Influencing many aspects of our culture, thought and being.

Ever-present in design, art, music, science, technology, religion,

but what is the Moon?

It depends who you ask.

The ancient Mesopotamians would speak of Nanna,

the god of the Moon and creator of all things.

While a present day cosmologist might describe

the stabilising influence of our Earth's tilt.

And most of us picture the Moon as being closer than it actually is.

Hmm, quite a squeeze for a textbook.

Strangely, the Sun is 400 times further away from the Earth

than the Moon

and is 400 times its size.

This means that, viewed from the Earth,

they appear to be exactly the same size.

Science fiction writer Isaac Asimov described this natural quirk as

'the most unlikely coincidence imaginable.'

These correlations didn't go unnoticed

by early star-gazing cultures.

Notably, 108 is an auspicious number for Hindus

who count 108 marma points, or sacred places in the body.

Many believe the Moon affects our bodies.

We know its push and pull affects the tides

and we are organic creatures made largely of water

who evolved in an ecosystem reliant on this celestial neighbour.

What about the Moon's effect on our state of mind?

The word lunacy is derived from the Latin word lunaticus,

meaning moonstruck.

Statistics do show a consistent rise in crime rates around a full moon.

Scientists prefer to attribute this to convenient light levels

for the plying of nefarious activity.

And it's not only our minds in question -

the perceived connection between fertility and the cycles of the Moon

goes back a long time.

Perhaps that's just because the lunar and menstrual cycles

correlate so closely.

In the ancient world, the Moon was generally personified as male

with the shift to female deities and ideas happening more recently,

relatively speaking.

If the Moon is female, there has been no shortage of historical characters

trying to fathom her mysteries

to harness this elusive beacon of the natural world.

So it's nice to hear Nasa has just announced an initiative

to put a woman on the Moon by 2024,

aptly-named Artemis, after Greek god Apollo's twin sister.

And the Moon's many faces continue

with some seeing her as a harbinger of doom.

The Maori people call the Moon Hina, the man-eater,

who was the bringer of death.

Then there's the melancholic reflective Moon.

Around the turn of the 18th Century,

as we adjusted to the brave new world of science and discovery,

artists became increasingly focused on our place in the natural world.

Paintings from the likes of Caspar David Friedrich

and Joseph Wright of Derby

turned to the Moon as a central theme -

often with small human figures,

their backs to the viewer in quiet reflection.

Finally in July 1969, we successfully landed two men on the Moon

and we discovered what she'd been silently gazing upon

for all this time.

So what is the Moon?

Male, female, a life support system, or a bringer of death?

Inducer of madness, a conspiracy, a symbol of peace?

What if it's all these things?

Embodying all the light and shade of human experience.

It seems the Moon is whatever we choose to see -

a constant reflection of us.

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