Slashdot Mirror
Should NASA Try To Refute Crackpots?
angkor writes "CNN has an interesting article on the dilemma faced by NASA: what is the proper way to deal with far-out theories given exposure (and legitimacy) by the media--ignore the crackpots or refute them?"
After all, NASA are controlled by the illuminati lizards who want to keep the truth about life on other planets hidden from the rest of us.
Sorry, but my karma just ran over your dogma.
punch 'em in the face!!
(Can't get link to work...)
I say refute the crap out of them and get more press then the idiots making the wild claims.
Nasa needs to get more public support, the more chances to remind people how magical walking on the moon was the more likely we will be doing it again.
If you ask me the best way to refute it isn't to right a book, but to do it again. Would it really be that hard now that we have a space station to launch from.
You're probably not going to change the mind of someone who is CONVINCED the moon landing was a hoax. I don't see a need to spend money that could go toward research on trying to change people's minds.
Go away, or I will replace you with a very small shell script.
http://moonhoax.com/site/evidence.html
Outsource it!
NASA's core business is delivering science and engineering, not education.
There are plenty of educated, credible and vocal people who don't work for NASA who can and will provide necessary refutations (word??) for pseudoscientific nonsense.
NASA could probably achieve the same goal (convincing swinging skeptics) to the same level of efficiency through a PR department staffed with a couple of researchers and the occasional "read this or ask them" press release.
"If you create user accounts, by default, they will have an account type of Administrator with no password." KB Q293834
"The issue of trying to do a targeted response to this is just lending credibility to something that is, on its face, asinine," NASA chief Sean O'Keefe said in late November after the dust settled."
Why bother trying to convince the "crackpots"? What percentage of the population are they, and does it really concern NASA? Maybe the most telling thing about the whole story is that NASA does seem concerned.
If they really want to prove them wrong, then take me (and everyone else) to the moon, and we'll check out that flag and footprints to see if they're there.
Nasa will not be able to convince all the "crackpots" until there is a viable station on the moon that people can go to for vacation.
Remeber the pseudoscience they used to "prove" a Martian meterioite had evidence of extraterrestrial life? Lesson lerned: do not release the sample for independent verification of research.
Nasa should take off and nuke the crackpots from orbit - it's the only way to be sure.
dave
I mean, seriously, why waste good money on a bunch of people who don't believe that the NASA went to the moon? I mean, sure, some point they make are compelling about lack of stars, flag wave while there is no wind. But each and everyone one of those points been tackled by claims like overexposure, not so perfect cameras, etcetera. So why waste money on a bunch of idiots who do not believe the NASA? Besides, even IF you would prove it to them, there will always be a few retards who will still refuse to believe it all, claiming that the evidence was set up as well and more of such claims.
NASA should realize that there also are idiots on this planet who should be ignored.
Hate me!
Like theories about the evils of MP3 from people who think pink make mice tails rot off?
_O_
.|< The named which can be named is not the true named
For what it's worth I think it would be quit arrogant to even think we're alone in this universe we ourselves hardly know. The universe is simply too huge for us te imagine. Allthough I'm very sceptic about foreign visits it just might be possible. On the other hand would I want to visit a planet ruled by violence, envy and aggression. If they're smart they'll leave us alone
/(bb|[^b]{2})/
NASA should offer holidays to the moon. Anyone who doubts this can go up there, and see the evidence for themselves.
I guess they could always argue that it was only the Apollo moon shot that was faked. Of course, then you may as well argue that so were Marco Polo's journeys.
It's a non-issue.
What makes a man want to be a mouse? (Python's Flying Circus)
Is it my imagination, or are the people who believe the moon landings were faked often the same people who there's an aliens conspiracy in the Whitehouse?
Maybe it's just the the two groups are lumped together as crackpots. Either that, or it was the aliens who prevented the Apollo missions from succeeding.
People will believe what they want to believe. Evidence is ignored or twisted into something that helps their cause; human beings, for as long as the history books remember, have been leaping ahead into possibilities so minute, so improbable in order to feed a familiar sense of understanding; people wish and hope for what they'd rather know rather than what is, at times, oft eventually convincing themselves of something that may be untrue.
----- Wtcher Dragon, UDIC
If enough people believe it, then it happened. If they don't, it didn't. So we just need to know how many people believe it - cue a Slashdot Poll?
There is no spoon.
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
I personally say ignore the crackpots and don't waste the money.. unless things get out of hand and NASA's budget is threatened by the stupid people. If NASA stands to lose money from lack of funding because people start protesting their tax dollars being put towards "hoaxes", then make a book. Otherwise, a few individuals from the scientific community writing a few well-placed newspaper articles could help alot more than an official response from NASA.
Let's all don our pope hats and crusade against the crackpots! Man didn't land on the moon? Blaspheme! There must be purification!
It never ends with them, you can't please them.
You show them documents, they say they are fake.
Show them footage, they say it was done in a studio.
Show them the moon lander through a telescope, they say the telescope has been tampered with.
Take them to the moon and show them the lander in person, and they say it was planted.
Last time i posted this reply i got some replies suggesting that the crackpots be left on the moon.
Be you Admins? nay, we are but lusers!
