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84-633: Night is the period in which the sun is below the horizon. Night or Nights may also refer to: Night Night or nighttime is the period of darkness when the Sun is below the horizon . The opposite of nighttime is daytime . Sunlight illuminates one side of the Earth, leaving the other in darkness. Earth's rotation causes the appearance of sunrise and sunset . Moonlight , airglow , starlight , and light pollution dimly illuminate night. The duration of day, night, and twilight varies depending on

168-576: A night shift . Nightlife , encompassing bars, nightclubs, and cultural venues, has become a significant part of urban culture, contributing to social and political movements. A planet's rotation causes nighttime and daytime . When a place on Earth is pointed away from the Sun, that location experiences night. The Sun appears to set in the West and rise in the East due to Earth's rotation. Many celestial bodies, including

252-903: A vomeronasal organ that enhances their sense of smell. Bats heavily depend on echolocation . Echolocation allows an animal to navigate with their sense of hearing by emitting sounds and listening for the time it takes them to bounce back. Bats emit a steady stream of clicks while hunting insects and home in on prey as thin as human hair. People and other diurnal animals sleep primarily at night. Humans, other mammals, and birds experience multiple stages of sleep visible via electroencephalography . The stages of sleep are wakefulness , three stages of non-rapid eye movement sleep (NREM) including deep sleep , and rapid eye movement (REM) sleep . During REM sleep, dreams are more frequent and complex. Studies show that some reptiles may also experience REM sleep. During deep sleep, memories are consolidated into long-term memory . Invertebrates most likely experience

336-561: A form of sleep as well. Studies on bees, which have complex but unrelated brain structures, have shown improvements in memory after sleep, similar to mammals. Compared to waking life, dreams are sparse with limited sensory detail. Dreams are hallucinatory or bizarre, and they often have a narrative structure. Many hypotheses exist to explain the function of dreams without a definitive answer. Nightmares are dreams that cause distress. The word "night-mare" originally referred to nocturnal demons that were believed to assail sleeping dreamers, like

420-482: A greater percentage of rod cells. In most mammals, rod cells contain densely packed DNA near the edge of the nucleus. For nocturnal mammals, this is reversed with the densely packed DNA in the center of the nucleus, which reduces the scattering of light. Some nocturnal animals have a mirror, the tapetum lucidum , behind the retina . This doubles the amount of light their eyes can process. The compound eyes of insects can see at even lower levels of light. For example,

504-462: A major part of the economy and urban planning in modern cities. People who prefer to be active at night are called night owls . Social movements in the 20th century including feminism , black activism, the gay rights movement , and community action blurred the lines between political action and broader cultural activities, making political movements a part of the nightlife. Sociologists have argued that vibrant city nightlife scenes contribute to

588-513: A metaphor for nocturnal danger. Roman poets like Marcus Manilius and Aratus worked late into the night and incorporated darkness and the night sky into their writing. Since the Age of Enlightenment , nocturnal settings have been a frequent place for passionate chaos as a counterbalance to the rationality present during the day. In Gothic fiction , this absence of rationality offered a space for lust and terror. Ottoman literature portrayed night as

672-496: A much higher rate. Before the industrial era , night was a time of heightened insecurity. Fear of the night was common but varied in intensity across cultures. Dangers increased due to lower visibility. Injuries and deaths were caused by drowning and falling into pits, ditches, and shafts. People were less able to evaluate others after dark. Due to nocturnal alcohol consumption and the anonymity of darkness, quarrels were more likely to escalate to violence. In medieval Stockholm ,

756-470: A single side. Gangs were uncommon except for housebreaking . The increased humidity of night was deemed the result of vapors and fumes. The annual movements of stars and constellations across the night sky were used to track the passage of time, but other changes in the night sky were interpreted as significant omens . Many daytime religious, governmental, and local social controls dissipated after nightfall. Fortified Christian communities announced

