Month: December 2016

If you are like me then you enjoy nature and what it has to offer us in beauty. As a young girl I would spend hours admiring the stars and the moon, just wondering how amazing it is that these spec of dots in the sky could provide so much light on a dark night. I also remember seeing bugs bunny on the moon or a face, I could never quite tell whose face it was but just the trick of the mind seeing a face there was fascinating to me. 

The super-moon on the other hand is a different story. 

The term super-moon was coined by astrologer Richard Nolle in 1979 and according to Nolle the term super-moon can be defined as ‘a new or full moon which occurs with the at or near within 90% of its closest approach to Earth in a given orbit or perigee. In short this means that the Earth, Moon and Sun are aligned, with the moon closest to Earth.

It all sounds a little weird doesn’t it? However, the full moon that passed on November 14 is much closer with perigee than previous moons, in fact this has been the moon’s closest point to Earth in over 68 years. Thus, in light of this it is save to say that Nolle’s original definition of the super-moon, allows for a wide latitude between full moon and perigee. The last full moon happens only about one and one-half hours after the moon reaches perigee, the moon’s closest point to Earth for this month and year. At perigee, the moon lies only 221,524 miles away. Two weeks before, on October 31, the moon swung out to apogee which is the farthest point for the moon this month and year at 252,688 miles away.

November 14 marks the moon’s closest encounter with Earth in over 68 years, since January 26, 1948. The next estimated perigee will be November 25, 2034 which is estimated to be 356,448 kilometers from Earth. This just goes to show that not everything is about science and maybe there is a little truth to astrology. 

Even the proximity of full moon with perigee isn’t all that rare. The extra-close moon in all of these years – 2011, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2015 and 2016 – finds the full moon taking place at or nearly the same hour as lunar perigee. More often than not, the closest perigee of the year also called proxigee comes on the one day of the year that the full moon and perigee closely coincide. 

The table below shows the years in which the moon as been the closest to the Earth.

  Moon closest to Earth

Year	Date	Distance
2011	March 19	356,575 km
2012	May 6	356,955 km
2013	June 23	356,991 km
2014	August 10	356,896 km
2015	September 28	356,877 km
2016	November 14	356,509 km

You may ask yourself how often is the moon both full and close to Earth well the closest full moons occur 14 lunar cycles otherwise known as synodic months where 14 lunar months almost equals 15 returns to perigee. The term lunar month refers to the time period between successive full moons, a period of 29.53059 days. An anomalistic month refers to successive returns to perigee, which is a period of 27.55455 days. Therefore, 14 x 29.53059 days = 413.428 days and 15 x 27.55455 days = 413.318 days.

This time period is equal to about 1 year, 1 month, and 18 days. The full moon and perigee will realign again on January 2, 2018 counting from November 14.

Looking further into the future, the perigee full moon will come closer than 356,500 kilometers for the first time in the 21st century (2001-2100) now isn’t that something to behold, I for one can’t wait to experience this one on November 25, 2034. The closest full moon of the 21st century will be on December 6, 2052 (356,425 km).

For the moon to come closer than 356,400 kilometers which is 221,457 miles from the Earth is quite a feat. In fact, this won’t happen at all in the 21st century (2001-2100) or the 22nd century (2101-2200). The last time the full moon perigee swung this close to Earth was on January 14, 1930 (356,397 km), and the next time won’t be till January 1, 2257 (356,371 km).

The super-moon of March 19, 2011 (right), compared to an average moon of December 20, 2010 (left). Image via Marco Langbroek, the Netherlands, via Wikimedia Commons.

With all full moons comes larger-than-usual tides, and perigee full moons bring the highest and lowest tides of all. Each month, on the day of the full moon, the moon, Earth and sun are aligned, with Earth in the middle. The lineup of the sun and moon creates spring tides. Spring tides climb up especially high, and, on the same day, low tides plunge especially low.

The extra-close full moon accentuates these monthly full moon spring tides all the more. Storms sometimes occur from these spring tides too so it is always good to keep an eye on the weather during a full, especially if you live close to a shoreline or flood areas.

We will see the highest tides follow the crest of the moon’s full phase on the day of the super-moon by a day or two.

The full moon that passed on November 14, 2016, is the closest and largest full moon of this year. By a new definition one that has entered the world of astronomy from astrology many people will call it a supermoon. There are three full moons in 2016 that meet the definition of a supermoon one in October, November and December. But this November 14 full moon  will be the most super of all three super-moons we could cal even call it a super-duper moon.

Fun Facts: It is said that all super-moons have a different names  based on  different calendar months or seasons of the year. Some almanacs like to give each month a special full moon name. Other almanacs like to reference full moons relative to seasonal markers, as defined by equinoxes and solstices. Both have their roots in folklore. Both the monthly names and the seasonal names necessarily favor either the Northern or Southern Hemisphere. That’s because the moon has different characteristics in the two hemispheres, at opposite times of year. For example, the Harvest Moon is the full moon closest to the autumnal equinox. So it falls in September or October for the Northern Hemisphere, and it falls in March or April for the Southern Hemisphere.