One of Nasa's three stated mission objectives is "to inspire the next generation of explorers". Exactly how could the next generation be inspired if they think NASA was lying up-front about its most inspiring accomplishment?
Bad astronomy
"It takes considerable knowledge just to realize the extent of your own ignorance." - Thomas Sowell
"How NASA faked its proof of the fact that the moonlandings are not a fake; read all about it at www.crackpot.org"
Sigh! They should really create a new top level domain suffix,
www.something.moron
There seems to be no shortage of csutomers for it.
Only to idiots, are orders laws.
-- Henning von Tresckow
Apparently Sean Penn is booked on the next flight.
Yay! Lunar propaganda.
If NASA really wants to convince the "crackpots", I belive they
should create a separate organization, specializing in informing
people about "the truth". It may seem unimportant to inform "crackpots", but isn't it so that every democracy is based on enlighted individuals?
Where I live, in Norway, there are some goverment-driven places where one can get neutral info about i.e. mushrooms or certain law-issues. Perhaps a parallel to this could be a good idea for NASA as well?
That's what Usenet is for :-).
1)Write a book and call it "Moon landings for Idiot's".
2)Discuss the pro's and con's of the whether or not the moon landing happened. Need about 1/4 inch of text. Clarity and logic not necessary.
3)Profit!!
NASA should hire Chris Carter to plant fake clues, and build it up into such a wacky, all-inclusive conspiracy that it collapses from its own weight.
Did you guys read the article at cnn.com? I think it gives huge credibility to the "moonoax". Before I read it, I just took for granted that the USians actually landed on the moon and I didn't really care. Now I am starting to wonder why the hell is that flag fluttering. Yeah, maybe it's time for NASA to speak up.
NASA got itself into this problem by presenting itself as a frontier organization, a group of heroic explorers. And to maintain that image, they are wasting lots of money on useless projects like the space shuttle and the space station.
What should NASA do? They should present themselves as a scientific organization and forego the wild-west mentality. They should stop presenting astronauts as "heroes", reduce manned space travel to next-to-nothing, and instead go mostly with comparatively low-cost, unmanned probes. As you may have noticed, people don't generally ask whether unmanned probes are fake or not, and even if they did, nobody would really care very much.
And, of course, the other problem is that the US population isn't exactly up to speed on science, on average. Refuting a single crackpot is too little too late, but NASA should take its educational role in the sciences more seriously and they should get the funding to do it--they are trying, but they aren't making a dent.
If we had a scientifically literate population, and NASA stuck to doing science and didn't create a heroic mysticism around manned exploration, crackpots wouldn't stand a chance. The way it is, NASA is merely reaping what they sowed.
If Dr. Sagan was around I'm sure he would point out that debunking crackpottery encourages critical thinking. That was pretty much the whole point of his book The Demon Haunted World, the idea that we are constantly bombarded by claims, arguments, and pitches. By taking on arguments logically rather than emotionally you can separate the legitmate claims from the pseudoscience. These sort of skills have wide relevance in our modern world. Every person that has ever been subjected to an infomercial, a verbal sales pitch, a car sales pitch, a print ad (or about a thousand other forms of persuasive speech) would benefit from logical, critical thinking. Additionally, you are much better at constructing valid arguments if you understand logic and reason, and aren't forced to make emotional appeals, ad hominem attacks, etc. to convince someone of your viewpoint.
Can hubble resolve the garbage we left on the moon? Crackpots aside, that'd make some neat pictures.
I find it interesting that everyone is referring to the non-believers as "crackpots".
One thing that always stood out in my mind was a High School teacher of mine telling us that the computational power used to deliver people to the moon way back when was equivelant to the computational power in "current" (1994?) calculators.
Up untill that moment I had no reason to doubt the moon landing. After that, however, I started to wonder - not doubt, mind you - but wonder.
Is it really such a hard thing to find a hint of disbelief in? Way back when, on their first attempt, people fired a big-ass rocket off the earth, located and landed safely on another planet, walked around a bit, launched succesfully off of that other planet, located and landed safely back on earth.
I mean come on, yeah, in all likelihood it happened, but can you say that with absolute certainty that it DID happen (or as close to absolute certainty that reality will allow)? Are you so certain as to be able to label those who disagree with you as crackpots without even talking to them first?
...Also, I didn't know Buggalo could fly.
note: I DO think we went to the moon, but there are some things NASA can't explain.
Namely, why in some pictures, the crosshairs which were on the camera lens itself, actually appear either partially or fully obstructed by objects in the pictures. In one picture, for example, one of the crosshairs appears behind an Astronaut, in another, behind a flag, etc. This is technically impossible, since the crosshairs were on the camera lens itself. Further more, numerous people, including former Astronauts have stated that it was impossible to take and bring back pictures, because of the Van Allen Radiation Belt, pointing out that numerous attempts were made prior to the moon landing to take pictures in space and bring them back, but each time the film was totally ruined, with spots and lines through it.
Again, I'm not saying we didn't go to the moon, we did, the physical evidence is irrefutable. But there's strong evidence to suggest that the picture were absolutely fake. It's not inconceivable that NASA realized that without pictures, many people wouldn't believe the landing took place, so they faked them.
Of course, NASA would never admit to that, because it would give more ammo to the "crackpots," and prompt many to wonder, if NASA was lying about that, what else are they lying about?
