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Few people seem to realize that the moon is always the same
size in the sky. When the moon is rising or falling (near
the horizon), we experience an illusion that makes the moon
appear larger than it really is. Most people believe that
there is some physical phenomenon afoot that causes the
moon to appear distorted when in fact there is none.
As far as physics is concerned, there is no reason why the
moon should appear larger than it normally would. In fact,
if you photograph the moon or even stand on your head
and look at the moon, the image goes back to it's original
size. That's what makes the "moon illusion" an illusion:
it's all in our minds. So far there have been many theories
on the moon illusion but none of them can fully explain why
our minds would do this. While I'm no master at psychology,
I do enjoy puzzling over the moon illusion and crafting
my own theories to the problem. On this page I offer theories
I've developed and experiments I've conducted. Feel free to
do experiments of your own and make your own theories! If
you like, I'll even let you post them here.
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