Full moon via EarthSky Facebook friend Lee Capps

Northern Hemisphere full moon names by month:
January: Old Moon, Moon After Yule
February: Snow Moon, Hunger Moon, Wolf Moon
March: Sap Moon, Crow Moon, Lenten Moon
April: Grass Moon, Egg Moon, Pink Moon
May: Planting Moon, Milk Moon
June: Rose Moon, Flower Moon, Strawberry Moon
July: Thunder Moon, Hay Moon
August: Green Corn Moon, Grain Moon
September: Fruit Moon, Harvest Moon
October: Harvest Moon, Hunter’s Moon
November: Hunter’s Moon, Frosty Moon, or Beaver Moon
December: Moon Before Yule, or Long Night Moon

Southern Hemisphere full moon names by month:
January: Hay Moon, Buck Moon, Thunder Moon, Mead Moon
February (mid-summer): Grain Moon, Sturgeon Moon, Red Moon, Wyrt Moon, Corn Moon, Dog Moon, Barley Moon
March: Harvest Moon, Corn Moon
April: Harvest Moon, Hunter’s Moon, Blood Moon
May: Hunter’s Moon, Beaver Moon, Frost Moon
June: Oak Moon, Cold Moon, Long Night’s Moon
July: Wolf Moon, Old Moon, Ice Moon
August: Snow Moon, Storm Moon, Hunger Moon, Wolf Moon
September: Worm Moon, Lenten Moon, Crow Moon, Sugar Moon, Chaste Moon, Sap Moon
October: Egg Moon, Fish Moon, Seed Moon, Pink Moon, Waking Moon
November: Corn Moon, Milk Moon, Flower Moon, Hare Moon
December: Strawberry Moon, Honey Moon, Rose Moon

About once every 19 years, February has no full moon at all.

However, in 7 out of every 19 years, two full moons will fall in the same calendar month. And in a year where February has no full moon at all, like in the year 2018, you can actually have two full moons in January and two full moons in March, in which case you have 8 calendar months with 2 full moons in one 19-year lunar cycle. The second of the month’s two full moons is popularly referred to as a Blue Moon

Full moon from EarthSky Facebook friend Fernando Alvarenga in San Salvador.

Full moon names by season (Northern or Southern Hemisphere):
After the winter solstice:
Old Moon, or Moon After Yule
Snow Moon, Hunger Moon, or Wolf Moon
Sap Moon, Crow Moon or Lenten Moon

After the spring equinox:
Grass Moon, or Egg Moon
Planting Moon, or Milk Moon
Rose Moon, Flower Moon, or Strawberry Moon

After the summer solstice:
Thunder Moon, or Hay Moon
Green Corn Moon, or Grain Moon
Fruit Moon, or Harvest Moon

After the autumnal equinox:
Harvest Moon, or Hunter’s Moon
Hunter’s Moon, Frosty Moon, or Beaver Moon
Moon Before Yule, or Long Night Moon

There are usually three full moons in between an equinox and a solstice, or vice versa. Seven times in 19 years, four full moons fall in a single season. In that case, the third of a season’s four full moons is also called a Blue Moon. The next Blue Moon by this definition happened on May 21, 2016.

Full moon via Michelle Eve Photography. 

Northern and Southern Hemisphere full moon names, listed first by month and then by season. 

I found these findings about the full moon to be very interesting I had no idea that the moon that I have loved to admire since I was a child had so many different meaning and variations.

earthsky.org/tonight/most-super-supermoon

 

I am one of those people who strongly believe in freedom of speech and equality for all and I never share my political views because as much they want us to believe that we have a say and we are free it is not so. However, when it comes to politics, transparency, lies and blatant hypocrisy I have to share my views.

Most people were shocked and angered by the results of the recent presidential elections but I was not of those people. I like most people wanted Hillary to win just because she was a female and for no other reason, while knowing deep down that she may not be able to control the country. We can just look at her performance as former  minister of defense the whole scandal with the launch codes, that in my opinion was a simpler task than running a whole country. While Trump on the other hand who is supposedly a graduate from the Wharton University of Pennsylvania speaks as a man who lacks education, integrity and humanity. In my opinion as much as he has grown because he is 70 years old at the moment, he still sees the world as it was and not as it is, where people of all color and race are equal in the eyes of the law, society and the world.  As a child growing up I would often hear my elders say that there is a difference between between intellectually smart and book smart and most people do not know the difference between the two.

During the entire campaign I listened to people talk about how much they hated Trump because they saw him as racist, sexist and backward in his way of thinking. They also described him as being a idiot, but to me as much as I have no political affiliation to Trump or even Hillary for that matter, I thought he was smart in his tactics for the election.