Just a thought.
$SIG{__DIE__};
Show them the moon lander through a telescope, they say the telescope has been tampered with.
Thats the whole point of these debunking missions you can't see the lander on the moons surface or the rovers, even with modern telescopes the size relationship between the lander and any earth based telescope is just too small its like looking for a grain of sand from 100,000 miles away.
I believe Japan is launching a mission in 2003 to photograph the moon (called LUNAR-A) from a hi resolution camera on a low orbit satellite , also a californian company is doing the same with a mission called Trailblazer which also should prove/disprove that mankind was indeed on the moon.
In order to see if someone is lying you cannot ask the said lier to show evidence especially if fabrication of evidence was an issue in the first place , that is why its probably a better idea for a independant non connected 3rd party to verify the accused lier's claims.
Of course this still probably wont be enough for the hoax/conspiracy believers as they will say NASA skewed the results or "tainted" the 3rd party.
You must remember, we live in an age of liers and fraudsters and no one is untouchable even a established science agency such as NASA or members of the American goverment, after all no one thought Enron or AC would be one of the biggest frauds in history so it is somewhat understandable that people don't believe everything they see
But for the "ignorant" masses an independant investigation will go a long way to dispell any doubts, especially from one by a country independant from that of the said "fraudsters", plus with any luck they might be able to complete some worthy science along the way.
If NASA wants to refute these twits without giving credence to thier theories, there are ways. First, you make a web page/materials that debunk the common myths and arguements. Then, whenever someone comes up with a 'new' article 'proving' that it was faked, you simply link to the appropriate parts of the page, adding as little necessary to debunk the people.
:)
'Duh' I hear you say, it probably exists allready, the point was not to give these people exposure, and by extension, legitemacy. Well, you don't have to mention them, what they stand for, thier organizations, thier pets, or the brain tumor that they should have removed. Every time one of these crackpots surfaces with an epic theorem, simply restate it, with NO refrence to the origional, and shoot it down. After the first 10 or so, you could almost automate it with a perl script. Think auto-flame generator.
This way, you get your information out, without helping them. It cuts the legs out from under moronic attention-getters. I used to use similar tactics on street preachers who hung out in my favorite places and tried to 'convert' me. If you actively attack to de-legitimize them, they win. Go around, and you win.
-Charlie
P.S. My personal opinion is to wait them out till they go away, and have the CIA kill them, it will make the world a better place. We really should be getting some return on all those 'black' dollars we are spending!
You've got TransOrbital's TrailBlazer mission which will take photos of the landing sites. Followed a few years later by TransOrbital's Electra II which will drive rovers up to the landing sites. And within 15 years we'll have Chinese astronauts on the Moon (they say by 2010, but personally I think that's about 5 years too optimistic).
None of these things will convince the conspiracy nuts. Nothing would. But that's not the point. The point is to discredit them in the eyes of the public.
Slashdot monitor for your Mozilla sidebar or Active Desktop.
In arguments with people, I have a goal that I shoot for. I try to make sure that I've reached the point where: a) I am sure that my opponent has heard me and understood me; b) I am sure that I have heard and understood my opponent; c) I can state my opponent's views, and his or her reasons for holding them, in a manner that my opponent agrees is accurate; d) my opponent can state my views and their rationale in a manner that I agree is accurate.
Even with very intense religious or political discussions, it is usually possible to reach this goal.
And, for the most part, this goal is usually about as far as it is possible to go, at least in a single argument. After you get that far, you need to give it a rest for six months or so and not keep harping on it.
It is very unusual for anyone to say "By gosh! you're right! I just changed my mind." But if you can get a mutual understanding of each others' point of view, the chances of productive progress sometime in the future are much increased.
At work, say, with discussions with colleagues or supervisors, what typically happens (when I'm right and have presented it well) is that nobody agrees at the time, and nobody says that they've changed their mind, yet three or six months down the line I will see some partial or incremental progress in the directions I've advocated.
I believe that the same goal should be applied to the "moon-landing-hoax" debate. NASA should try to present clearly and publicly, the reasons why people believe the moon landing occurred, AND should try to address the opponents' arguments intelligently and respectfully.
NASA should not expect to convince the "it's-a-hoax" crowd nor to settle the debate, but NASA needs to acknowledge that the government has lied to us on occasion, and that saying, in effect, "it's true because we say so, and your opinions don't count because you're crackpots" is arrogant and inappropriate.
The Amazing Randi has not "settled" any debates about psychic phenomena, but he's done a lot of good.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
I've been reading alot of how we should make them believe, and do this and that to make people believe or think a certain way ie. that the moon landing did indeed occur. which I believe it did, but we have to realize that we need these kinds of people, the people that think against the grain at times, you never know if they actually might be on to something. So i suggest that we do write somekind of book explaning the events that took place and let them decide for themselves if they want to believe or not. If they don't they never will, and if they do well that's great, hopefully they will get a greater appreciation for science.
Just my 2 cents
Always ignore. Morons who fight logic with illogic cannot be fought with logic. It only feeds them. Suckers who believe them can't be convinced with logic either so it's useless to try. Let Darwin sort it all out.
