Reasons For The Seasons
By: Isaac Noble
Essay Part 1
-Earth's rotation is the earth spinning on an axis. The earth is tilted 23.5 degrees and it takes 24 hours to do a full rotation.
-The revolution is the earth orbiting around the sun. It takes 365.25 days to do a full revolution.
-The two reasons we have seasons are the tilt of the earth and the revolution around the sun. The tilt affects how the sun's light hits the earth. At certain points in the revolution the tilt changes how concentrated and how spread out the light is when it hits a location. The more spread out the light is the colder it is. The more concentrated the light is the more hot it is.
-The equator does not experience seasons because it is located where the tilt does not affect how the light hits it. Nor the revolution.
-The summer days are the longest, while the winter days are the shortest. This does mean that the 24 hour period of time is affected, the time of day and night is what is affected. In the summer day is 14 hours, and night is 10 hours. In winter night is 14 hours, and days are 10 hours.
-The summer and winter solstice are the dates when the seasons change from fall to winter or spring to summer. The winter solstice takes place on December 21. The summer solstice takes place on June 21.
-The spring and fall equinoxes are the dates when the seasons change from winter to spring or summer to fall. The fall equinox takes place September 21. The spring equinox takes place March 21. But Google says the next spring equinox will take place on March 20, and the fall equinox will take place on September 23.
-The tilt of the earth causes the North and South Poles to constantly be angled towards the sun during the summer months. Therefore there is always light during this time.
-The equator always experiences 12 hour day and night periods because the tilt of the earth does not affect it.
-If earth didn't have a tilt there would be no seasons. Day and night would remain the same and the weather would barely change.
Essay Part 2
-I think that the earth naturally heating up over millions of years changes the seasons because back in the Ice Age the weather didn't change much, and the rotation might have been faster. Now we have 4 different seasons, and the rotation slows down every million years or so.
-I don't think that if our distance towards the sun slightly changed seasons would not be affected. The reason is because during the winter months we are closer to the sun. During the summer months we are farther from the sun. That means distance doesn't matter so much and it is mostly the tilt that affects the seasons.
-Throughout the revolution light hits North America differently every few months. If the angle of light hitting the earth changes that means that the shadows change too.
-Animals are able to adapt in changes of the season. When they see signs of change they figure how to change with it to survive because an animals main priority is to survive.
-If the revolution sped up the time length of each season would just speed up. If the revolution speeds up then the time for where the earth is located in the revolution will change faster.