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How do moon phases work in Friendship is Magic?


RarityFan01

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We know Princess Luna raises the sun every night. What causes the moon phases though? I think in the real world, it's based on where the moon is in the sky. (I could be wrong) Does the moon. Does Princess Luna just move the moon every night? I'm not going to get started on how the moon glows when the sun was already lowered by Princess Celestia. It's magic. I want to know about the moon phases though. 

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The phases of the moon in RL are due to how much of the light from the Sun gets blocked by the Earth relative to where the Moon is. So it's a three-body system. If you were standing on the Moon, it's basically the Sun getting eclipsed by the Earth on a regular basis.

 

None of which seems to be relevant to the MLP moon. We rarely see the moon in MLP in anything other than 'Full' mode. In fact, it's so rare I don't remember any instance of non-full moon in MLP off the top of my head.

 

Depending on exactly how 'connected' Luna is to the Moon (same as Celestia and the Sun), if there are phases they might be connected to her mood. Alternately, I remember reading speculation that Luna might actually change herself based on the phase of the moon. What we saw in Season 1 might be her 'New Moon' appearance, while what we've seen afterwards were all 'Full Moon' appearances.

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Well, that assumes that the moon works in the same fashion as ours does. Considering that the moon & sun have had to be raised in the first place it is safe to assume that no; it doesn't work like that.

 

So yeah, the phases probably don't function in the first place.

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 We rarely see the moon in MLP in anything other than 'Full' mode. In fact, it's so rare I don't remember any instance of non-full moon in MLP off the top of my head

That's what I'm wondering too, are there even moon phases in MLP:FiM?

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The phases of the moon in RL are due to how much of the light from the Sun gets blocked by the Earth relative to where the Moon is. So it's a three-body system. If you were standing on the Moon, it's basically the Sun getting eclipsed by the Earth on a regular basis.

That's not quite true. Moon phases are caused by the fact that the Moon orbits around the Earth, which in turn causes the illuminated hemisphere of the Moon to traverse its entire surface over the course of a month, just as the illuminated hemisphere of the Earth traverses its entire surface in the course of a day. Because of this, different regions of the Moon will be lit up at different parts of the month, which we perceive as phases due to only being able to see the hemisphere facing us. Wikipedia has an explanation with diagrams, if you can't quite see it. The same thing happens for Venus and Mercury, and to a much lesser extent with Mars.

 

Eclipses can only happen when the triangle collapses into a line, which can only happen at new moon or full moon, for solar and lunar eclipses, respectively. They don't happen every month because the Moon's orbit is inclined to the ecliptic.

 

Getting away from the real world for a moment, I assume that anything having to do with the sky is some form of magic in the show, because it really doesn't behave anything like the real world.

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Correct me if I'm wrong, but it doesn't seem there really are moon phases in Equestria, it always seems to be full with a crescent that's just a bit brighter than the rest of it. The only time I recall seeing a not-full moon was when Twilight was at Canterlot High, a completely separate world from Equestria.

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I don't think the Moon has phases in Equestria.  For one thing it's always full.  I mean in Princess Twilight Sparkle, both it and the Sun were out at the same time, yet it was perfectly lit.  When this happens on Earth, it's called a New Moon. Secondly, it seems that as soon as the Sun sets, the Moon comes out, so they always occupy opposite sides of the heavens and that's not even getting into the idea of how the universe in MLP works. 

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It's my headcanon that there really aren't any phases of the moon in the Equestrian universe in the normal sense.  And as others have pointed out, there has rarely been an instance when the moon wasn't full (although Sweetie Belle's dance on the moon in the "Hush Now, Quiet Now" song may indicate that other phases are not unknown).

 

Curiously enough, it's also my headcanon that the equivalent of "months" in the pony universe are based on weather cycles rather than those of astronomical bodies.

 

 

 

Well, that assumes that the moon works in the same fashion as ours does. Considering that the moon & sun have had to be raised in the first place it is safe to assume that no; it doesn't work like that.

There's plenty of headcanons out there that the moon and the sun aren't actually raised despite the ceremonies; that it's more of an illusion or else it's that Luna and Celestia have to control them.  One wonders why she doesn't bother to do so anyway...

Edited by OptimisticNeighsayer
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Well in equestria girls we were given an increment of time about the portal, being it wouldn't open for another 30 moons. 

 

This fact states that they do use a method of measuring prolonged times using the lunar calender, which requires the moon to go through it's cycles. Now some may argue "maybe they were meaning a moon is everytime the moon is raised is a moon, so basically a day" But just in the sense why wouldn't they use to the term day in this situation. Plus the mane six were worried about twilight being stuck in this alternate universe, to quote Pinkie Pie "A really really long time" 

 A month doesn't seem like a really really long time. But if we go back to the lunar calender based on the moons cycle that originated from the islamic culture, a 'moon' is the time between one new moon to the next. So it alternates between 29-30 days for a lunar month. So 30 moons would be around 2.5 years which would explain the mane six's worry for twilight.

 

So after all that, I'd sum up that the lunar cycles do work similar to how they do IRL, because whose to say Celestia doesn't change the location of the sun every night on purpose to partially eclipse the moon so they have their calender system.

 

Sorry for the rant 

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