840-664: A time for forbidden or unrequited love . Night and day were long depicted as opposite conditions. The electric light, the industrial revolution, and shift work brought many aspects of daily life into the night. The author Charles Dickens lived in London during the time of gas lighting and compared the unstable separation between the waking and sleeping city, to the unstable separation he perceived between dream and delusion. Night in contemporary literature offers liminal settings, such as hospitals and gas stations, that contain some aspects of daily life. Night fell, while Helga Crane in

924-411: Is Neurospora crassa , a bread mold, widely used to study biorhythms. During the day, plants engage in photosynthesis and release oxygen . By night, plants engage in respiration , consuming oxygen and releasing carbon dioxide. Plants can draw up more water after sunset, which facilitates new leaf growth. As plants cannot create energy through photosynthesis after sunset, they use energy stored in

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1008-409: Is tilted 23.44° to the line perpendicular to its orbital plane , called the ecliptic , the length of daytime varies with the seasons on the planet's surface, depending on the observer's latitude . Areas tilted toward the Sun are experiencing summer . Their tilt toward the Sun leads to more than half of the day seeing daylight and warmer temperatures, due to the higher directness of solar rays,

1092-411: Is almost exactly half the planet; but because of atmospheric and other effects that extend the reach of indirect illumination, the area of the planet covered by either direct or indirect illumination amounts to slightly more than half the surface. The hemisphere of Earth experiencing daytime at any given instant changes continuously as the planet rotates on its own axis. The axis of the Earth's rotation

1176-470: Is embodied by Nótt . Ratri and Nött are goddesses of sleep and rest, but it's common for personifications to be associated with misfortune. In Aztec Mythology, Black Tezcatlipoca , the "Night Wind", was associated with obsidian and the nocturnal jaguar. In his "Precious Owl" manifestation, the Aztecs regarded Tezcatlipoca as the bringer of death and destruction. The Aztecs anticipated an unending night when

1260-531: Is known as the midnight sun that is famous in some northern countries. To the north, the Arctic Circle marks this 23.44° boundary. To the south, the Antarctic Circle marks the boundary. These boundaries correspond to 66.56° north or south latitude, respectively. Because the sky is still bright and stars can't be seen when the sun is less than 6 degrees under the horizon, 24-hour nights with stars visible all

1344-410: Is not perpendicular to the plane of its orbit around the Sun (which is parallel with the direction of sunlight), and so the length of the daytime period varies from one point on the planet to another. Additionally, since the axis of rotation is relatively fixed in comparison to the stars, it moves with respect to the Sun as the planet orbits the star. This creates seasonal variations in the length of

1428-515: Is the only extant Greek tragedy where night is explicitly invoked and made an element of the story. In the play, night is a time of disorder and confusion that allows Odysseus to sneak into the Trojan camp and kill King Rhesus of Thrace . The handful of surviving classical Classical Greek texts that describe the nocturnal activities of women portray female freedom especially to speak openly, male anxieties about that freedom, and magic that functions as

1512-515: Is tidally locked to Earth; it rotates so that one side of the Moon always faces the Earth. The side of the Moon facing away from Earth is called the far side of the Moon and the side facing Earth is called the near side of the Moon . During lunar night on the near side, Earth is 50 times brighter than a full moon. Because the Moon has no atmosphere, there is an abrupt transition from day to night without twilight. Night varies from planet to planet within

1596-644: The Aztec personification of the Milky Way. The elongated Egyptian goddess Nut and N!adima from Botswana are said to consume the Sun at dusk. In the Ancient Egyptian religion , the Sun then travels through the netherworld inside Nut's body, where it is reborn at dawn. Many cultures have personified the night. Ratri is the star-covered Hindu goddess of the night. In the Icelandic Prose Edda , night

1680-538: The Solar System . Mars 's dusty atmosphere causes a lengthy twilight period. The refracted light ranges from purple to blue, often resulting in glowing noctilucent clouds . Venus and Mercury have long nights because of their slow rotational periods. The planet Venus rotates once every 243 Earth days. Because of its unusual retrograde rotation, nights last 116.75 Earth days. The dense greenhouse atmosphere on Venus keeps its surface hot enough to melt lead throughout