NASA should assemble all the crackpots and tell them about the giant mutant space goats coming to devour the planet, then herd them all onto the rockets that will take them to safety....
----------------------------------- My Other Sig Is Hilarious -----------------------------------
How do I know OJ Simpson played a real fake astronaut?
It is not about the crackpots. It is not even about moon landings. It is about teaching reasonable folks about critical thinking and evaluating evidence.
There are many people who believe what they see on Fox, because there are no easily accessible sources that give them the other side. These people also vote at elections, and one of their votes count as much as your vote (at least theoretically... :-) ). They shape policy as much as you do, and really, democracy can't work unless you have a well-educated public who can tell when they are being lied to.
That's why NASA, and every well-educated person has to spend time teaching everyone about evaluating evidence, not because of the moon landings, but because you can't have a working democracy without.
Employee of Inrupt, Project Release Manager and Community Manager for Solid
They present these claims as factual, so they should be sued for defamation and slander by every scientist and astronaut that worked on the Apollo program. They should be left penniless, destitute, with judgements against them that they can never hope to pay off. Let them see how much of an audience they get when they are living in refrigerator boxes under bridges.
Nor can you win over crazy. It's fruitless to try and only serves as a solid world troll.
IF people can believe that millions of abductees are lying why then is it illogical to believe our government may have faked the moon landings?
To this day no other country has put a man on the moon.
To this day we havent went back to the moon, and the timing is suspcious.
I'm not saying we couldnt do it, but we have every right to be skeptical of the moon landings, just like we have every right to be skeptical of the roswell incident.
The government lies when it benifits them to do so.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
The crackpots will always believe that they are correct, regardless of what the scientific community does. For example, the Air Force was constantly berated for not "explaining" the Roswell incident more completely. But when they did, all the crackpots said they were just covering it up with their explanations.
The "Moon Landing is a Hoax" crackpots are the same: if NASA doesn't refute them, then they can continue with their silliness. If NASA does refute them, then the crackpots either say "See, if NASA is refuting us, we are important" feeding into their delusions, regardless of the information NASA releases. It's a Catch-22.
Plus, any information that NASA does release would be used against them in some way: any little deviation, correction, etc, automatically triggers the "conspiracy sense" these idiots have.
It is a lot like the John Edwards stuff: you can explain exactly how he does his tricks, exactly how he gathers his information, but none of that will actually convince a person who believes.
Vincent J. Murphy
Spandex Justice
Come on now, can't you see what's due? Try to imagine what would you do if someone came into your garden and said "hey, this is my house and my garden". Would you start arguing with the guy? I sure wouldn't. I would probably:
- Tell him to get his ass outta here or else I'll call the cops
- Call the cops
- Use physical force (aided by appropriate tools) to get the guy off my property
but sure as hello I would -not- argue with him. If I would argue, I would give a very small legitimity to the claim. And he'd take it from there and get more and more obnoxious, so I would really have to kick his ass.
Why should NASA refute these crackpot claims, argue with sleazy journalists in search for fame? You don't argue these outrageosly stupid allegations, because if you do, you give them at least a little bit of validity.
Sigged!
So why cant the moon landing be a Hoax?
How can you believe something when it was only on TV? You didnt see it in person.
Also why has no other country gone to the moon besides us? We havent even gone back since then.
So why not be skeptical.
I'm going to admit I dont know either way.
I dont trust the government, the government is just as quick to claim something they cant prove is a hoax, like UFO sightings. Millions of people claim to have seen them, but its a hoax because the government prolly doesnt even know.
So why dont we have the right to be skeptical of the government if they are skeptical of us?
If you claimed to have found an unlimited energy source and your only proof was a video tape, and no one has since been able to duplicate your experiment in a lab, everyone would say its a hoax, including NASA.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
I thought I saw something on Fox or Discovery chan that combated the hoax theories?
Dont we have relatively inexpensive telescopes that people can buy to see apollo debris left on the moon? I mean it's not THAT far away!
I do entertain myself with the hoax theories when I see them.. but come on as Jim Carey would say "We landed on the moon!!!"
This is right down the line with Area51. People have some amazing imaginations!
It's posts like this that make me understand why people think American science teaching is a joke.
There is nothing "NASA can't explain" about these photos. Really, go visit badastronomy.com or one of the numerous other web sites which explain precisely why these photos look the way they do, rather than spouting about fakes because you don't understand the physics of optics.
I mean, do you honestly believe that rather than just buy a camera with a plate that had crosshairs... THEY PAINTED HUGE CROSSHAIRS ON THE WALL OF THE MOVIE STUDIO??!?!?!?!? Yep, sounds likely to me, why take the easy route when you can make life real hard for yourself and provide "evidence" for the crackpots.
But the show will go on!
Have you ever tried to take a photograph of stars in the sky? You'll quickly find out that if you want a decent picture of a person in the foreground, it's impossible. Why? Light from stars at this distance is incredibly faint. It's so faint that it won't imprint on film at the kinds of shutter speeds used for normal photography. That's really all they used to take those photos on the moon. Photos of starry skies are taken with very long exposure times, often more than several minutes.
Thats like me looking at UFO footage (theres plenty of so called scientists who do this) And claiming its real.
The government is quick to call it swamp gas, air balloons, everything under the sun besides an un indentified flying object. The government is to arrogant to admit they dont know something.
