For as long as there has been earth, there has been moon. But the first time Neil Armstrong ever walked on the surface of the moon was on 1969. Until then no man had ever stepped on the moon.
But have you ever thought what would happen if there was no moon ? I can bet one thing; there would be alot more songs about the sun.
Here is a list of things that would happen if there was no moon:
1. The stars in the night sky would be much brighter:
The night sky is beautiful to look at. However, if there was no moon, the sky would get darker.
This would make everything else on the night sky brighter. So, the view of the sky from earth would be much more stunning.
Without the moon venus will be the brightest object in the sky. But it still wouldn’t be able to light the earth’s surface like moon does.
2. No more eclipses without the moon:
If you loved learning about lunar eclipse and been fascinated by one, this might be a sad one for you.
Without anything to block the sun, there wouldn’t be any eclipses. People wouldn’t have to worry about getting those eclipse glasses anymore.
3. Size of the ocean tides:
The ocean tides are caused by the gravitational pull of the moon. So, without the presence of the moon, there wouldn’t be anything causing the tide pulls.
Without the moon, high and low tides would reduce by almost one third from what it is now. This would also largely impact the tidal ecosystem and marine life.
4. A day on earth would be 6 to 12 hours long:
At present, the day on the earth is longer due to the moon. But if there was no moon, it would be much much shorter.
A typical day would last only about 6 hours. At present, the gravitational pull of the moon is slowing down the speed of the earth’s rotation.
Without the presence of which, the earth would rotate a lot faster. But this would also mean that the winds would be faster on earth.
This might have affected the plant and animal life on the earth. Perhaps, we would have evolved as some other creature with just a few hours of daylight and night.
5. Earth’s axis would tilt:
Right now the earth’s tilt is about 23.5 degrees. This was around 24.5 degrees thousands of years ago.
Planets without huge moons have a higher scale of change. At the present, our moon is the stabilizing force for our axis tilt.
Without which, the tilt might have been around 45 degrees. This means that the North and South poles wouldn’t always be cold and warm.
So, our earth would have been hit by ice ages every thousand years.
6. The achievements of NASA wouldn’t be possible without the moon:
Apollo 11 that landed commander Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin is one of the most remembered accomplishments in the history of space exploration.
However, without the moon, this project would have not been there.
And thus, we probably wouldn’t even have heard about Neil Armstrong. Also NASA probably wouldn’t have been as popular that it is now.
Also chances of further space exploration would have been very slim. As even now we have planned to use moon as a stop by to get to mars.
7. There probably would be no calendars using months:
Julian calendars, that were used before the Gregorian calendars were made using the lunar cycles.
But the calendars that we use right now was derived using the previously used Julian Calendar.
So, without moon, the lunar calendar wouldn’t have been there. Nor would there be any solar calendar.
8. The seasons on earth would change without our moon:
Because of the moon, the weather in the earth is stable. Without it, there would be a lot of difference in the seasons.
Due to the tilt on the axis of the earth, there would be a severe change in the seasons of the planet.
Or it is also possible that we could see no changes in the season if the title would decrease.
Along with these major points there are other smaller but significant thing that we might notice, if there was no moon:
- Human would probably not be present on earth. Because of the extreme seasons, life wouldn’t have taken the same path.
- The atmospheric conditions would be very different.
- There would so songs about our very own moon. Probably a lot more about the sun.
- Moths wouldn’t have been attracted to light.
- Moonwalk wouldn’t be a thing.
- We would probably have a lot less space debris.
If you liked this article also learn how the earth would look like in a hundred years from now.
