Why do we only see part of the moon?

Answer 1

The 'far side' is always the far side because the moon is tidally locked with earth. The moon turns on its axis exactly once for every orbit around the earth. This isn't obvious at first; it may take some thinking to realize that this must be true.

More detail for the stout of heart:

It is really not correct to refer to the 'dark side' of the moon. It is no more dark, and is no less dark, than any other part of the moon (with a minor exception*). It is better to refer to it as the 'far side' of the moon. The entire moon goes through a day-night cycle just like the earth, except that on the moon an entire day is the same length of time as a full cycle of lunar phases. The phases of the moon as we observe them over the course of a month are nothing more than the month-long 'day' slowly passing around the moon's surface. When it is 'new moon' from our point of view, the far side of the moon is in full sunlight.

*On average, it turns out that the part of the moon visible from earth is slightly darker than what we incorrectly call the 'dark side', because it is our face of the moon, the near side, that occasionally experiences the full cover of earth's shadow. This never happens on the far side, because the earth can never block sunlight that would otherwise illuminate the far side! The full earth never appears in the sky relative to the far side of the moon**. This is just another reason to consider the term 'dark side' to be incorrect.

**At the limbs or outer edges of the visible face of the moon there is some variability because of some effects called libration, an apparent wobble in the moon's motion. Because of this wobble some slivers of the far side of the moon are sometimes visible from earth, and therefore some part of earth may be visible from those locations on the moon. So the earth can never block sunlight to the far side beyond a very small percentage at any one time.

Answer 2

You only see one side of the moon because the earth's gravity has shifted the core of moon slightly towards the earth causing that side to be heavier, and thus always pull towards the earth. This causes the moon to rotate at the same rate that it orbits the earth.

Answer 3

Sometimes you can and sometimes you can't. It all depends where the the sun is in relation to it. Say the sun was on the left, the earth was in the middle, and the moon was on the right.

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(You see the earth spins around the sun and the moon spins around the earth, meanwhile the earth and the moon are spinning in a circle) So say the moon was closer to us. Now the sun can only get to part of the moon. So that is why sometimes we can only see part of the moon.

Answer 4

You cannot see the "back side of the Moon" because that is the part of the Moon that faces away from the earth. When you look at the Moon, you always see the "front side," the side that faces Earth.

This is because the Moon is in synchronous rotation, which means it rotates on its axis in about the same time it takes to orbit the Earth. This results in it keeping nearly the same face turned towards the Earth at all times. This is caused by gravity, and the Moon is said to be "tidally locked" with the Earth.
The "dark side" of the moon is not actually dark but varies between light and

dark during the lunar month as we also see on the near side. The dark side

refers, rather, to the side that always faces away from the Earth. The reason

that it is locked so that one face of the moon always faces towards us is due to

tidal effects. You can see how the moon affects tides in the Earth's oceans.

Well, the Earth has an even bigger effect on the moon, raising rock surfaces as

the Earth revolved. As this action took kinetic energy from the spin of the moon,

it slowed until it revolved at exactly the rate at which it orbits the earth. Locked

like this means that tides of raised rock no longer need to ripple across the

moons surface and no more energy is lost. It therefore remains at this revolution

rate.

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There is no "dark side" of the moon. Just like the Earth ... and any other spinning

sphere illuminated by a flashlight ... 50% of it is illuminated at any moment, and

every point on it is light for half the time and dark the other half of the time.

There is, however, a "near side" and a "far side" of the moon. It always keeps

the same 50% facing toward the Earth, for the reasons expounded above.

When the entire near side is illuminated, we call that a "Full Moon". Most of the

time, however, part or all of the near side is not illuminated. We cannot see that

part of the near side, because that part is "dark". The 'dark' part is not visible,

for the same reason that you can't see a rock in a dark room unless you shine

a flashlight on it.
The Moon is tidally locked to the Earth; the Moon's spin is constant at one rotation per orbit, so the same side always faces the Earth. The Moon moves in an elliptical orbit, so we can actually see about 55% of the Moon's surface as it "wobbles".

"Dark side of the Moon" is an incorrect designation, since it gets as much light as the near side. Instead, you should call it the "far side" of the Moon.
The time it takes for the moon to orbit Earth is exactly the same as the time it takes for the moon to rotate. As a result the same side of the moon always faces us. This phenomenon is called tidal locking. Most moons are tidally locked.

Answer 5

It might surprise you to know that half of the Moon is ALWAYS illuminated by the Sun's rays, but you need to be in the right places in space to see it all the time. Here on Earth the amount of the Moon we can see depends on the angle between the Sun, Moon and Earth. When the Moon is closer to the Sun than us, we see close to a New Moon. When the Moon is further for the Sun than us, you see a Fuller Moon.

Answer 6

Excellent question. The reason we can only see half the moon is because of something called a partial lunar eclipse; which is when the moon passes through the shadow of the earth.

Answer 7

Because its dark! and so is the sky were the 1s movring not the moon!

Answer 8

You arent able to find that because of the big fat person in the in way!

Answer 9

The Earth's moon rotates on its axis at a rate that keeps the same "face" toward Earth at all times as it revolves around Earth.

Answer 10

You can.