1764-456: The Tzitzimīmeh , skeletal female star deities, would descend to consume all humans. In classical mythology, the night goddess Nyx  is the mother of Sleep , Death , Disease, Strife , and Doom . In Jewish culture and mysticism , the demon Lilith embodies the emotional reactions to darkness including terror, lust, and liberation. Nighttime in the pre-industrial period, often called

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1848-424: The central nervous system of their prey, allowing the fungi to control the actions of the dying insect. During the late afternoon, the fungi will pilot their prey to higher elevation where wind currents can carry its spores further. The fungi will kill and digest the insect as night falls, extending fruiting bodies from the host's exoskeleton. Few species of fungi have true circadian rhythms. A notable exception

1932-577: The elephant hawk moth can see in color, including ultraviolet , with only starlight. Nocturnal insects navigate using moonlight, lunar phases, infrared vision, the position of the stars, and the Earth's magnetic field. Artificial lighting disrupts the biorhythms of many animals. Night-flying insects that use the moon for navigation are especially vulnerable to disorientation from increasing levels of artificial lighting. Artificial lights attract many night-flying insects that die from exhaustion and nocturnal predators. Decreases in insect populations disrupt

2016-603: The horizon . From the March equinox to the September equinox , the Sun rises within 23.44° north of due east, and sets within 23.44° north of due west. From the September equinox to the March equinox, the Sun rises within 23.44° south of due east and sets within 23.44° south of due west. The Sun's path lies entirely in the northern half of the celestial sphere from the March equinox to

2100-594: The incubus (male) or succubus (female). It was believed that the demons could sit upon a dreamer's chest to suffocate a victim, as depicted in John Henry Fuseli's The Nightmare . Fungi can sense the presence and absence of light, and the nightly changes of most fungi growth and biological processes are direct responses to either darkness or falling temperatures. By night, fungi are more engaged in synthesizing cellular components and increasing their biomass. For example, fungi that preys on insects will infect

2184-526: The loup-garou and rougarou —were believed to be people who transformed into beasts at night. In West Africa and among the African diaspora , there is a widespread tradition of a type of vampire who removes their human skin at night and travels as a blood-sucking ball of light. Variation includes the feu-follet , Surinamese asema , and Caribbean sukuyan , Ashanti obayifo , and Ghanaian asanbosam . The medieval fear of night-flying European witches

2268-529: The polar regions to be cold. The slight effect of daylight hours on average seasonal temperature can be seen with the poles and tropical regions. The poles are still cold during their respective summers, despite seeing 24 hours of daylight for six months, while the Equator remains warm throughout the year, with only 12 hours of daylight per day. Although the daytime length at the Equator remains 12 hours in all seasons,

2352-447: The "night season", was associated with darkness and uncertainty. Various cultures have regarded the night as a time when ghosts and other spirits are active on Earth. When Protestant theologians abandoned the concept of purgatory , many came to view reported ghost sightings as the result of demonic activity. In the sixteenth century, Swiss theologian Ludwig Lavater began attempting to explain reported spirits as mistakes, deceit, or

2436-446: The 1600s, the major European cities introduced streetlights. These were lit by lamplighters each evening outside of the summer months. Early street lights were metal and glass enclosures housing candles or  oil lamps . They were suspended above streets or mounted on posts. The use of artificial lighting led to an increase in acceptable nightlife. In more rural areas, night remained a period of rest and nocturnal labor. Young adults,

2520-399: The Equator sees the shortest sunrise or sunset because the Sun's path across the sky is so nearly perpendicular to the horizon. On the equinoxes, the solar disk takes only two minutes to traverse the horizon (from top to bottom at sunrise and from bottom to top at sunset). The tropics occupy a zone of Earth's surface between 23.44° north and 23.44° south of the Equator . Within this zone,

2604-427: The September equinox, but lies entirely in the southern half of the celestial sphere from the September equinox to the March equinox. On the equinoxes, the equatorial Sun culminates at the zenith , passing directly overhead at solar noon . The fact that the equatorial Sun is always so close to the zenith at solar noon explains why the tropical zone contains the warmest regions on the planet overall. Additionally,

