It turns out that the Solar system is not the same as we used to think

The earth was round, mercury is the hottest planet and the Sun yellow. It would seem, is the simple truth, known even to those who did not attend school lessons of astronomy. In fact, all a little different.

The website has gathered for you some pretty common misconceptions with their full exposure.







It is both, and neither. The shape of the Earth is constantly changing due to continuous movement of lithospheric plates. Of course, the speed of its small — on average it is not more than 5 cm per year, however, this affects the "profile" of our planet, which is far from ideal smoothness.









However, sensational pictures, allegedly showing the real shape of the Earth, — not that other, as the gravitational model of the planet. It was established on the basis of data from the satellites and does not show the true shape of the celestial body, but only shows the difference in gravity in different places of the planet.





















There is a quite popular misconception that sun's rays illuminate only one side of the moon, while the other always remains dark. This belief has arisen from the fact that our satellite is always turned toward the Earth on one side, and the second remains inaccessible to earthly observers.

In fact, the Sun warms and equally the visible and the invisible part of the moon. The fact that the orbital period of the moon around its axis coincides with the period of own rotation of the satellite around the Earth, that is why we can observe only one hemisphere.





















It would seem that everything is logical — mercury is closest to the Sun, and hence its surface temperature is higher than on other planets. However, most "hot" planet in the Solar system — Venus, although it is located more than 50 million km further from the sun than its outer neighbor. The average daytime temperature on mercury is about 350 °C, while the surface of Venus, it reaches almost 480 °C.

In fact, the surface temperature of the planet depends on the atmosphere. On mercury it is almost absent, whereas the atmosphere of Venus, composed almost entirely of carbon dioxide and very dense. Because of its high density on the surface of the planet gives a strong greenhouse effect that makes the planet really hot place.





















Everyone knows that the surface temperature of the Sun is very large — more than 5 700 °C. Therefore, it is logical to assume that our light is burning like a giant bonfire. But it is not. What we take for the fire to actually heat and light energy that is released during the fusion reaction occurring in the sun's core.

Thermonuclear reaction is the conversion of one element to the other, which is accompanied by release of heat and light energy. It passes through all the solar layers, reaching the upper photosphere, which seems to us to be burning.





















Everyone who is slightly familiar with astronomy knows that the Sun belongs to the category of stars called yellow dwarfs. It is therefore logical to assume that our star is yellow. In fact, like other yellow dwarfs, the Sun is completely white.

But why is human vision sees it yellow? It turns out that all the matter in the earth's atmosphere. As you know, best of all, it ignores the long waves that are in the yellow-red part of the spectrum. The short waves of green-violet part of the spectrum, which mainly radiated by the Sun, the atmosphere scatters. Due to this effect our star and it appears to the observer with the Earth yellow. However, once you leave the earth's atmosphere as the Sun "will find" his true colors.























The reason for this confusion became, of course, Hollywood films showing the terrible scene of death of people trapped aboard a space ship.

In fact, our skin is quite elastic and quite capable of holding all the internal organs on the ground. Blood vessels protect the blood from boiling, also thanks to its elasticity. In addition, in the absence of external pressure — and in outer space not — boiling temperature of blood rises to 46 °C, substantially above the temperature of the human body.

But the water encased in the cells of skin begin to boil, and people still increase slightly in size, but definitely will not explode.

The real cause of death will be anoxia. After 15 seconds after the person will be in open space without a spacesuit, it would cause a loss of consciousness, and in 2 minutes — death.





















Another myth, which seems pretty logical. It's simple: if the winter is colder than summer, so Earth is "running away" from its star. However, the reality is exactly the opposite — in the cold season our planet is 5 million km closer to the Sun than in summer. Why in the winter we wrap up in clothes, and in summer to swim and sunbathe?

The fact is that, in addition to the rotation around the Sun, the Earth makes revolutions around its axis, whereby there is a change of day and night. The axis that passes through the North and South poles, is not perpendicular to the orbit and fall on her the sun. Thus, one half of the year, a large portion of the sun's heat falls on the southern hemisphere, and during the other half — in the North, which leads to the change of seasons.

As you know, winter in the southern hemisphere is warmer than in the North. This is because the closest Earth approaches the Sun in January, that is, when in the southern hemisphere reigns calendar winter.











See also
7 historical mysteries, which are all still scratching their heads
6 historical findings, which are still not solved


via nationalgeographic.org/encyclopedia/lithosphere/