# Standing on Mars **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [February 21, 2004, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308 "2004-02-21T01:40:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![gbrohman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3be4f8/32.png) [@gbrohman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gbrohman)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 1:40am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/1 "2004-02-21T01:40:15Z")
If I was to look into the night sky on Mars, Could I see the Big Dipper? Would I see Polaris? Is the mars explorer scheduled to take pic’s of the solar system? ---
**Author:** ![Cillasi](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/71e660/32.png) [@Cillasi](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cillasi)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 1:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/2 "2004-02-21T01:47:09Z")
Yes, you could. Mars is not far enough away from Earth to change the relative positions of far away stars. ---
**Author:** ![Squink](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b5e925/32.png) [@Squink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Squink)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/3 "2004-02-21T02:16:37Z")
> [@Cillasi](#): > > Yes, you could. Mars is not far enough away from Earth to change the relative positions of far away stars. However, Mars is far enough away from earth that your view of the [_planets_ in martian the sky](http://space.jpl.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/wspace?tbody=3&vbody=4&month=2&day=20¢ury=20&decade=0&year=4&hour=00&minute=0&fovmul=1&rfov=120&bfov=30) would be different. ---
**Author:** ![Jinx](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/c6cbf5/32.png) [@Jinx](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jinx)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/4 "2004-02-21T02:16:56Z")
Yes, it is true the constellations would all look the same, but where they rise and set would be different as this depends on the angle of tilt of Mars on its axis. Also, Polaris would no longer be the north star marking the North Celestial Pole. Again, it is dependent on how Mars is tilted on its axis relative to the plane of its orbit. - Jinx ---
**Author:** ![Padeye](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/a9a28c/32.png) [@Padeye](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Padeye)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 2:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/5 "2004-02-21T02:36:50Z")
Strictly speaking the constellations would be ever so slightly different but not enough that you could tell with the naked eye. Parallax shift as the Earth goes around its orbit is one way of measuring distance to stars. That of course means all the stars don’t line up the same way from Earth througout the year but for any given time there would be slight differences in the positions of some starts from Earth vs. Mars. ---
**Author:** ![gbrohman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3be4f8/32.png) [@gbrohman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gbrohman)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 4:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/6 "2004-02-21T16:45:34Z")
Ever night Polaris is,and stays in the same place throughout the night, and must still be there throughout the day unseen by us. Being Mars has a 24h 39m 35s day how does that relate to astronomy? My thinking it would take about 61 days for the stars to realign. ---
**Author:** ![RM\_Mentock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e274bd/32.png) [@RM\_Mentock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RM_Mentock)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 5:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/7 "2004-02-21T17:32:31Z")
> [@gbrohman](#): > > My thinking it would take about 61 days for the stars to realign. Why 61 days? ---
**Author:** ![Polycarp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/82dd89/32.png) [@Polycarp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Polycarp)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/8 "2004-02-21T17:44:00Z")
> [@Padeye](#): > > Strictly speaking the constellations would be ever so slightly different but not enough that you could tell with the naked eye. Parallax shift as the Earth goes around its orbit is one way of measuring distance to stars. That of course means all the stars don’t line up the same way from Earth througout the year but for any given time there would be slight differences in the positions of some starts from Earth vs. Mars. However, parallax is based on the diameter of the Earth’s orbit, and Alpha Centauri, with the highest parallax, shifts less than one arc second. Presuming Mars to have 1.6 the parallax of Earth (which I believe to be the accurate ratio based on orbital figures), Alpha Centauri would shift about 1.5 arc seconds, or about 1/2400 of a degree, over the course of a year. This sounds to me like a textbook case of “negligible.” ---
**Author:** ![Bytegeist](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/9dc877/32.png) [@Bytegeist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bytegeist)\ **Post date:** [February 21, 2004, 9:39pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/9 "2004-02-21T21:39:28Z")
> [@gbrohman](#): > > If I was to look into the night sky on Mars, Could I see the Big Dipper? Would I see Polaris? As others have said, you would still be able to see the same stars you can see from Earth, and in the same constellations — assuming of course you’re on the correct side of Mars to see them at the time. Since Mars’s north celestial pole is somewhere around Deneb (if I recall right), the Big Dipper and Polaris should be visible most of the time from most the Martian northern hemisphere. > [@](#): > > Is the mars explorer scheduled to take pic’s of the solar system? Not really; the probes sent to Mars are there to photograph and sample Mars. If they happen to capture some stars in their images, it’s purely incidental. If you have a computer with good graphics capabilities, then there’s a program named [Celestia](http://www.shatters.net/celestia/) which, though a little tricky to maneuver in, will let you roam the Solar System at will, including Mars. It renders atmospheric effects too, so you can really get a nice feel for what it might be like to stand on the Martian surface and look around. (It doesn’t render rocks though, or other small surface detail, so the landscape is pretty bland in comparison to the real thing.) ---
**Author:** ![eburacum45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/eburacum45/32/8690_2.png) [@eburacum45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/eburacum45)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 12:04am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/10 "2004-02-22T00:04:42Z")
Yes, I certainly recommend _Celestia_; for instance, standing on the north pole of Mars, and looking directly upwards, I can determine that Deneb is the closest thing Mars has to a North pole star; and unlike standing on Mars, my toes have not dropped off through frost bite. * * * SF worldbuilding at [http://www.orionsarm.com/main.html](http://www.orionsarm.com/main.html) ---
**Author:** ![127.0.0.1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/1/258eb7/32.png) [@127.0.0.1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/127.0.0.1)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 12:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/11 "2004-02-22T00:05:26Z")
also worth noting, [other](http://www.space.com/php/multimedia/imagedisplay/img_display.php?pic=mgs_earthjupiter_030522_02.jpg) [probes](http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/express_earth_030717.html) have looked back at earth, with spectacular results. ---
**Author:** ![Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bosda_di_chi_of_tricor/32/16845_2.png) [@Bosda\_Di\_Chi\_of\_Tricor](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bosda_Di_Chi_of_Tricor)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 1:05am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/12 "2004-02-22T01:05:52Z")
Of course, with winds thar are considerably faster than 100 MPH, you wouldn’t be standing _long_. ---
**Author:** ![gbrohman](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3be4f8/32.png) [@gbrohman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gbrohman)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/13 "2004-02-22T01:12:43Z")
Thank you all for the replies. I find it hard to read Steven Hawking’s books. I feel we are not programed to be able to understand/comprehend the big picture. I am a admirer of Albert Einstein, and enjoy when modern science announces it can’t prove A E wrong. What year was he visiting us from??? What I mean by that, Is,What year would his theory’s of been made if he wasn’t alive? ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 4:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/14 "2004-02-22T04:16:48Z")
> [@Bosda Di'Chi of Tricor](#): > > Of course, with winds thar are considerably faster than 100 MPH, you wouldn’t be standing _long_. Ah, but the Martian atmosphere is so thin, that hundred mile an hour wind just doesn’t push against you as hard as it would here. The big problem would be the grit flying in your face, not being knocked down. DD ---
**Author:** ![RM\_Mentock](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e274bd/32.png) [@RM\_Mentock](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RM_Mentock)\ **Post date:** [February 22, 2004, 5:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/standing-on-mars/230308/15 "2004-02-22T05:17:48Z")
> [@gbrohman](#): > > What I mean by that, Is,What year would his theory’s of been made if he wasn’t alive? Special Relativity was in the wind, probably would have been soon after. Nobody but him, maybe, would have come up with General Relativity–except maybe for a version of the equivalence principle.