Stars, wanderers and the cycles Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifeof life

The patterns of stars in the sky do not change from one generation to the next

Ancient cultures developed stories from the patterns they saw

They gave names to patterns - like Orion and The Seven Sisters

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

There are just 7 objects that are visible to the naked eye and that move amongst the patterns of the stars

One of them is the Sun

The Sun is so bright to us that other stars become invisible in daylight - but they are still there

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

The Sun seems to move against a background of fixed stars The sequence of patterns behind the Sun is called the Zodiac The time taken for the Sun to move around the Zodiac is the same as the

time taken for a cycle of the Earth’s seasons You count your age according to these cycles

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

The Moon is another of the 7 wanderers

Its visible sunlit part changes shape, as seen from where we are, between a bright full circle and a crescent

Our idea of a month comes from the reliable regularity of these cycles of apparent change of shape

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

As well as yearly cycles of the Sun and cycles of the phases of the Moon, there are cycles of light and dark that give us day and night

Our lives are shaped by these cycles

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

There are five other wanderers visible to the naked eye - Mercury, Venus, Mars, Jupiter and Saturn

There are the same number of visible wanderers as days of the week

In English, three days are named after these wanderers - Sunday, Monday and Saturday

In some languages, all 7 days match the 7 objects that wander amongst the fixed stars

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

People have never gone far from the Earth - seen here from the Moon

If we inhabited another planet or moon, the cycles of our lives would need to be very different

Stars, wanderers and the cycles of Stars, wanderers and the cycles of lifelife

image credits Slide 1 - NASA and H Richer (University of British

Columbia) Slide 2 - NASA JPL Slide 3 - Tau ‘olunga Slide 4 - Fekete Csaba Slide 5 - David Brodie Slide 6 - NASA JPL Space Science Institute Slide 7 - NASA