The Moon's Orbit is WEIRD
Why Hacker News recommends it
HN links it whenever the Moon's orbit comes up, as a concise explanation of why the Moon always curves toward the Sun.
What it is
A minutephysics explainer showing that the Moon's path around the Sun is not a spiral but closer to a 12-sided polygon with curved corners. It argues the Moon arguably orbits the Sun rather than the Earth.
Recommended by 4 HN commenters across 4 different months, 2024 to 2026.
What Hacker News said
Recommends GuB-42 · 2024-12 · on “Moon”
Minutephysics did a video about this: [this video] It looks like a dodecagon with rounded corners, but the video goes into more details.
Recommends d1sxeyes · 2025-01 · on “IAC confirms existence of a Super-earth in the habitable zone of a Sun-like Star”
It’s arguable that even the stuff we consider to orbit the earth like the moon is really orbiting the sun. MinutePhysics did a great video on this: [this video]
Recommends nandomrumber · 2026-04 · on “Artemis II crew take 'spectacular' image of Earth”
This video explains what you’re talking about re the moons orbit always curving toward the sun, and also mentions Earths gravitational dominance. It’s about the suns gravitational pull on the moon dominating over the Earths gravitational pull on the moon, but that due to the centrifugal force (there isn’t one, so conservation of angular momentum) the Earth's gravitational pull dominates. [this video]
Recommends lgcmo · 2026-06 · on “Show HN: Gravity – interactive solar-system simulator, from Newton to Einstein”
Very cool! Just one note about the moon orbit around the Earth, it is far more subtle; almost just orbiting the Sun alongside Earth. I can't explain better than minute physics, highly recommend: [this video]