Most Rock fans would have heard of Pink Floyd’s Dark Side Of The Moon. This was a very successful album released in
1973.
The far
side of the Moon refers to
the side of the Moon that always faces away from Earth. It was commonly referred
to as the dark side of the Moon, more because it was unknown rather than lack of
light. No humans have ever seen the far side directly until astronauts orbited the moon in 1968. The
Russians photographed the far side during
their lunar probe in 1959. Incidentally, when astronauts go behind the moon, there is no contact
with earth as communication is not available. Radio communications go ‘dark’ and astronauts refer to the other
side of the moon as the ‘dark side’.
The near side of the moon refers to the side of the moon that is always
facing the earth. Why is this so? The rotation of the moon about its axis is
the same as it goes around the earth. There is a mistaken notion that the dark side of the moon never see any light.
Actually, the approximately half the surface of the moon is bathe in sunlight at
any one time, and that is the reason why we see phases of the moon during its orbit
around the earth.
(A similar reference to Africa
as the Dark Continent was because it
was unknown rather than a reference
to its inhabitants. I was quite surprised when I used the phrase in a comment
some time ago and I had a group of rather highly irritated uninformed church-going women somewhere in the US ready to lynch me. They were most likely black
ladies).
