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NASA dismisses solar eclipse myths

Next Monday, August 21st, the first total solar eclipse will be visible to America since 1918. RVers, campers and outdoor enthusiasts have prepared for months, even years, for the three-minute stretch of darkness. Campgrounds are completely booked (some even added more spaces to hold more visitors), and traffic jams are predicted to last hours. Throughout this week we have asked our readers if they would take their RV to see the total eclipse. Sixty percent said no, but 38 percent said yes, they would travel to see it or that they were already in the path. Visit here to answer the survey or to simply see the current results.

Humans have watched eclipses since before the dawn of written history, and during this long span of time our scientific understanding of the physical world has grown enormously. As a consequence, many of the older ideas we had about the causes and effects of total solar eclipses have been replaced by detailed physical explanations. Nevertheless, some older ideas seem remarkably resistant to replacement by the more scientifically correct explanations. Here are a few of the most popular misconceptions about the upcoming eclipse as explained by NASA. 

Total solar eclipses produce harmful rays that can cause blindness.
During a total solar eclipse when the disk of the moon fully covers the sun, the brilliant corona emits only electromagnetic radiation, though sometimes with a greenish hue. Being a million times fainter than the light from the sun itself, there is nothing in the coronal light that could cross 150 million kilometers of space to penetrate our dense atmosphere and cause blindness. However, if you watched the sun before totality, you will catch a glimpse of the brilliant solar surface and this can cause retinal damage, though the typical human instinctual response is to quickly look away before any severe damage has actually occurred.

If you are pregnant you should not watch an eclipse because it can harm your baby.
This is related to the previous false idea that harmful radiations are emitted during a total solar eclipse. Although the electromagnetic radiation from the corona, seen as light, is perfectly safe, there is another form of radiation that travels to Earth from the sun. Deep in the solar interior where nuclear fusion takes place to light the sun, particles called neutrinos are born, and zip unimpeded out of the sun and into space. They also pass through the solid body of the moon during the eclipse and a second or so later reach Earth and pass through it too! Every second, your body is pelted by trillions of these neutrinos no matter if the sun is above or below the horizon. The only consequence is that every few minutes a few atoms in your body are transmuted into a different isotope by absorbing a neutrino. This is an entirely harmless effect and would not harm you, or if you are pregnant, the developing fetus.

Eclipses will poison any food that is prepared during the event.
Related to the false idea of harmful solar rays is that during a total solar eclipse, some kind of radiation is produced that will harm your food. If that were the case, the same radiations would harm the food in your pantry, or crops in the field.  The basic idea is that total solar eclipses are terrifying and their ghostly green coronae look frightening, so it is natural to want to make up fearful stories about them and look for coincidences among events around you. 

There are no total solar eclipses at Earth’s North or South Poles.
In fact, there is nothing especially unique about these locations from an astronomical standpoint. The last total solar eclipse viewed from the North Pole area was on March 20, 2015, and passed right over the North Pole itself at which time it came to an end exactly at the Spring Equinox! The last total solar eclipse viewed from the South Pole area was on November 23, 2003.

The moon turns completely black during a total solar eclipse.
Look at the first quarter moon and you will discover that the dark lunar surface beyond the crescent is weakly illuminated. This is because, as viewed from the moon, Earth is very bright in the sky and its weak light is enough to turn the lunar surface a pale milky white. This is called Earthshine, and the same thing applies during a total solar eclipse. Most of Earth’s surface is actually in broad daylight off the path of totality, and from the moon it would be in full phase, shining down on the lunar surface at its brightest. So, during a total solar eclipse, the lunar surface will be dimly seen due to earthshine, surrounded by the much more brilliant corona of the sun!

Solar Eclipses foretell major life changes and events about to happen.
This is a common interpretation found in astrological forecasts, which are themselves based on coincidences and non-scientific beliefs in how celestial events control human behavior. A common qualification is that if the eclipse doesn’t foretell a change in your life it may foretell a change in that of your friends. This is a logically flawed use of confirmation bias in which you prove a cause-and-effect relationship by ignoring failures and only consider successful forecasts. There is nothing other than human psychology that connects eclipses with future events in your life.

Solar eclipses are a sign of an exceptional celestial event taking place in time and space.
Actually, because they can be mathematically predicted across thousands of years, solar eclipses are a reaffirmation that there is a sublime clock-work regularity to the universe, as Sir Isaac Newton admired more than 300 years ago.

Solar eclipses six months after your birthday, or on your birthday, are a sign of impending bad health.
This is a common belief among astrologers, and once again is only supported by confirmation bias. There is no physical relationship between a total solar eclipse and your health, any more than there is a relationship between your health and a new moon. Among a random sample of people, you may find such correlations from time to time but they are outnumbered by all the other occasions during which your health was excellent.

See what the eclipse will look like from where you will be on Monday, the 21st.

##RVT807

Emily Woodbury
Emily Woodburyhttps://www.rvtravel.com
Emily Woodbury is the editor here at RVtravel.com. She was lucky enough to grow up alongside two traveling parents, one domestically by RV (yep, Chuck Woodbury) and the other for international adventures, and has been lucky to see a great deal of our world (and counting!). She lives near Seattle with her dog and chickens. When she's not cranking out 365+ newsletters for RVtravel.com she's hiking, cooking or, well, probably traveling.


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