I understand that it is the Earth’s shadow that causes moon phases. This works except for one problem, this morning the sun and the moon were out at the same time, which isn’t unusual except this time it dawned on me that if the whole Sun is out above the earth and the whole Moon is up above the Earth how is there still a shadow over the moon? Wouldn’t it have to be a full moon because the full sun is shining on it now? Or why wouldn’t the moon phases be horizontal instead of vertical?
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The moon is just a ball hanging in space, just like the Earth. The same principles apply. The Sun shines on it, so the half of the ball that is facing the sun it is lit up, and the back half of it is dark. The Earth sees this ball from different perspectives over the course of its monthly orbit. When we can see only the fully lit half, we call it a full moon. When we are only seeing the dark half, it’s a new moon. When we can only see a bit of the lit-up side, it’s a crescent moon.
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