So if they cant admit they dont know what a UFO is, why would they admit the moon landing could have been staged?
IT only happened once,theres no absolute proof,it could be as fake as Alien Autopsy.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
I think NASA should refute them, but not spend too much time on it. It should be easy quick and inexpensive to put together a dossier of information which non-paranoids would accept as reasonable evidence that it happened. Sell it for $19.95.
It's important to address the concerns because unresponsive government is not good government. Even if they're crackpots, address them long enough to say "You're crackpots, here's why you're crackpots, good night" If they don't do anything, then it is fuel on the fire.
On the other hand, if they provide proof in the form of some dossier, the conspiracy theorists are in a position of having to refute more and more documents, and saying that the conspiracy goes even deeper than they thought in NASA. The kookier they get, the fewer people will buy their crap.
-- Truth goes out the door when rumor comes innuendo. -- Groucho Marx
How is NASA more credible than the so called crackpots?
What makes NASA incapable of lying?
I just dont understand how people can be so stupid to trust everything the government says. Gov said Roswell was a flying saucer, then changed their story to a weather balloon when people began to panic, then in the 1990s they said it was a top secret spy balloon with test dummies inside with big black eyes like the witnesses saw.
Thats 3 seperate lies about the same incident right there.
Then you have the secret test trials they did on the population and prolly still do.
\\
The government is no more credible than people on the art bell show, when I see another country besides our own go on the moon and put their flag on it, then i'll believe we went there.
So far i've only heard of one country landing on the moon, the USA, I've only seen one video, ours, and no ones ever done it since then, not even us.
So of course I'm skeptical, I mean China, Russia and other super powers still havent landed on the moon and its 2002?
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Wow look at the UFO videos, the crop circles, alien autospy, hell all of this bullshit could be created by the government as part of a psyops program to confuse and scare other enemy governments into wasting resources on invaders that dont exist.
You need to wake up and learn to believe what you can actually prove, not just what you see.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
The debunkers have a point. That was over 30 years ago and one look at today's world tells us it was obviously impossible. And everytime you vote for not funding the space program, you help them prove their point.
I know what I saw in my backyard on July 20, 1969. Watching under a full moon, watching the moon landing on TV. I know what I saw.
But I know now that I was wrong. What do I tell my daughters?
The essence of science is repeatability. Show me this wasn't a hoax. Wasn't a one time stunt at the most.
Don't give me a book. Don't debunk this with photoshop.
Give me a space program. Let's go back.
In soviet russian a beawulf cluster of fake moon landings or something.
boy oh boy......Since when does being a skeptik make you a crackpot?
You'll never be able to prove UFOs or Alien Abductions are real unless you physically show people.
You'll never be able to prove that the moon landing happened unless you physically bring people to the moon.
I'd believe the moon landing happened if other countries also went to the moon, the fact that its only the USA who sent men to the moon allows skeptics to claim its a hoax.
It would be hard for skeptics to claim UFO sightings are a hoax if other governments were claiming its not, but because our government says its a hoax and other governments dont comment on it , well then its a hoax. Forget what millions of people say, forget video tapes, forget physical evidence like weird metals, its all fake or done in the studio.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
The belief in psuedoscience has not increased nor decreased. People are, by nature, susceptible to wild ideas. Sometimes, in the case of research based theory and science, this yields fantastic results. The majority of the time, though, it just yields fantasy.
All the article is pointing out is that we're now in the Sun entering the house of Virgo new-agey crapfest that resurfaces every ten years or so. Science will once again become popular at some point. When it is popular again, it'll be for all the wrong reasons.
My favorite way to refute psychics is a joke: "I don't believe in psychics, because you have to make an appointment".
So, go out there and do your job... :-)
...richie - It is a good day to code.
kinda reminds me of the creationists too.
UFO investigators, they go around trying to prove that UFOs are real and that they land on earth.
How is NASA going to prove we landed on the moon?
Impossible, even if there were thousands of hours of footage
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
Is-it true that 50% of Americans believe in UFO ?
UFO as 'I've been abducted by little green men', not UFO simply as Unknown Flying Objects, which do exist of course.
Should NASA help also to dismiss these myths?
It's going to be hard: when you really look at it it is really a belief: it's the same thing as fighting against astrology or other stupid myth.
The only thing that can help fighting those myth is better teaching, trying to change the mind of adults is nearly impossible.
PS:
I'm French but I'm not criticising the US, in France we have our own crackpot theories:
- astrology is a huge marcket here
- to apply to any jobs we have to write by hand a letter so that a specialist can check in our handwriting our qualities and default!
*Sigh* and I'm not even joking: it is sad but true.
I agree, if enough countries go back Ill believe it. BUT I'm not going to believe anything which comes directly from one source.
Why should I put all faith in NASA? When I see China or Russia go land on the moon I'll believe it.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
There is one way to refute the folks who think we faked the missions to the Moon: show samples of Moon soil from the Apollo missions and compare them against the Moon soil sample brought back by the Soviet Luna 16 probe in 1970.
:-p
Given that these two samples are pretty much the same element-wise, that should end the arguements once and for all, so there you hoax-believers.
