Stellar Aberration

Professor Richard Conn Henry

	The Earth, carrying a telescope tube, moves around the Sun with velocity v. At least as we normally think about it, light moves down the telescope tube with velocity c. The stellar aberration angle is the negative of ψ. The common analogy is falling rain: but in fact, stellar aberration is a deep phenomenon of Special Relativity.
	I have created a gif animation,     showing the appearance of the sky when the Earth starts off,     stationary, on Mar 21, and accelerates to 0.8 c over a one year period -         small screen, black sky.         small screen, white sky.         big screen, black sky.         big screen, white sky.         Big screen, white sky: the non-relativistic sky at a steady 0.9 c.

WHY did no one, ancient or modern, predict the phenomenon?

By the time of Bradley, it was well determined that light moves with finite velocity.

If you stand still, in vertically-falling rain, only the top of your head gets wet.
But, if you stride forward, your chest gets wet, too!
The angle that the rain appears to fall at, clearly depends on both your speed, and that of the falling raindrops. See the formula!

"..the mean distance of the earth from the sun is about 93,000,000 miles,
and since light travels a little over 186,000 miles per second,
it follows that the time occupied by a ray of light in reaching us from the sun is about 8 ¹/₃ minutes (8 min. 18 sec.);
so that, in fact, (1) we do not see the sun as it is, but as it was 8 ¹/₃ minutes ago.
And since, during this time, the earth has moved in its orbit about   20 ¹/₂"
(2), we do not see that luminary in the exact place it occupies at the time of observation."