Events
It's time to say goodbye to long warm days and great summer weather, as autumn has arrived with its drizzling rains, leaf falls and cold nights.
Today is September 22, the first day of autumn, which is also known as the autumnal equinox.
The word equinox is associated with an astronomical phenomenon. During the spring and autumn equinoxes, the Sun passes directly above the Earth's equator. Day and night become roughly equal in duration at this time.
The exact time of the equinox, that is, when the Sun visible from Earth transits the equator, varies from year to year. Sometimes the autumnal equinox falls on September 23 or 24, depending on the vagaries of our calendar and the Earth's slightly curved orbit.
Day and night last about 12 hours on several dates near the equinox, but then the length of the day in the Northern Hemisphere will begin to decrease as winter approaches.
This is because the Earth's axis is tilted by 23.5 degrees. When the Northern Hemisphere tilts towards the Sun, summer sets in, and winter in the Southern Hemisphere, respectively. When the Southern Hemisphere gets closer to the Sun, summer comes to this part of the planet.
At the poles, the difference between day and night in winter and summer is so great that sometimes some of these times of day simply disappear.
At the North Pole, during the spring equinox, the Sun rises above the horizon and doesn't set until the summer solstice.
The living organisms of the Earth react to the change of seasons, with the arrival of autumn, leaves turn yellow and fall, and animals begin to prepare for wintering.
Seasons are also of great importance for a person. Some people suffer from winter depressions, when the days get shorter, due to hormonal changes that take place in response to changes in light.
Even stranger is the fact that scientific studies have shown that Google's search engine experiences outbreaks of searches for adult content twice a year.
Research, which was published in the Archives of Sexual Behavior magazine in August, showed that the number of such searches in search engines increases as Christmas approaches and early summer. Other studies have shown that condom sales are also increasing during this time, with young people saying they have sex more often than at other times of the year.
It is not yet clear whether this seasonal human sexual cycle is biological or cultural, or whether people simply have more time to relax before the winter holidays or at the beginning summer.