not so fast with the moon conclusions!

Turns out I've been playing pretty fast and loose with this moon question thing. The other day I pulled a GW and prematurely declared "mission accomplished". I've been advised that we need more photographic evidence. I hope that Professor Don Collins at Warren Wilson College doesn't mind if I reprint his email to my father here:

"I took a look at your daughter's blog site. Unfortunately, we cannot make any conclusions regarding the moon appearance from the tropics and temperate latitudes merely from one fuzzy photo. In order to study this scientifically, you would need a network of observers world-wide to agree to take digital photos of the moon at exactly the same date/time. The time should be Universal time. Another option would be to photograph the moon rising or setting on specified dates where the horizon is also in the photo. If the crescent moon is photographed near the horizon from different latitudes, the "angle" of the crescent will certainly be different. Be sure to get a team of photographers to photograph the moon on the same dates, however.

"I also suspect that participants on her website may be confused about the shape of the crescent moon being caused by the earth's shadow. The earth's shadow rarely falls on the moon - it's only during a lunar eclipse. I will post a Physics Photo of the Week this Friday explaining
that."

So I will need to enlist some help in this. It would be great to get a photo of the rising moon, with the horizon in the picture -- at the same time on the same day. Last night I went up on the roof again and looked at the moon. At that point it was high in the sky and I realized that without the horizon in the picture, you simply cannot compare photos of the moon and draw any conclusions about how its angle differs from place to place. Despite suffering from a lack of common sense, not to mention scientific know-how, I drew this conclusion simply by rotating my head around and noticing how different the moon looked!

Other than trying to conduct faulty scientific experiments, I've been suffering from bedbugs and prickly heat. That's about all the excitement from here. People here are majorly depressed because India is already out of the Cricket World Cup. When they lost to Bangladesh the fans went ballistic and were putting their pictures on donkeys, conducting mock funerals of team members, shaving their heads in mourning, and attempting to destroy the homes of some of the disgraced players. Needless to say, cricket is taken very seriously here in India. In the English language media these fan outbursts have initiated a debate about "progress" and "rationalism" in India -- the highly educated Indian elites opinion of the "common man" is often disparaging, especially with respect to the events of late. Then there is the whole Bob Woolmer murder fiasco which has marred the sport altogether. Will have more reports tomorrow.