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Nearby stars have a larger parallax angle.

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12y ago
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14y ago

A small parallax means the object is far, far away.

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12y ago

Yes; less than a second (1/3600 of a degree) even for Proxima Centauri, the closest star after the Sun.

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14y ago

farther away

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13y ago

No, the opposite.

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9y ago

Yes

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Q: If a star's parallax is too small to measure does that mean that it is close or far from Earth?
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Parallax would be harder to measure if?

A parallax is hard to measure if it is very small - and this happens when the corresponding object is very far away.


What is it called when astronomers estimate the distance from Earth using the fact that nearby stars shift in position as observed from Earth?

That is called parallax and it happens when a nearby star appears to move against the background as the Earth moves round the Sun. The baseline is the mean radius of the Earth's orbit (not the diameter) and a star which has a parallax of 1 arc-second would be at a distance of 1 parsec. In practice the nearest stars have a parallax of about 0.7 seconds so are at a distance of 1.4 parsecs or 4 light-years. Parallaxes are always small and require sensitive instruments to measure. The lack of parallax was formerly used as a proof that the Earth must be fixed, and it took until 1838 for Bessel to measure the first stellar parallax. After that people began to realise that the stars are much further away than they had thought.


Would it be possible to measure star distances using telescopes in orbit around the Moon and Mars?

In principle yes but an orbit round the Moon is too small to make it worth doing. An orbit round Mars would also be too small. The present system uses the Earth's orbit as the base line, and parallax measurement works by measuring the exact position of a nearby star agains the background of distant stars at intervals of 6 months at opposite sides of the Earth's orbit. The parallaxes are so small that it took until the 1800s for any parallax to be discovered. Before then the lack of parallax was always used as a genuine reason that the Earth could not be moving.


How did aristotles' inability to detect parallax lead him to propose a geocentric model of the solar system?

He reasoned that since parallax could not be observed for celestial objects near the sun, then the earth was stationary. This erroneous assumption was because at the time he had no way of knowing that celestial objects were so far away that their parallax angles were too small to detect.He reasoned that since parallax could not be observed for celestial objects near the sun, then the earth was stationary. This erroneous assumption was because at the time he had no way of knowing that celestial objects were so far away that their parallax angles were too small to detect =) Hope it helped. I had the same question


Why was Aristotle wrong about the solar system?

He reasoned that since parallax could not be observed for celestial objects near the sun, then the earth was stationary. This erroneous assumption was because at the time he had no way of knowing that celestial objects were so far away that their parallax angles were too small to detect.He reasoned that since parallax could not be observed for celestial objects near the sun, then the earth was stationary. This erroneous assumption was because at the time he had no way of knowing that celestial objects were so far away that their parallax angles were too small to detect =) Hope it helped. I had the same question

Related questions

If a star's parallax angle is too small to measure what can you conclude about the star's distance from earth?

It means that the distance is greater than a certain amount - depending on how precisely you can measure the parallax.


Why can parallax only be used to measure distance to star that are relatively close to earth?

At farther distances, the parallax becomes too small to measure accurately. At a distance of 1 parsec, a star would have a parallax of 1 second (1/3600 of a degree). (The closest star, Toliman, is a little farther than that.) At a distance of 100 parsecs, the parallax is only 1/100 of a second.


Parallax would be harder to measure if?

A parallax is hard to measure if it is very small - and this happens when the corresponding object is very far away.


If a star's parallax angle is too small to measure what can you conclude about the star's distance from the earth?

It means that the distance is greater than a certain amount - depending on how precisely you can measure the parallax.


If a star's parallax angle is too small to measure what can you conclude about the stars distance from earth?

You can conclude that it is farther than a certain distance. How much this distance is depends, of course, on how accurately the parallax angle can be measured.


Why can't astronomer measure the parallax of a star that is a million lights away?

The farther the object, the smaller its parallax. In this case, the parallax is about 1/300,000 of an arc-second (and an arc-second is 1/3600 of a degree) - way too small to measure. Perhaps you will eventually find a way to measure smaller parallax angles.


Why can't the parallax effect be used to measure distances to other galaxies?

The parallax angle of such distant objects is way too small to be measured. In general, the farther away an object, the smaller is its parallax angle.


What is it called when astronomers estimate the distance from Earth using the fact that nearby stars shift in position as observed from Earth?

That is called parallax and it happens when a nearby star appears to move against the background as the Earth moves round the Sun. The baseline is the mean radius of the Earth's orbit (not the diameter) and a star which has a parallax of 1 arc-second would be at a distance of 1 parsec. In practice the nearest stars have a parallax of about 0.7 seconds so are at a distance of 1.4 parsecs or 4 light-years. Parallaxes are always small and require sensitive instruments to measure. The lack of parallax was formerly used as a proof that the Earth must be fixed, and it took until 1838 for Bessel to measure the first stellar parallax. After that people began to realise that the stars are much further away than they had thought.


Parallax cant be used on a star if the star is too?

We can't use parallax to measure a stars distance from the Earth if the star is already too far away. The angles used in parallax measurment are already very small, and if the star is beyond a certain distance from us the angle becomes too small to measure, and no distance can be determined.To date the largest distance that can be measured using parallax, with the Hipparchos sattelite, is about 1 600 light years. This will be improved with the European Space Agencies Gaia mission in 2012 and 2013.


Why were ancient people unable to detect stellar parallax?

they couldn't measure small angles


Why were early astronomers unable to detect stellar parallax?

Pressumably, they didn't have the high-precision devices required to measure those angles. You must consider that we are talking about extremely small angles - even the closest star has a parallax of less than one arc-second (1/3600 of a degree).


Would it be possible to measure star distances using telescopes in orbit around the Moon and Mars?

In principle yes but an orbit round the Moon is too small to make it worth doing. An orbit round Mars would also be too small. The present system uses the Earth's orbit as the base line, and parallax measurement works by measuring the exact position of a nearby star agains the background of distant stars at intervals of 6 months at opposite sides of the Earth's orbit. The parallaxes are so small that it took until the 1800s for any parallax to be discovered. Before then the lack of parallax was always used as a genuine reason that the Earth could not be moving.