Astronomy Take-Home Pretest Help?

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pookiebear

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At the start of the summer of 2008 the planet Mars had an apparent magnitude of -1.2. Currently mars has an apparent magnitude of +0.8. How much brigher (or fainter) is Mars currently compared to its brightness at the start of the summer of 2008? Express your answer as a ratio or factor.

please a little explanation would be greatly appreciated
 
Apparent magnitude is how bright an object appears in the sky. If i remember correctly, the lower the number, the brighter the object appears to be.

So without actually answering the question, I can tell you that you need to calculate the difference between the two magnitudes and express that as a ratio or factor. Take 0.8-1.2 to get the difference in brightness between these two times.

And if it helps anything, Mars got fainter.
 
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