding songs to your short list.

We use dark in so many ways. Dark matter is another knowledge-base use. We have no idea what color DM would be if you could make a large enough pile. Dark Energy is also about lack of knowledge but the energy connection implies invisibility as well. I'm guessing DE is invisibly violet in color. Just a guess.

 

[Vincent Peri]

There is a fourth alternative - the Far Side of the Moon

That sounds like a comic strip:

The Far Side Comic Strip by Gary Larson - Official Website | TheFarSide.com

Visit the official online home of The Far Side comic strip by Gary Larson for your daily dose of Gary’s classic cartoons.

www.thefarside.com

 

[Helio]

There is a fourth alternative - the Far Side of the Moon

Yep, that is the proper phrase, but there's poetry in having dark sides. My favorite is the "dark side of the Sun", which forces one to wonder quickly what sort of character is saying it. I kinda like it, and it was the title of a movie. Perhaps it's just my dark side that favors this sort of stuff.

 

[merrycorsten]

Space thrusts against mid-years. It may come Foreign treasures like flooding if u say that the moon Escapes through literally any direction.