The problem with silly things like this being given publicity and put into the general "crazy conspiracy theory" basket is that it creates a habbit of people to assume that anything that is contrary to what the government says as also being in that crazy basket.
For example you make a big deal about this obviously false argument, then you cast, say those opposed to civil rights violation due to anti-terrorism legislation into the same basket, then some people could judge it in that light. It might not be complete but it may be enough of a doubt or discouragment to stop them taking action in the form of protest.
I think silly things like this just deflect attention from the real issues with current government.
You are enclosed in a hermetiacally sealed space suit, its damn hot in the sunlit parts of the lunar surface and even your body heat will accumulate inside the suit. Yet, there is no atmosphere into which you could dump the excess heat which means that you cannot utilize a heat exchanger!
NASA should contract a PR agency to release "information" about how the crackpots are really funded by the CIA in order to draw attention away from the fact that the moon has been occupied since the mid 70's. The CIA, and their cohorts the NSA, have maintained a super-secret observational post and with budgets on the increase they are expanding their capabilites to include a laser which sends subliminal signals to anyone who looks at the moon thereby reducing the resistance to American imperial business units (Disney, RIAA, MPAA, etc) and completing the cultural unification of ze world!
Remember, You are unique...just like everyone else.
This moon hoax crap is as disrespectful as burning a flag. It's not the flag under attack, but the men and women who sacrificed time and their lives so that you could actually exercise the right to express your feelings by...burning the flag.
OK--it's circular, but you get my meaning. Denying an accomplishment is a very personal thing. No wonder why Aldrin took a slug at that harrassing hoaxmonger. Bad enough that he got second fiddle to Neil on the first moon landing, but then for some nose-picking assclown to come up and claim you didn't go at all, well, that's personal.
Gus Grissom, Roger Chaffee, Ed White, Mr. Freeman, C.C. Williams, Mr. See, Mike Smith, Judy Resnik, Ms. McAuliffe, Mr. Onizuka, Mr. McNair, and quite a few more people died in the process of training or actually going to space. Their tombstones aren't fake. Their loss to their family aren't fake. Their motivations were never fake. The blood, sweat, and tears given up so we could stand on that ball of rock wasn't fake.
Personally, I think the moon hoax people are fake.
Vos teneo officium eram periculosus ut vos recipero is.
You can physically go there and see it. As far as whats inside, well you can believe the gov and they say Area51 doesnt exist even though you can physically GO to Area51, or you can believe the people who claim it exist and who work there.
Since the government doesnt give any counter information on this issue, you dont have any choice but to believe the amazingly imaginative stories.
If you use Linux, please help development of Autopac
You're probably not going to change the mind of someone who is CONVINCED the moon landing was a hoax.
;-)
NASA should bother simply because the people that deny the Moon landings are the most amusing of the conspiracy theorists of course!
I get my heartiest chuckles from these folks and, say I, the more ammunition they have the better. They will take everything NASA supplies and twist it into some sort of "it did not... INFINITY" arguement.
Oh my, I can feel the giggles building
Eve Fairbanks says I drive a hybrid!LOL
How can the flag flutter when there's no wind on the moon?
The flag flutters because of the "sun wind", i.e. light pressure. If americans would have better physic lessons, they would learn about it..
Why can't we see stars in the moon-landing pictures?
Do you see stars when you make pictures on a clear night, but need to have a short exposure time
because of the extreme foreground brightness??
The human eye has much much more gain than a camera.
Why did'nt we hear the noise of the rocket motor when the Moon lander was returning to earth?
Hmmm, in space no one can hear you...
OK.. Why not ask AMSAT to send a cheap satellite to the moon and take some images from the landing sites. Sent these picture to earth using ham radio, so that everyone can see them and no one can fake you again!!!!!
Better ignore the ignorants...
I think that this shows very clearly that there is a number of people who expect the US administration to either lie or prevaricate.
I do not think that this is based on doubts over science, just cynicism built on experience that governmental bodies frequently push false information.
The US is currently lead by someone who lied and cheated their way to power, GW certainly did not win an election. Why should it be any different in any other department?
Slashdot Beta should die a painful death.
How can the flag flutter when there's no wind on the moon?
The flag flutters because of the "sun wind", i.e. light pressure. If americans would have better physic lessons, they would learn about it..
Why can't we see stars in the moon-landing pictures?
Do you see stars when you make pictures on a clear night, but need to have a short exposure time
because of the extreme foreground brightness??
The human eye has much much more gain than a camera.
Why did'nt we hear the noise of the rocket motor when the Moon lander was returning to earth?
Hmmm, in space no one can hear you...
OK.. Why not ask AMSAT to send a cheap satellite to the moon and take some images from the landing sites. Sent these picture to earth using ham radio, so that everyone can see them and no one can fake you again!!!!!
Better ignore the ignorants...
It's a bit closed-minded to simply dismiss those who question the veracity of this "accepted truth" without hearing what they have to say. The use of the term crackpot is more ad hominem than anything else.
I do believe that the moon landings happened, by the way. I think that the evidence stands overwhelmingly in favor of it - but while some folk are accusing these so-called crackpots of having irrational faith, how do you know what you "know?"
In what is your faith placed? Is it faith in government science documents, or faith in other "believers" who agree with you?