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2688-528: The Sun and shorter when a hemisphere is tilted toward the Sun. As a result, the longest night of the year for the Northern Hemisphere will be the shortest night of the year for the Southern Hemisphere . Night's duration varies least near the equator . The difference between the shortest and longest night increases approaching the poles . At the equator, night lasts roughly 12 hours throughout

2772-406: The Sun is a luminous disc as seen from the Earth, rather than a point source of light, sunrise and sunset are not instantaneous and the exact definition of both can vary with context. Additionally, the Earth's atmosphere further bends and diffuses light from the Sun and lengthens the period of sunrise and sunset. For a certain period after sunset and before sunrise, indirect light from the Sun lightens

2856-519: The Sun will pass almost directly overhead (or culminate ) on at least one day per year. The line of 23.44° north latitude is called the Tropic of Cancer , because when it was named, the Sun passed overhead at this location at the time of year when it was near the constellation of Cancer. The equivalent line of south latitude is called the Tropic of Capricorn , for similar reasons. The sun enters and leaves each zodiacal constellation slightly later each year at

2940-485: The background. Lower budget films are more likely to use day for night shooting, larger budget films are more likely to film at night with artificial lighting. Cinematographers have used tinting, filters, color balance settings, and physical lights to color night scenes blue. In low light, people experience the Purkinje effect which causes reds to dim so that more blue is perceived. As light decreases towards total darkness,

3024-478: The changes brought by nightfall, including darkness, increased humidity, and lower temperatures. Their responses include direct reactions and adjustments to circadian rhythms , governed by an internal biological clock . These circadian rhythms, regulated by exposure to light and darkness, affect an organism's behavior and physiology . Animals more active at night are called nocturnal and have adaptations for low light, including different forms of night vision and

3108-453: The city's marketability but also something to be managed in order to reduce activities viewed as disorderly, risky, or otherwise problematic. Urban renewal policies have increased the available possibilities for nighttime consumers and decreased the non-commercial nocturnal activities outside of sanctioned festivals and concerts. In literature, night is often associated with mysterious, hidden, dangerous, and clandestine activities. Rhesus

3192-437: The coming darkness with horns, church bells , or drums. This alerted residents—like peasants working the fields—to return home before the city gates shut. The English engaged in a daily process of "shutting in", where valuables were brought into homes before they were bolted, barred, locked, and shuttered . Many English and European towns attempted to impose curfews during the medieval period and gradually loosened

3276-809: The darkness of night. Light and darkness also affect circadian rhythms, the physical and mental changes that occur in a 24-hour cycle. This daily cycle is regulated by an internal " biological clock " that is adjusted by exposure to light. The length and timing of nighttime depend on location and time of year. Organisms that are more active at night possess adaptations to the night's dimmer light, increased humidity, and lower temperatures. Animals that are active primarily at night are called nocturnal and usually possess adaptations for night vision. In vertebrates' eyes, two types of photoreceptor cells sense light. Cone cells sense color but are ineffective in low light; rod cells sense only brightness but remain effective in very dim light. The eyes of nocturnal animals have

3360-440: The day in black and white. The sections of the monochrome film reel with exterior night scenes were soaked in an acidic dye, that tinted the whole scene blue. " Day for night " is a set of cinematic techniques that simulate a night scene while filming in daylight. They include underexposing to the soften scene, using a graduated neutral-density filter to mute lighting, and setting up the artificial lighting to amplify shadows in

3444-405: The daytime period at most points on the planet's surface. The period of daytime from the standpoint of a surface observer is roughly defined as the period between sunrise , when the Earth's rotation towards the east first causes the Sun's disc to appear above the horizon, to sunset , when the continuing rotation of the Earth causes the Sun's disc to disappear below the horizon to the west. Because

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3528-618: The development of culture and political movements. David Grazian cites as examples the development of beat poetry , musical styles including bebop , urban blues , and early rock, and the importance of nightlife for the development of the gay rights movement in the United States kicked off by the riots at the Stonewall Inn nightclub in Greenwich Village , Lower Manhattan , New York City . odern cities treat nightlife as necessary to

