Astrology Midterm 1

What has your address in the correct order

You, earth, solar system, local group, Milky Way, local cluster

An astronomical unit

The average distance from earth to the sun

From the fact that virtually every galaxy is moving away from us and more distant galaxies are moving away from us at a faster rate than closer ones, we conclude that

The universe is expanding

Which of the following statements does not use the term light-year in an appropriate way?

It will take me light-years to complete this homework assignment.

The age of the universe

Between 10 and 16 billion years

Which of the following statements about the Milky Way Galaxy is not true?

Our solar system is located very close to the center of the Milky Way Galaxy.

Imagine that we put a raisin cake into the oven, with each raisin separated from the others by 1 cm.

An hour later, we take it out and the distances between raisins are 3 cm. If you lived in one of the raisins and watched the other raisins as the cake expanded, which of the following would you conclude?

More distant raisins would be moving away from you faster.

How long would it take to count all the stars in the Milky Way Galaxy at a rate of one star per second?

1. hundreds of thousands of years

On the scale of the cosmic calendar, in which the history of the universe is compressed to 1 year, how long has human civilization (i.e., since ancient Egypt) existed?

a few seconds

What is the Sun mainly made of?

hydrogen and helium

Which of the following is smallest?

size of a typical Planet

The royal palace of which ruler has its columns aligned so that during the summer solstice the shadows of each column falls on the other columns and not in the central area?

Persepolis the capital of Darius I.

Which of the following best describes the modern definition of a constellation?

region of the celestial sphere

Which of the following statements about constellations is false?

Most constellations will be unrecognizable hundreds of years from now.

Which of the following statements about the celestial equator is true at all latitudes?

It represents an extension of Earth's equator onto the celestial sphere.

What is the ecliptic?

the Sun's apparent path along the celestial sphere

When we look into the band of light in our sky that we call the Milky Way, can we see distant galaxies?

Why or why not?

No, because the stars, gas, and dust of the Milky Way block us from seeing them.

How many arcseconds are in 1°?

3600

We describe a position on Earth's surface by stating its

latitude and longitude.

What makes the North Star, Polaris, special?

It appears very near the north celestial pole.

Why do we have seasons on Earth?

1. As Earth goes around the Sun and Earth's axis remains pointed toward Polaris, the Northern and Southern hemispheres alternately receive more and less direct sunlight

Which of the following is not a phase of the Moon?

Half moon

What time would a full moon be on your meridian

Midnight

Why do we see essentially the same face of the Moon at all times?

because the Moon's rotational and orbital periods are equal

What conditions are required for a solar eclipse?

1. The phase of the Moon must be new, and the nodes of the Moon's orbit must be nearly aligned with Earth and the Sun.

The names of the seven days of the week are based on the

seven naked-eye objects that appear to move among the constellations:

Historians trace the origins of a 24-hour day to

the ancient Egyptians.

He developed a system for predicting planetary positions that remained in use for some 1,500 years.

Ptolemy

The ancient goal of astrology was to

1. predict human events.

Which of the following is not one of, nor follows directly from, Kepler's laws?

1. The force of attraction between any two objects decreases with the square of the distance between their centers.

In order to tell time at night, the ancient Egyptians of 3000 B.C. used

1. star clocks, which measured time based on the positions of stars at particular times of night and particular times of year.

When we see Venus in its full phase, what phase would Earth be in as seen by a hypothetical Venetian?

new moon

Compared with the standard hour of 60 minutes used today, the hour of ancient Egypt

was longer than 60 minutes in the summer and shorter than 60 minutes in the winter.

The Muslim fast of Ramadan occurs

during the ninth month of a 12-month lunar cycle.

Kepler's third law, p2 = a3, means that

1. planets that are farther from the Sun move at slower average speeds than nearer planets.

2. a planet's period does not depend on the eccentricity of its orbit.All of the above are correct.

3. all orbits with the same semimajor axis have the same period.

4. the period of a planet does not depend on its mass.

The path that led to modern science emerged from ancient civilizations in which part of the world?

1. the Mediterranean and the Middle East

How did the Ptolemaic model explain the apparent retrograde motion of the planets?

It held that the planets moved along small circles that moved on larger circles around Earth.

The astrology practiced by those who cast predictive horoscopes can be tested by

comparing how often the predictions come true to what would be expected by pure chance.

The amount of time between successive passes of the star Sirius across the meridian is

23 hours 56 minutes.

Which of the following is the reason for the solar day being longer than a sidereal day?

the combined effect of the rotation of Earth and its orbit about the Sun

What kind of time can be read directly from a sundial?

apparent solar time

Which of the following is the reason for the leap years?

Earth year being a non-integer number of Earth days

Suppose you lived at Earth's equator. Which of the following statements would not be true?

The celestial equator goes through your sky from due east on your horizon, through 50° altitude in the south, to due west on the horizon.

The south celestial pole appears on your meridian at an altitude of 30° in the south. Where are you?

latitude = 30°S

The time between rising and setting of a star

depends on the observer's latitude.

Suppose the date is June 21 and the Sun never sets, just touching your northern horizon at midnight.

Where are you?

the Arctic Circle

The Sun is on your meridian, and you have a UT clock that tells you it is 3 P.M. in Greenwich. What is your longitude?

45° west of Greenwich

The constellation shaped like a W is

Cassiopeia

Which of the following statements about Betelgeuse is not true?

Its Arabic name means "the demon star."

Each of the following lists a constellation and a bright star. In all cases but one, the star is part of the constellation. Which one is the mismatch?

Scorpio, Vega