In school (US) I moved around a lot and I feel like I learned two separate theories on what makes seasons change: 1) the tilt of the Earth on it’s axis and 2) the distance of the Earth from the Sun during its yearly trip around. I understand that (1) is correct, but why does the slight tilt of the Earth make more of a difference than the actual distance from the Sun? And how is it possible that it’s difference is so significant that the Northern and Southern Hemispheres experience their seasons at different times?
In: Physics
A simple way to consider it is to look at the relative size of the changes for each.Our orbit varies between 147 and 152 million km. That’s a difference of about 3% from the median.The length of a day in Paris (picked arbitrarily) varies between 8.3 hours and 16 hours, or very roughly 66% difference from the median. The length of the day is controlled by the tilt, which is why that’s the major factor.
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