3612-460: The difference in day to night temperature shifts increases dramatically. Some exoplanets, like those of TRAPPIST-1 , are tidally locked . Tidally locked planets have equal rotation and orbital periods, so one side experiences constant day, and the other side constant night. In these situations, astrophysicists believe that life would most likely develop in the twilight zone between the day and night hemispheres. Living organisms react directly to

3696-446: The difference in the length of the day from summer to winter can be very noticeable: the sky may still be lit at 10 pm in summer, but may be dark at 5 pm in winter. In the lower middle latitudes where southern California , Egypt and South Africa are located, the seasonal difference is smaller, but still results in approximately 4 hours difference in daylight between the winter and summer solstices. The difference becomes less pronounced

3780-485: The duration at all other latitudes varies with the seasons. During the winter, daytime lasts shorter than 12 hours; during the summer, it lasts longer than 12 hours. Northern winter and southern summer concur, while northern summer and southern winter concur. At the Equator , the daytime period always lasts about 12 hours, regardless of season. As viewed from the Equator, the Sun always rises and sets roughly vertically, following an apparent path close to perpendicular to

3864-432: The equator, day quickly transitions to night, while the transition can take weeks near the poles. The duration of twilight is longest at the summer solstice and shortest near the equinoxes. Moonlight , starlight , airglow , and light pollution can dimly illuminates the nighttime, with their diffuse aspects being termed skyglow . The amount of skyglow increases each year due to artificial lighting . Night exists on

3948-770: The heightening of other senses. Diurnal animals are active during the day and sleep at night; mammals, birds, and some others dream while asleep. Fungi respond directly to nightfall and increase their biomass. With some exceptions, fungi do not rely on a biological clock. Plants store energy produced through photosynthesis as starch granules to consume at night. Algae engage in a similar process, and cyanobacteria transition from photosynthesis to nitrogen fixation after sunset. In arid environments like deserts, plants evolved to be more active at night, with many gathering carbon dioxide overnight for daytime photosynthesis. Night-blooming cacti rely on nocturnal pollinators such as bats and moths for reproduction. Light pollution disrupts

4032-415: The horizon at noon, it is still only 23.44° above the horizon at the poles. Additionally, as one approaches the poles the apparent path of the Sun through the sky each day diverges increasingly from the vertical. As summer approaches, the Sun rises and sets become more northerly in the north and more southerly in the south. At the poles, the path of the Sun is indeed a circle, which is roughly equidistant above

4116-462: The horizon for the entire duration of the daytime period on any given day. The circle gradually sinks below the horizon as winter approaches, and gradually rises above it as summer approaches. At the poles, apparent sunrise and sunset may last for several days. At middle latitudes , far from both the Equator and the poles, variations in the length of daytime are moderate. In the higher middle latitudes where Montreal , Paris and Ushuaia are located,

4200-439: The horizon. During nautical twilight, the horizon is visible enough for navigation. "Astronomical" twilight continues until the Sun has sunk 18 degrees below the horizon. Beyond 18 degrees, refracted sunlight is no longer visible. The period when the sun is 18 or more degrees below either horizon is called astronomical night. Similar to the duration of night itself, the duration of twilight varies according to latitude . At

4284-415: The horizon. This number will be fewer, but close to the number of days in the summer where the sun doesn't set (for example the sunrise is usually a few days before the spring equinox and extends a few days past the fall equinox). This phenomenon of more daylight than night is not unique to the poles. In fact, at any given time slightly more than half of the earth is in daylight. The 24 hours of summer daylight

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4368-441: The human eye has more scotopic vision , relying more rod cells and less able to perceive color. Night photography can capture the natural colors of night by increasing the exposure time , or length of time captured in the photography. Longer exposures open the possibility for photographers to use light painting to selectively illuminate a scene. Digital photography can also make use of high-ISO settings , which increase

