Is it true that the moon is drifting away from the Earth?
414408
Yes, the radius of the moon's orbit is currently increasing by about 3.8 cm (about 1.5 inches) every year.  This happens because the moon raises tides on the Earth.  Because the Earth rotates faster than the moon orbits the Earth, the tidal "bulge" of the Earth on the side nearest the moon actually leads, or is in front of, the position of the moon in its orbit (see diagrams in sources given below). That "extra" mass of the Earth's tidal bulge acts to accelerate the moon in its orbit, increasing its angular momentum, and causing the moon's orbit to "spiral out" over time.  Because the angular momentum of the Earth-moon system must be conserved, the Earth's angular momentum must decrease to balance the increase in the moon's momentum, slowing the Earth's rotation rate by a bit (currently, about 15 microseconds/year).  \n\nThese rates have changed over geologic time because the position of the tidal bulge relative to the line connecting the Earth and moon depends on, among other things, the arrangement of continents and oceans on Earth.  These affect the friction affecting the tidal bulge, and therefore its velocity relative to the Earth's rotational velocity.\n\nThe energy of the Earth-moon system must also be conserved, and because the moon gets further from the Earth, its potential energy increases.  Consequently, it's kinetic energy must decrease by an amount exactly equal to the increase in potential energy.  Because the kinetic energy of the moon (or any other object) is proportional to the square of the velocity, the moon's velocity in its orbit is decreasing.\n\nThis process will continue until the moon's orbital period and the Earth's rotational period are equal, at which point the moon and Earth will be "tidally locked", with the same side of each body facing the other body at all times.\n\nThe story doesn't stop here, though.  The Earth-moon system loses angular momentum to the (Earth/moon)-sun system, resulting in an increase in the distance of the center of mass of the Earth+moon from the sun.  This is occurring today, but is a much smaller effect than the lunar tidal effect discussed above.  Once the Earth and moon are tidally locked, though, it will become the dominant effect. As a consequence, the moon's orbital radius will slowly *decrease* until the moon gets somewhere within the Roche limit, at which point (assuming the sun has not become a red giant and expanded beyond the orbit of the Earth by then!) the moon will break apart, most likely forming a ring system around the Earth.\n\nThe Roche limit is the distance from a parent body at which the difference between the gravitational force on a a satellite's near side and a satellite's far side exceeds the gravitational self attraction of the satellite.  Because the moon is made of rock, it has some cohesive strength (i.e., the moon is not just held together by self-gravitation) that will allow it to come within the true Roche limit before being disrupted.
715750
Distance to the Moon\n\n  \n  \n  \n  \n     \n An Astronomy Tid-Bit about the mean and extreme distances to the Moon\n\n  \n  \n  \n  \n     \n   Note:  Distance is from center to center of orbiting bodies.\n             Kilometers divided by 1.6093 = miles.       \n\n      Many sources, such as beginning astronomy textbooks, yearbooks, and atlases, give the distance to the moon as 384,400 kilometers (km), and  0.055 as the flattening or eccentricity of the moon's elliptical orbit around the Earth.\n\n      The moon travels around Earth in an elliptical orbit, with the Earth at one of the two focuses (foci) of the ellipse.  As a result the distance to the moon varies by quite large amounts.  Its close (or perigee) distance is 384,400 x (1- 0.055) = 363,258 km.  Its far (or apogee) distance is 384,400 x (1+0.055) = 405,542 km.  BUT these values turn out to be the mean or average values.  See the table below for actual distances.\n\n      The actual (computed) distances over 10 centuries, from  1500 to 2500, have been calculated by the Belgian astronomer, Jean Meeus, to be as small as 356,371 km or as large as 406,720 km./1 These values differ from the MEAN values by 6,887 km and 1,178 km respectively\n\n      An excellent and easy-to-use source for the moon's position and distance is "Multiyear Interactive Computer Almanac" produced by the US Naval Observatory, Wash. DC and published by Willman-Bell, Inc., PO box 35025, Richmond, VA  232235.  The program called "MICA15" is on one CDRom for both IBM and MAC systems.  Included with the disk is an information and instruction book.\n\n      I used MICA15 to scan moon distances for the one  year, 2000, shown in TABLE 1.  The same source was used for the ten-year period, 1995 to 2005.  For this ten years,  the smallest distance (356,613.970 km) between Earth and Moon for this period occurred on November 4, 1998.  The largest occurred on March 14, 2002 when the moon was 406,706.975 km away.
721438
Of course it is, silly. Just zoom in with the website I gave you and Google Maps will enlighten you.\n\nSeriously? Of course it isn't. :P That's what people blame their farts on. "Oh, that moon is rotting again!"
931063
Of course the Moon is closer than the Sun.\n\nThe average distance from the earth to the sun, the semimajor axis of its orbit, is 149,597,890 km.\n\nMoon's orbit is elliptical: its average orbital radius is 384401 km, apogee (farthest distance from the Earth) is 406700 km, and perigee (distance of closest approach to the Earth) is 356400 km.
165024
Yes. Neil Armstrong and others have really walked on the moon.  They even left a mirror on the surface which, over 30 years later, we still use to measure the distance between the earth and the moon.
