How does the geocentric model explain the seasons and the changing length of daylight through the year?
A viewer named Hubert asks how to explain, in the geocentric model, that daylight is not the same throughout the year (for example, eight hours in winter and twelve in summer at certain latitudes) and how the seasons work.
Answer
In the geocentric model you have the earth, and the sun is going around it, but the sun's height changes through the year. In June the sun is at its high point, in December at its low point, and in September and March it is in the middle, which is about where we are now with a few days left in February before March 21. The whole span is forty-seven degrees, twenty-three and a half degrees above the equator and twenty-three and a half below, which equals forty-seven. When the sun is up at its peak of 23.5 degrees, you get more sunlight per day in the northern hemisphere than you do when the sun is down low. You can see it in the sky: around December 21 the sun reaches its lowest point and travels a shorter arc across the sky, hitting the horizon much sooner, while in summer it shifts over by 23.5 degrees and travels a longer arc. That longer daytime path in summer and shorter path in winter is what produces the changing length of daylight through the year.