The First Sunrise Is Just a Story We Tell Ourselves

We all have learned that Sun rises from the east. Something very simple hit my mind today. Sun rises from the east just because our earth rotates from west to east. Since the earth is a sphere, how can we even set an absolute east or west ? Yes a location can be east or west from another location. But there can't be an absolute east or west for a spherical earth.

That's when I got really confused on why we say Japan is the first country to see the sunrise. I then came to know that Kirbati (an island country somewhere in Pacific ocean) is the first country to see the sunrise first while Japan is also in top 5 countries to see the sunrise first. But how? Before Japan sees the sunrise, places in the Pacific, and before them, regions in the Americas and Europe, have already seen it.

In normal circumstances, it sounds completely fine. If we look at the normal world map that we are used to seeing, Japan is always on the right side (the east side). Thus, it is obvious to say that Japan will see the sunrise before Europe or Africa or USA. But when I thought a little deeper, the whole idea stopped making sense.

Why the normal world map always has Japan on the right side and USA in the east side ? What if we see the map where America is in the rightmost part. If we follow that map, America should be getting the first sunrise.

The fact is that our Earth is a round ball, not a flat map. Actually, sunlight never "starts" or "stops" at one point. Sunrise keeps moving in a circle around the Earth again and again as the earth is continuously rotating. Before Japan gets sunlight, another place to the east of Japan just got it a few minutes earlier. Before that place, another place to the east of itself got it, and so on. It's like a loop that never begins and never ends.

So how can we say Japan gets sunlight first? The truth is, we can't say that in an absolute way. We only say it because humans made something called the International Date Line. This is an imaginary line in the Pacific Ocean where we decided a new day begins. Because of this line, the places near it are called the "first" to see sunrise of a new day. But that doesn't mean they get the physical sunlight first. It only means we labeled them that way or it's just the way we chose to count days.

What if we moved the date line to the other side of the world ? Europe or the USA would then become the east and will be the first place to see sunrise. It's nothing about Sun or Earth, its just about that imaginary line humans created. Only our time zones would change. This is enough to conclude that "today", "tomorrow" or "first sunrise" all are imaginary. These are created by us just to organize or standardize the time.

In reality, the Sun shines all the time while Earth keeps spinning. No country gets the "first" sunlight. Every place simply enters the sunlight in a continuous loop. It's up to us where we choose to start counting the day.

Thinking about this made me realize how many things in life feel "natural", but are actually just human decisions. The world is round. Sunrise is a circle. And "first sunrise" is just something we made up.