When and how did humans first realize that it was darker/lighter on other parts of earth at the same time?

147 viewsOther

I get how time zones were established, and I get how people knew the earth was round thousands of years ago, so I assume that it was hypothesized that some areas of earth were darker/lighter than others at the same time. I feel like it was kind of unprovable though due to limitation. At what point did we actually confirm that it was indeed night time somewhere else when it was daytime on the opposite side of the world? And how was the found out?

In: Other

8 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

This question has been asked here before.  

The answer is “basically among learned people if they ever thought about it, they knew”

People knew the earth was round and that the sun shone down. 

There was VERY little need for this information, it is almost impossible to leverage in any way in the ancient world. 

But the ancient Greeks were trying to measure it. You can be sure pre historical societies simply implicitly knew this fact if they cared to think about it. 

You are viewing 1 out of 8 answers, click here to view all answers.