756100
i would generally say no its not, as the atmosphere is only between 5 adn 10 miles high, the moon is considerably further away than this.\n\ncant explainy why its like this has something to do with the creation of the solar system the mood being far away and such.
1090261
Ah, well, first of all, the moon hits hydrogen atoms in space, and thus slows down from its orbit aound the sun, and thus slowly moves off from its current orbit, and since the sun's Fg is larger than the Earth's, we can say bug off to Earth's Fg on the moon. \n\nOn the other hand, the slight changes in the moon's orbit around the sun does have some changes, like a slightly lower high tide. Still, it does not compare to 300 years of industrial revolution damage the humans has done.
754982
The moon is geologically inert. It is believed that the last lunar volcano erupted several million years ago (perhaps more than a billion years ago though there is some debate). There would be NO effect on the earth whatsoever as lunar volcanism was less energetic it is unlikely that anything spewed out would escape lunar gravity and reach Earth.\n\nOn the other hand, asteroid IMPACTS on the moon CAN be energetic enough to throw debris towards the Earth, and some meteorites found on the Earth are believed to be of lunar origin.
826033
If you want additional information you will have better luck looking up formation of the moon rather than "moon split."  \n\nHere is the seminal paper supporting this hypothesis with a robust computer model.\n\nhttp://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6WGF-45N4TKM-26&_coverDate=02%2F29%2F1996&_alid=491949780&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_qd=1&_cdi=6821&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C000050221&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=10&md5=182356e6b7c7f44dd9327d9e5d126f17\n\nThe publisher insists on keeping even this 10 year old publication for sale only.  Still, you can glean a lot from the free abstract.\n\n(P.S. I knew Robin Canup in grad school.  This was her PhD project!)
782867
no.  it affects the tides in a big way though, which can lead to weather.  But the moon doesn't affect our weather directly
359151
No.  The angle between the sun and the moon as viewed from the earth is 180 degrees for the full moon pahse.  This means that the full moon and the sun are always on opposite sides of the earth.\n\nSince the moon is not always "in plane" with the sun, and your horizon is not perfect, it may be possible on occasion, depending on the geography of the horizon, and one's latitute to see the full moon rising as the sun is setting, or to see the full moon setting as the sun is rising.
1023489
No.  But we see only the side that faces earth.\n\nHere's a good diagram that explains it better than I can...\n\n\nhttp://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/the_universe/uts/moon2.html
422854
The moon although is a sphere, but it is so far away that it appear a flat round disk. there is nothing strange about this and if people are not educated that moon is a spherical rock, they'd probably think it's a round flat disk.\n\nBut for me, I see it as a hole in the ceiling.
1018425
Yes, the Moon is receding from the Earth slowly. The reasons why have to do with tides and conservation of energy and angular momentum, and are about a college-junior-level homework problem to work out. \n\nThere is direct observational evidence for this. The Apollo 11, 14, and 15 astronauts left retroreflectors on the Moon, and the Soviets put retroreflectors on two of their unmanned lunar landers, just for this purpose. You can shoot a laser pulse through a telescope at one of these retroreflectors and some of the beam will be reflected back to the telescope. (The beam spreads out during the trip, 384,000 kilometers each way, so not all that much actually makes it back; you have to do this for a number of minutes to be sure that you got a good amount of measurements.) We know the speed of light with great accuracy, so if you measure how long it takes between your laser shot and the time the pulse returns, you get a very precise measurement of the distance between your telescope and the retroreflector on the Moon. A single good measurement gives an accuracy of about an inch. Measurements have been collected now for over 25 years. \n\nThe Moon's orbit around the Earth isn't a circle, so over the course of one month it moves towards and away from the Earth by a few per cent. This means a small number of measurements don't suffice to tell what's going on. If you track the Moon over time, though, it is clear that the Moon's orbit is slowly growing larger and that the Moon is moving away from the Earth. The net result is that the Moon is receding from the Earth at about 4 centimeters a year. \n\n(Incidentally, this isn't the only evidence for recession of the Moon from the Earth. The ancients observed and recorded solar eclipses pretty well, and those observations don't match what one would expect based purely on unchanging Twentieth Century orbital parameters for the Moon.) \n\nWe aren't limited to doing this laser ranging trick to retroreflectors on the Moon. Several satellites have been equipped with these also and laser ranging of artificial satellites has been going on for a long time as well.
807753
. . also the moon rises about 52 minutes later each day/night. You can also see it during the day.\nThe phases are in constant motion. Waxing (getting fuller) and waning (getting smaller).\nDon't forget to check for Lunar Eclipse's. Try NASA.gov
1182323
The average Earth-Moon distance is about 385,000 km.  Remember, the average is important because the moon rotates around the Earth in an eliptical fashion, which means that there are times when the moon is closer to the Earth than others depending on the point in its rotation.
60264
Our moon is locked in what is known as a geo-synchronous orbit. For millions of years the angular momentum has stablized the moon to provide very little loss of energy between earth and moon. This does not account for the influences that the moon has upon our oceans though. (Tides) Our solar system has "moved about" for many millions of years to allow for efficient energy transfers between baryonic masses.  This is not unlike a person who sit's in a chair and move's about to become more comfortable.  Peace