4452-508: The late evening into the early morning. It has traditionally included venues such as pubs , bars , nightclubs , live music , concerts , cabarets , theatre , Hookah lounges , cinemas , and shows. Nightlife entertainment is often more adult -oriented than daytime entertainment. It also includes informal gatherings like parties , botellón , gymkhanas , bingo , and amateur sports. In many cities, there has been an increasing focus on nightlife catering to tourists. Nightlife has become

4536-639: The limited water availability in arid environments like deserts . The stomata of cacti do not open until night. When the temperature drops, the pores open to allow the cacti to store carbon dioxide for photosynthesis the next day, a process known as crassulacean acid metabolism (CAM). Cacti and most night-blooming plants use CAM to store up to 99% of the carbon dioxide they use in daily photosynthesis. Ceroid cacti often have flowers that bloom at night and fade before sunrise. As few bees are nocturnal, night-flowering plants rely on other pollinators including moths, beetles, and bats. These flowers rely more on

4620-409: The longer period of daytime itself, and less absorption of sunlight in the atmosphere . While increased daylight can have some effect on the higher temperatures in the summer, most of temperature rise results from the directness of the Sun, not the increased daylight. The high angles (around the zenith ) of the Sun causes the tropics to be warm, while low angles (barely above the horizon) causes

4704-399: The majority of murders were committed while intoxicated. Crime and fear of crime increased at night. In pre-industrial Europe, criminals disguised themselves with hats, face paint, or cloaks . Thieves would trip pedestrians with ropes laid across streets and dismount horse riders using long poles extended from the roadside shadows. They used "dark lanterns" where light could be shined through

4788-749: The night by the electric light bulb —invented in the late 19th century—and the widespread usage of newer timekeeping devices like watches. Electric lights created night shifts for traditionally daytime fields, like India's cotton industry, and created opportunities for working adults to attend night school . Before the widespread usage of artificial lighting, sleep was typically split into two major segments separated by about an hour of wakefulness. During this midnight period, people engaged in prayer, crimes, urination, sex, and, most commonly, reflection. Without exposure to artificial light, studies show that people revert to sleeping in two separate intervals. Diverse cultures have made connections between

4872-489: The night sky and the afterlife . Many Native American peoples have described the Milky Way as a path where the deceased travel as stars. The Lakota term for the Milky Way is Wanáǧi Thacháŋku , or "Spirit's Road". In Mayan mythology, the Milky Way's dark band is the Road of Xibalba , the path to the underworld . Unrelated cultures share a myth of a star-covered sky goddess who arches over the planet after sunset, like Citlālicue ,

4956-427: The night together this way. Some families took precautions to prevent unintended pregnancies , like sleeping in the same room, laying a large wooden board between the couple, or pulling a single stocking over both of their daughter's legs. Historian Roger Ekirch described pre-industrial night as a "sanctuary from ordinary existence." Artificial lighting expanded the scope of acceptable work and leisure after dark. In

5040-448: The night," including werewolves , witches , ghosts, and goblins , reflecting societal fears and anxieties. The introduction of artificial lighting extended daytime activities. Major European cities hung lanterns housing candles and oil lamps in the 1600s. Nineteenth-century gas and electric lights created unprecedented illumination. The range of socially acceptable leisure activities expanded, and various industries introduced

5124-412: The night. Its planetary wind system, driven by solar heat, reverses direction from day to night. Venus's winds flow from the equator to the poles on the day side and from the poles to the equator on the night side. On Mercury , the planet closest to the Sun, the temperature drops over 1,000 °F (538 °C) after nightfall. The day-night cycle is one consideration for planetary habitability or

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5208-450: The other planets and moons in the solar system. The length of night is affected by the rotation period and orbital period of the celestial object. The lunar phases visible from Earth result from nightfall on the Moon . The Moon has longer nights than Earth, lasting about two weeks. This is half of the synodic lunar month , the time it takes the Moon to cycle through its phases. The Moon

