full transcript

From the Ted Talk by Gordon Williamson: The Sun's surprising movement across the sky

Unscramble the Blue Letters


But why is it a figure eight and not just a straight line? This is due to another feature of the Earth's rluovtoein, its orbital eccentricity. The Earth's obirt around the Sun is an eplslie, with its distance to the Sun changing at various poitns. The corresponding change in gravitational force causes the eatrh to move fastest in jnauray when it reaches its closest point to the Sun, the perihelion, and the swsleot in July when it reaches its farthest point, the aphelion.

The Earth's eccentricity means that solar noon, the time when the Sun is highest in the sky, doesn't always occur at the same point in the day. So a sundial may be as much as sixteen minutes ahead or fourteen minutes behind a regular clock. In fact, coclk time and Sun time only match four times a year. The analemma's width renpstrees the extent of this deviation.

Open Cloze


But why is it a figure eight and not just a straight line? This is due to another feature of the Earth's __________, its orbital eccentricity. The Earth's _____ around the Sun is an _______, with its distance to the Sun changing at various ______. The corresponding change in gravitational force causes the _____ to move fastest in _______ when it reaches its closest point to the Sun, the perihelion, and the _______ in July when it reaches its farthest point, the aphelion.

The Earth's eccentricity means that solar noon, the time when the Sun is highest in the sky, doesn't always occur at the same point in the day. So a sundial may be as much as sixteen minutes ahead or fourteen minutes behind a regular clock. In fact, _____ time and Sun time only match four times a year. The analemma's width __________ the extent of this deviation.

Solution


  1. earth
  2. ellipse
  3. represents
  4. january
  5. orbit
  6. points
  7. slowest
  8. clock
  9. revolution

Original Text


But why is it a figure eight and not just a straight line? This is due to another feature of the Earth's revolution, its orbital eccentricity. The Earth's orbit around the Sun is an ellipse, with its distance to the Sun changing at various points. The corresponding change in gravitational force causes the Earth to move fastest in January when it reaches its closest point to the Sun, the perihelion, and the slowest in July when it reaches its farthest point, the aphelion.

The Earth's eccentricity means that solar noon, the time when the Sun is highest in the sky, doesn't always occur at the same point in the day. So a sundial may be as much as sixteen minutes ahead or fourteen minutes behind a regular clock. In fact, clock time and Sun time only match four times a year. The analemma's width represents the extent of this deviation.

Frequently Occurring Word Combinations


ngrams of length 2

collocation frequency
sun appears 3
remains tilted 2
orbital eccentricity 2
clock time 2
solar time 2


Important Words


  1. aphelion
  2. change
  3. changing
  4. clock
  5. closest
  6. day
  7. deviation
  8. distance
  9. due
  10. earth
  11. eccentricity
  12. ellipse
  13. extent
  14. fact
  15. farthest
  16. fastest
  17. feature
  18. figure
  19. force
  20. fourteen
  21. gravitational
  22. highest
  23. january
  24. july
  25. line
  26. match
  27. means
  28. minutes
  29. move
  30. noon
  31. occur
  32. orbit
  33. orbital
  34. perihelion
  35. point
  36. points
  37. reaches
  38. regular
  39. represents
  40. revolution
  41. sixteen
  42. sky
  43. slowest
  44. solar
  45. straight
  46. sun
  47. sundial
  48. time
  49. times
  50. width
  51. year