How tidal locking works and Why we see same side of moon always, This moon thing is confusing me very much, I watched many videos and made a understanding but i can’t picture it, too hard for my brain
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The moon still rotates on its axis. Label its hemispheres A and B. Let’s say that right now, A is facing the sun and B is not. In 6 months, B will be facing the sun and A will not. 6 months later, A will be facing the sun again and B will not.
But since the moon’s orbital period is the same as its rotational period, it will orbit the earth in the same amount of time it takes to rotate around its axis once. This is what causes it to present the same face to the earth at all times.
So in the above, when face A is facing the sun, it’s also facing the earth and on the far side (the earth is between them). When face B is facing the sun, face A is still facing the earth, but is now on the near side (between the earth and the sun). It has rotated halfway around its axis and moved halfway around the earth.
As for why, it’s just a natural phenomenon. Energy is lost from the moon’s rotation over time until it slows down enough to become tidally locked. If it were too slow instead, it would be pulled toward the earth while its rotation would be sped up until it became tidally locked. It’s just how gravity acts on objects like this – every moon in our solar system which is large enough to be round (has enough mass to not have irregular shape) is tidally locked to its planet.
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