5292-408: The other planets in the solar system, have a form of night. The length of night on Earth varies depending on the time of year. Longer nights occur in winter, with the winter solstice being the longest. Nights are shorter in the summer, with the summer solstice being the shortest. Earth orbits the Sun on an axis tilted 23.44 degrees. Nights are longer when a hemisphere is tilted away from

5376-486: The overall ecosystem because their larvae are a key food source for smaller fish. Dark-sky advocate Paul Bogard described the unnatural migration of night-flying insects from the unlit Nevada desert into Las Vegas as "like sparkling confetti floating in the beam's white column". Some nocturnal animals have developed other senses to compensate for limited light. Many snakes have a pit organ that senses infrared light and enables them to detect heat. Nocturnal mice possess

5460-500: The patterns in ecosystems and is especially harmful to night-flying insects. Historically, night has been a time of increased danger and insecurity. Many daytime social controls dissipated after sunset. Theft, fights, murders, taboo sexual activities, and accidental deaths all became more frequent due in part to reduced visibility. Cultures have personified night through deities associated with some or all of these aspects of nighttime. The folklore of many cultures contains "creatures of

5544-523: The plant, typically as starch granules . Plants use this stored energy at a steady rate, depleting their reserves almost right at dawn. Plants will adjust their rate of consumption to match the expected time until sunrise. This avoids prematurely running out of starch reserves, and it allows the plant to adjust for longer nights in the winter. If a plant is subjected to artificially early darkness, it will ration its energy consumption to last until dawn. Succulent plants , including cacti , have adapted to

5628-429: The pole itself, polar night lasts 179 days from September to March. Over a year, there is more daytime than nighttime because of the Sun's size and atmospheric refraction . The Sun is not a single point. Viewed from Earth, the Sun ranges in angular diameter from 31 to 33 arcminutes . When the center of the Sun falls level with the western horizon , half of the Sun will still be visible during sunset. Likewise, by

5712-442: The pollinators' sense of smell with strong perfumes to attract moths and foul-smelling odors to attract bats. Eukaryotic and prokaryotic organisms that engage in photosynthesis are also affected by nightfall. Like plants, algae will switch to taking in oxygen and processing energy stored as starch. Cyanobacteria , also known as blue algae, switch from photosynthesis to nitrogen fixation after sunset, and they absorb DNA at

5796-434: The possibility of extraterrestrial life on distant exoplanets . In general, shorter nights result in a higher equilibrium temperature for the planet. On an Earth-like planet, longer day-night cycles may increase habitability up to a point. Computer models show that longer nights would affect Hadley circulation , resulting in a cooler, less cloudy planet. Once the rotation speed of a planet slows beyond 1/16 that of Earth,

5880-584: The rate of about 1 day every 72 years. For more information, see precession of the equinoxes . On the Tropical Circles, the Sun is directly overhead only once per year, on the corresponding solstice. At latitudes closer to the Equator and on the Equator itself, it will be overhead twice per year (on the equinoxes in the case of the Equator), leading to the Lahaina Noon or zero shadow day phenomenon. Outside

5964-490: The restrictions via exceptions. Prayer and folk magic were more common by night. Amulets were hung to ward off nightmares, spells were cast against thievery, and pig hearts were hung in chimneys to block demons from traveling down them. The common phrase "good night" has been shortened from "God give you a good night." In Ottoman Istanbul , the royal palaces shifted to projecting nocturnal power through large parties lit by lanterns, candles, and fireworks . Though alcohol

6048-422: The rushing swiftness of a roaring elevated train sat numb. It was as if all the bogies and goblins that had beset her unloved, unloving, and unhappy childhood had come to life with tenfold power to hurt and frighten. Directly filming at night is rarely done. Film stocks and video cameras are much less sensitive to low light environments than the human eye. During the silent film era, night scenes were filmed during

6132-425: The sensitivity to light, to take shorter exposure shots. This makes it possible to capture moving subjects without turning their movements into a blur. Daytime Very broadly, most humans tend to be awake during some of the daytime period at their location, and asleep during some of the night period. Approximately half of Earth is illuminated at any time by the Sun . The area subjected to direct illumination