Surely there are people with completely irrational beliefs out there, but if you don't ever listen, you may never hear truth that contradicts conventional wisdom....
But Herr Heisenberg, how does the electron know when I'm looking?
Inveigle a crackpot into the centrifuge and spin him until well-done. Afterwards, he'll forget all about wanting fame via crackpotting:
"Chelette said some centrifuge subjects awake confused, bewildered and disoriented, often with no memory of the event. Others react violently with spasms and convulsions: what some call the 'Funky Chicken.'"
http://www.af.mil/news/airman/0698/spin2.htm
I didn't believe the nutcases until I saw one of the shows. They weren't talking about tinfoil on their heads-- they had some pretty interesting points if you ask me.
Let's face it. People lie and so do the governments they form. They lie to others and they lie to themselves. They lie to cover up, to make believe, to get rich, and to advance a million other schemes. Some of the lies are even honorable and kind, but that doesn't change the fact that it occurs.
It doesn't take too much work to find lies as big as the moon landings. According to the press releases and the briefings, we were "winning" the Vietnam war up until the very last strategic withdrawal. President Clinton didn't have sexual relations with that woman. Terrorists set the fire in the Reichstag. The US signed a treaty forbidding biological weapons.
So I think that Nasa should answer these things. I think the cost of a few historians isn't very much compared to the cost of a space probe or a Mars Lander or even an additional programmer. What the heck.
I theorize that my head will not explode if I have sex on the moon with that hot chick Topanga from 'Boy Meets World.'
Almost explode, but not quite. I won't mind if it does explode afterwards.
I prefer Buzz Aldrin's response... The Daily Show featured a video by a hoax advocate as he harrassed the astronaut on a city street. Aldrin simply ignored the guy until he got in his face calling him a liar and demanding that he tell the world the truth, at which point he punched the guy in the face and continued on his way.
More at Bad Astronomy
What do you mean they cut the power? How can they cut the power, man? They're animals!
Reluctantly, I think NASA should debate the crackpots - but with hard data AND personal testimonies. Line up every guy that's been to the moon and INVITE the people to call them liars to their faces, along with presenting the crackpots with their evidence. Doing it on both levels works wonders - the crackpots have to look both impolite and ignorant.
I do think this is important because with the prevalent media, though it can give us much information, it's also highly biased towards spectacle and word-games. It's a virtual reality of talking heads, word-juggling, and popularity contests with far to little connection to anything actually relevant. Anyone can come up with a bunch of pretty words, push a few buttons, and ridicule a few people to polite to be jackasses, and bam - instant "credibility" despite the fact said person has any relevant arguments, evidence, or credentials.
Debating the crackpots isn't just good for science or society, it'd be good for our culture.
"The Sage treasures Unity and measures all things by it" - Lao Tzu
Channel surf around on cable or satellite these days and you are likely to find pseudo-scientific programs all over the place. "Scientists study the Bermuda Triangle" was one headline I remember. Even The Learning Channel dips into these low spots from time to time. And given the lack of scientific knowledge on the part of most Americans (or even a large segment of Slashdotters for that matter) there will always be a certain number of credulous people.
One of my co-workers was talking to his brother who mentioned that he had watched one of these no-moon-landings programs and now believes that there never was a moon landing. My co-worker responded, "The only people who believe that there was no moon-landing are the morons who believe the CIA killed Kennedy." A long silence ensued.
The mass media panders to people like this and most rebuttals would only reach those who were clueful anyway. My advice is to laugh at anyone who says that a moon landing never occured. And roll on the floor when you meet a flat-earther.
No one ever had to evacuate a city because the solar panels broke!
Trying to wack a little reality into the heads of these loons is a waste. While some apparently are faking their belief in this nonsense in order to make money, others are so alienated from reality that they're beyond redemption.
If someone has such a miserable little life that they have to prop it up by denying great achievements, give them your condolences and move on.
-- Slashdot: When Public Access TV Says "No"
You forget that Congress can cut funding to NASA and your Elected Representatives are itching to cut.
It's very understandable that NASA is nervous, high IQ hasn't been a very common factor amongst politicians and they may well constitute 'the ignorant masses' others have referred to in posts.
I have also seen a comment saying the answer is to send Robotica to explore for us. I say nay, we need to go there ourselves for it to count as human exploration. So there!I am the Barber of Seville.
A local hero of mine, Dr. Lawrence Krauss Chair of the Physics Department of Case Western University in Cleveland, Ohio, has taken up the call-to-arms to protect Ohioans and the rest of the world against crackpots. In our recent "Intelligent design" debacle, creationists attempted to hijack the science education curriculum, and, thanks in no small part to his efforts, were stopped. He has also made a bigger name for himself analyzing science fiction, and is best known for his book "The Physics of Star Trek." If you find a scientific cause that needs a real scientist to refute morons, he is your man.
http://www.accountkiller.com/removal-requested
If we had continued to explore the moon and established a base there and maybe moved on to the planets and the stars we wouldn't be having these debates would we? Going to the moon was (IMHO) man's greatest scientific and engineering achievement. We got there and just stopped. We had no vision for anything beyond meeting Kennedy's goal of sticking it to Soviet Russia before they stuck it to us. Literaly thousands of highly trained and dedicated engineers, scientists and techicians were given pink slips. The whole program was dismantled! We couldn't build a Saturn IV today if we tried! So is it any suprise that our collective memory of the achievement starts to fade into the realm of myth and legend?