My reason for saying so is that there are plenty people in the world who are still “racist”, but the problem is they are “secretly racist,” which is even worse, I mean who wouldn’t want to know who their enemy is? I know I would. Thus, due to the fact that he discovered this from his travels during his campaign he knew that he could use this as a ploy to win, so he did. He used the information from his travels to win voters, to win over those people who never vote because they themselves are either racist, (which I don’t know or even truly believe that he is racist) or just cut off from civil society for one reason or another.

He gave the people what they wanted and I believe that this past election allowed people to really look at who our government is and the type of people who we have stepping up to represent us as a whole. It is because of people like Trump that movements like ‘Black Lives Matter,’ and ‘Occupy Wall Street’ came about.

Micah White one of the founders of Occupy Wall Street has a vision that I can relate to where he feels that the people should form their own government with people who are actually for the people and about the people. The same concept that drives these movements about equality, freedom and justice for all is the same mindset that we need in politics.

Politics in my opinion is run like a business they market (campaign), to get followers or viewers (voters), with the aim to gain a profit (power).

Most people will not agree with me but this is my political observation.

 

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You can call me old fashion, but I was under the impression that technology and social media were supposed to help us not just evolve but also stay connected and be more aware of what is going on around us? Thus, why is it that so many of us in society are acting like mindless, insensitive drones, whose only concern is the amount of information we can acquire without actually retaining said information. Not to mention the fact that people are too concerned with how they look, and how many likes and shares they can get on social media rather than the actual people who are physically in their lives. With that being said I did a little research and found two videos from two famous speakers and this is what they had to say about us and social media.

Nicolas Carr – What the Internet is doing to our brains & Sherry Turkle – Connected, but alone?

After watching both videos from Nicolas Carr and Sherry Turkle, I have come to realize that technology is and has affected us in more ways than one and also in ways that I had not even thought about, unconsciously we check our phones and emails 20-30 times within  an hour and we send over 3000 text messages a month according to a study that was conducted for Mr. Carr’s research. Carr focused on how technology affects our brains and our ability to properly receive, process and retain useful information. He attributes this to a study that was done to see how people who multitask heavily  how their brains received, processed and retained information for long term use. The study showed that due to the high volume  of information that was being transmitted into the brain all at once it was hard for the test subjects to retain the information because of information overload. In order for us to retain information in our long term memory we need to be able to focus on one thing at a time and allow our brains to decipher the information for us to choose what is useful information and what is not.

Mr. Carr went on to further state that we have become slaves to technology and our ability to acquire and receive new information has taken over our way of thinking. We have cut ourselves off from being able to acquire useful information, think critically and reflect on all the information that we have acquired. We no longer aspire to grow our minds and think deeply we have become comfortable with just being able to acquire information and that makes it difficult for us to have an intellectual conversation and have full use of brain.

Turkle, speaks about our ability to have conversations and our need to always be connected and why we do it. She states in her TED talk that people need each other and cannot get enough of each other but, we only want each other enough for us not to feel alone. In other words we use staying connected as a way to try and fill a void, it is a way for us to make people see us how we want to be seen without them actually seeing us. We no longer have conversations anymore or try to build actual face to face relationships because, we think they are too messy and intimate. Therefore, staying connected through text or email or on our daily online profiles like Facebook, Twitter & Instagram just to name a few allows us to share and connect without being vulnerable. It also gives us a sense of false assurance that we are not alone, we belong and we are accepted and liked.

In staying connected all the time we sacrifice our ability to form meaningful relationships with others and ourselves. Turkle, explains that we are so afraid of being alone and that no one is listening  that we use technology to replace human  beings. Facebook and those other social platforms become our companions. Turkle is afraid that people will stop to rely on each other all together and thus human interaction without the use of social platforms will no longer be.

I myself have to say that I have fallen into the category of people who sometimes prefer not talk to anyone unless I am sending a text or email, because it is easier than having to deal with someone and more convenient. In some respect I do agree with both Carr and Turkle we have become cut off from human interactions and conversations, the last time I went out with my friends I had to ask them what the point of coming out was if all they were going to do was post videos and pictures to Snapchat and Instagram all night. I have also experienced the problem of not being able to retain something that I read because I was reading and my TV was playing and I was also texting at the same time. I could not remember where I had read in my book or what the book was about so I gave up reading to focus on texting and watching TV. Right here we see that I chose to idle instead of reading my book. I was so caught up in  the texting and the movie that I was watching nothing else mattered in that moment. There are days that I would not even want to answer my phone when someone called just because I did not want to have to talk over the phone so I would tell them to just text me.

It is sad but this is the reality of the world and time that we live in now we are sacrificing human interaction and human relationships and our ability to receive, retain and process meaningful information, either because it is convenient or just because it satisfies some need or partially fills a void for us.

However, I had to ask myself after watching these videos if this is the person I want to be? The type of person that prefers be alone behind a computer screen or a smart phone because I am afraid of forming and developing human relationships.

Do I really want to have “Amputated Fingers in a Detached, Connected Society?”