6216-405: The sky after sunset and into twilight. There are multiple ways to define twilight, the gradual transition to and from darkness when the Sun is below the horizon. "Civil" twilight occurs when the Sun is between 0 and 6 degrees below the horizon. Nearby planets like Venus and bright stars like Sirius are visible during this period. "Nautical" twilight continues until the Sun is 12 degrees below

6300-408: The sky on Earth; this period is often referred to as twilight . Certain groups, such as Earthly astronomers, do not consider daytime to be truly ended until the Sun's disc is actually well below the Earth's horizon, because of this indirect illumination. Daytime length or daytime duration is the time elapsed between beginning and end of the daytime period. Given that Earth's own axis of rotation

6384-466: The time of year and the latitude. Night on other celestial bodies is affected by their rotation and orbital periods . The planets Mercury and Venus have much longer nights than Earth. On Venus, night lasts 120 Earth days. The Moon 's rotation is tidally locked , rotating so that one of the sides of the moon always faces Earth. Nightfall across portions of the near side of the Moon results in lunar phases visible from Earth. Organisms respond to

6468-426: The time only happen beyond 72°34' north or south latitude. At and near the poles, the Sun never rises very high above the horizon, even in summer, which is one of reasons why these regions of the world are consistently cold in all seasons (others include the effect of albedo , the relative increased reflection of solar radiation of snow and ice). Even at the summer solstice, when the Sun reaches its highest point above

6552-444: The time the center of the Sun rises to the eastern horizon, half of the Sun will already be visible during sunrise. This shortens night by about 3 minutes in temperate zones . Atmospheric refraction is a larger factor. Refraction bends sunlight over the horizon. On Earth, the Sun remains briefly visible after it has geometrically fallen below the horizon. This shortens night by about 6 minutes. Scattered, diffuse sunlight remains in

6636-412: The tropics, the Sun never passes directly overhead. Around the poles, which coincide with the rotational axis of Earth as it passes through the surface, the seasonal variations in the length of daytime are extreme. In fact, within 23.44° latitude of the poles, there will be at least some days each year during which the sun never goes below the horizon. There will also be days when the Sun never rises above

6720-462: The urban poor, prostitutes, and thieves benefited from the anonymity of darkness and frequently smashed the new lanterns. Gas lighting was invented in the 1800s. A gas mantle was over ten times brighter than an oil lamp. Gas lighting was associated with the creation of regular police forces. In England, police departments were tasked with maintaining the gas lights, which became known as "police lamps". Daytime routines were further pushed back into

6804-631: The work of demons. The idea of night as a dangerous, dark, or haunted time persists in modern urban legends like the vanishing hitchhiker . Many times in the night season, there have been certain spirits heard softly going or spitting or groaning, who being asked what they were have made answer that they were the souls of this or that man and that they now endure extreme torments. In folklore, nocturnal preternatural beings like goblins , fairies , werewolves , pucks , brownies , banshees , and boggarts have overlapping but non-synonymous definitions. The werewolf —and its francophone variations

6888-440: The year. The tropics have little difference in the length of day and night. At the 45th parallel, the longest winter night is roughly twice as long as the shortest summer night. Within the polar circles , night will last the full 24 hours of the winter solstice. The length of this polar night increases closer to the poles. Utqiagvik, Alaska , the northernmost point in the United States, experiences 65 days of polar night. At

6972-528: Was forbidden for Muslims , after dark, Turkish Muslims went to the bars and taverns beyond the Muslim areas. The night has long been a time of increased sexual activity, especially in taboo forms such as premarital , extramarital , gay , and lesbian sex. In colonial New England courtship, young unmarried couples practiced bundling before marriage. The couples would lie down in the woman's bed, her family would wrap them tightly with blankets, and they would spend

7056-482: Was influenced by the Roman strix . The Romans described the strix as capable of changing between a beautiful woman and an owl-shaped monster. Common themes among these mythical nocturnal entities include hypersexuality , predation, shapeshifting , deception, mischief, and malice. Nightlife , sometimes referred to as "the night-time economy", is a range of entertainment available and generally more popular from

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