On Sunday, July 20, 2014 2:41:39 AM UTC-7, oriel36 wrote:

Anyone,and I mean anyone, can easily identify the motion of Venus and Mercury as they move out from behind the Sun and in the opposite direction to the annual motion of the background stars and then move to their widest point before swinging back in front of the central Sun.

Anyone, and I mean anyone, can place 2 sticks in the ground and line them up on any bright star of their choosing (except for the Sun, it doesn't work using the Sun), and then start their stopwatch and easily measure the amount of time that passes until they line up once again on that same star, which will be 23 56 04 every time, pick any star.

What could this possibly mean? Why does this work for virtually any star in the sky that is a reasonable distance from either pole, except for the Sun?