NavList:

David McN, you wrote:
"Is it coincidence that the apparent moon face covers the apparent sun face exactly as seen from earth? Or is it a necessary outcome of physics? If the moon were larger or smaller, could it settle in an orbit at a changed distance from Earth such that it still matched the apparent Sun? "

Coincidence? No. They built it that way. They who?? Why, of course, the Overlords, the Ancient Beings who own and run this corner of the Milky Way Galaxy. They did it as an intentional message sent to us, their children, so that we would look up in awe at eclipse totality and say, "Oh come on! That can't possibly be a coincidence!!"

Hmmm... or maybe it really is just a coincidence.

You can apply an objective standard to the probability of a nearly perfect match in angular sizes like we have just by looking around the Solar System. We do, in fact, live in a relatively unique place. We get total eclipses with the Moon almost perfectly covering the disk of the Sun and the corona shining around it... and they don't. They who?? Not the Overlords this time, but instead the purely hypothetical inhabitants of other planets.

As for physics, no, nothing has driven the Moon to this delightful distance, and there's no reason it will stay there on geological time scales. Nothing in the laws of physics has made the Moon that perfect twin, that perfect metaphor, that counter-Sun. And yet look how dominant this idea is in our global culture. We say Sun and Moon like peanut butter and jelly (the latter is intentionally not a component of global culture). We say Sun and Moon like left and right, like yin and yang, like male and female, like husband and wife (and other "binary" pairings). It's either an extraordinary but "petty" coincidence, or it's a well-planned message sent billions of years into their future from the owners of our "petty" existence. Take your pick! :) It's either nothing... or it's the meaning of life. How's that for Sun and Moon?!

Frank Reed