A story begun in Chinese poems that tells of a rabbit that stands on
hind legs in the shade of a cinnamon tree alongside his toad friend,
pounding herbs to create an elixir of immortality
Other cultures had different interpretations of the same myth,
especially in Japan and Korea where it was believed the rabbit simply
pounded ingredients for a rice cake
Before the first moon landing in 1969, the Apollo 11 crew were told to watch out for a 4000 year old
Chinese girl and a rabbit standing on hind legs, to which Michael Collins replied,
“Okay. We’ll keep a close eye out for the bunny girl.”
A popular theory that what we’re seeing in the sky is just a fancy illusion, a computer generated
projection created after the moon was destroyed long ago to keep people from going insane.
There have been YouTube videos claiming a power glitch in the
moon’s artificial electrical system had it vanish from sight for a
few milliseconds.
If this theory turned out to be true, it would spell disaster for the
astronauts currently on their way to land on the moon – oh wait,
no, this happened over 40 years ago, never mind.
A common belief for any that watched Wallace and Gromit
when they were kids, the myth that we could bring some
crackers to the moon and set up a picnic.
The idea of a moon built of green cheese first came up in the
early 1500s and for a long time, it was the common belief,
especially in children all the way up to the 1900s.
When kids were asked what else they thought the moon was
made of, most claimed yellow people, dead people and God.
A surprisingly huge amount of people are under the belief that
when the Earth passes between the sun and moon, our colossal
shadow causes the phases of the moon.
In reality, the sun always lights up the moon and Earth barely
ever gets in the way except for during a lunar eclipse – the rest
of the time our rotation just means we can’t see parts of the
moon at any given time.
A discovery made in 1835, published in The Sun
magazine based in New York, articles claiming the
existence of bison, goats, unicorns, beavers walking on
two feet, and bat-like humanoids roaming the Moon.
For weeks, New York went into an uproar, everyone
believing the story and some even donating to charities
that wished to send envoys to the Moon to save the poor, unwashed Man-bats.
It was only later that people realized it was all a hoax, a commentary imploring people not to trust
supposed “scientific research” so seriously.
This is less of a myth and more of a misunderstanding – people naturally
assume, since astronauts can jump meters high, that there is no gravity in
the moon.
Now, if this were true, nothing would hold these people on the moon’s
surface – they would float away as soon as they landed.
The amount of gravity on the moon is about 1/6th the amount found on
Earth, bouncy, but just enough so you won’t float away and end up in
outer space where – believe me – it’s not so great.
A spin-off of the old myth about Earth being hollow,
either filled with mole-people or another universe –
but what gave a hollow moon credence is how
similar it appears to comets and meteors.
The gravitational pull while it spins around Earth is
determined by mass, and a hollow moon would
need a ridiculously dense crust to achieve the orbit it
currently has.
NASA astronaut Neil Armstrong has gone on record describing sounds from the moon to ring like a
bell, leading many to believe the claim of a hollow bell-like Moon.
Later research has shown moonquakes there act different to earthquakes, giving off the sound of a
bell even though the moon is dense.
Extending the notion of a hollow moon, two
Soviet scientists once hypothesized that the moon
is in fact, a hollowed out spaceship used by
advanced extraterrestrials.
Once again though, astronomers pointed out
that a hollow spaceship planet couldn’t possibly
maintain its mass and gravitational field if the
core happened to be dense.
As exciting as the prospect of a local Death Star may seem, the reality is our moon is a giant hunk of
rock with nothing interesting on it.
It was in the 1820s shortly before the report about civilizations of
creatures on the moon that we find a Bavarian astronomer Franz Von
Paula who claimed to have seen aliens on the moon – with a clear
amount more authenticity than a hollow spaceship full of aliens.
Using sophisticated buildings, forts and roads, the lunarians (as he titled
them) were also taken notice by a prominent British astronomer who
made regular observations on the alien architectural construction.
Then we find out, well, actually, no – the aliens they thought they saw was actually moon dust, and
the buildings, also moon dust – big piles of it.
A belief due to the awe-inspiring spectacle of a full moon that
people would turn crazy, including pets – running wild, crime
and hospital visits increased by a significant degree.
For a long time the myth may have actually been true,
policemen swore criminals got more rowdy on full moon nights,
and even vets reported they took in more pets around full
moon.
In 1985 an official investigation found that none of it had any
basis in science, it was all pure coincidence – although they did
admit vet visits did increase simply because more people let
their dog outside on bright night.
It was during the Apollo 12 mission that a camera
probe which returned to Earth was found to harbor a
mysterious bacteria Streptococcus Mitis – to which
nobody knew the origin.
At the time, it was generally assumed some type of
sterilization procedure had gone wrong, allowing an
Earthly microbe to reach the moon.
In 2007, NASA funded a study to confirm the breach in
sterilization, and in 2011 three researchers authored a paper that assessed the validity of the claim, as
well as discussing the ramifications for future missions. It was confirmed that the microbe in fact came
from Earth; it was not picked up on a moon vacation.
An attempt to explain the different moon
phases in the olden days, the Inuit people from
Greenland that named their Moon god
Annigan.
Annigan would chase the sun goddess around
the sky, all the while getting thinner from
malnutrition – leading to the illusion we know
today as the crescent moon.
There’s also another modern example known
as Moon illusion, where the moon appears to get bigger as it descends into the horizon due to an
optical illusion.
We all know that the moon only ever points one face
towards us at any given time, but most are under the
impression the other side is darkened since it, ya know, faces
the endless black of space.
In reality the opposite is true – it’s illuminated by the sun
just as frequently as the side we see, it just happens to be on
the other side.
Whether you know it from the Mighty Boosh, the
Legend of Zelda or the iconic 1902 fantasy film – a lot
of us are familiar with a moon that has a human face.
Many have drawn diagrams illustrating such a
familiarity, even written songs and stories based on the
fantastic idea.
Many took the lack of spin in regards to the moon’s
orbit as proof that it must be a hologramatic human
face lived on by aliens, bison, microbes, bat-men,
cheese, and elixir-brewing rabbits.
In reality, it’s a giant ball of rock.