OK,This may sound stupid,but it’s been bothering me for some time.
During any phase of the moon,OTHER than full or new you can usually observe the disk of the unlighted side.
My question is, assuming you knew exactly where to look,
do you think it would be possible to observe the blank area of the sky that the moon would occupy during the new stage?
During new moon, the moon is more or less in the same direction as the sun, as seen from the earth. So it would be very difficult to see the almost completely dark moon - it’s too close to the sun.
If the alignment happens to be perfect, the sun and moon are exactly in the same direction - that is, the sun is right behind the moon. That’s called a solar eclipse.
There’s also earthlight illuminating the dark side at new moon, which (if it weren’t so close to the sun then) would make it relatively easy to see the disk, even aside from blocking out stars there. If you look at the moon when it’s just a thin crescent, you’ll often notice that you can see the rest of the disk this way.
>My question is, assuming you knew exactly where to look, do you think it would be possible to observe the blank area of the sky that the moon would occupy during the new stage?
At least during a solar eclipse it is. And if you are in the path of totality, damn spectacular, too!