Which is yet entirely different from the religious meaning of faith in the Bible, which is always tied to obedience (that which you have faith in, you also believe enough to follow. That which you follow, you obey.)
I have known as many religiously fanatic people who had Definition-2 faith in mass-media or government published "science" alone, as religiously fanatic people who had Definition-2 faith in religion alone. That said, I have a ton more contacts in religion -- so I wonder if that means that, percentage-wise, science has as many fanatic followers as, say, Islam?
[Followup] Interesting thought: After writing this, I immediately thought "well, at least they aren't as destructive..." Of course, then I thought of enough examples to make me take that back as well...
Correct Horse Battery Staple: 72 bits of entropy. Enter "Correct H" into google. When it generates the phrase, that's
I think NASA should only concern itself with Science and Space exploration/ exploitation.
You can't reason with Fanatics/Zealots in any rational way. Leave them in the Stone age.
Science will advance with them or with out them.
http://www.Slaveway.com
I had a college room mate that claimed to have done just that in High School. He borrowed a laser, bounced it off one of the corner cubes, and timed the delay. Just did it because he wanted to . When his physics teacher found out, he chewed him out for not writing it up. This would have been mid to late 70's.
But that's just third hand information, do it yourself, the equipment isn't that expensive.
You pathetic Lunatics, simply because you are too narrow minded to realize that you can't fly to the Moon, that doesn't give you the magical ability to fly to the Moon. The easiest way for you to realize that you can't go to the Moon is for you to try it- but we all know that will never happen. What planet have you been living on for the past 30 years? What has happened to all your childish fantasies: they have faded into nothingness, the only legacy Apollo has is the debate over whether it was real. "Get a Life!...it was only a TV Show." The only people that believe in the Man on the Moon are people who have never been to the Moon. You are only fooling yourselves. You have the rest of your lives to realize it was fake, it is your arrogance and vanity that blinds you to the most obvious truth, even if I pretended that you could fly to the Moon- you still couldn't. You are only dreaming!
Awww, did somebody forget his tinfoil hat today? A 25 foot roll of it only costs a dollar, you know. Surely somebody can find it in their heart to spare a dollar for a poor lunatic.
Paul
Geez, sounded more like Dave Barry to me. :-)
The revolution will NOT be televised.
This may come a little late in the discussion, but when I read this I just about flipped.
That's troubling to some scientific experts who contend that someone needs to lead the fight against scientific illiteracy and the growing belief in pseudoscience like aliens and astrology.
Since when is the belief in, or search for, extraterrestrial intelligence pseudoscience?
I mean, if NASA is going to put out documentaries like "Capricorn One", how can we do anything else but wonder about them?
668: Neighbour of the Beast
BYW, what was the outcome of that experiment?
Paul
They must refute. They can do it quietly if they're worried about their image, but their duty to the smart masses, let alone the world, is to sanction good science and refute or at least point out, the bad science.
So NASA, I pay your salary... you could at least have a quiet little apache box somewhere in a basement...
www.DebunkedPseudoScience.NASA.gov ?
s/nerd/boss/
s/jock/salesman/
gtm
How many people would believe in aliens if we never made it up there in the first place? How many people would think they were abducted when we ourselves couldn't get off the ground? Crackpots owe their dreams and fancies to the same people they are claiming are lying to them. Sure, one can dream of aliens and spaceships, but the dream because so much more solid once we see it work by our own hands and ingenuity.
(Besides, the moon's an F&AM resort. Only for us members, neener =P)
Zech Harvey, MCSE, MCDBA, CCNA
What you do is get CNN to write a story about what should be done about "crack pots". By doing this you get the label "crack pot" out there in the public knowledge and it's automatically associated with anyone who disputes NASA.
Quite clever really.
What the "no, they didn't go" idiots are doing is spreading libellous remarks, defaming the character of the many good, honest folks who made the moon missions possible. People died to make the missions possible.
If criminals in prison can sue the state for "not giving them access to sports facilities", or for "interfering with their freedom of religion by not allowing them to have live chickens to sacrifice" (both Readers Digest stories from several years ago), then surely NASA can shake enough dollars out of the money tree to nail those idiots to the floor... Wasn't it recently said that that NASA were going to shell out $15M to get a book written and published refuting the nay-sayers? That would be a good war-chest...
I don't know quite how it stands in the US, but in England the defamers have to provide, in court, sufficient evidence to prove that what was said or written was factual, or face the consequences. If you flat out say someone is lying about something, and can't prove it, you're in deep shit.
At the very least you're made to publicly retract the statements, and often pay damages on top.
Come to think of it, that might be a good strategy - make 'em prove NASA didn't go to the Moon. The definitive way to prove it would be to go to the locations NASA visited and photograph the lack of footprints, the empty space where the landers are sitting, etc. Not only would NASA be vindicated, they'd get a moonshot funded by the idiots who claim they didn't go...
The hoax believers don't actually want to be proven wrong. There's quite a bit of profit to be made off of other peoples stupidity. Even if we tried to take them to the moon, they would refuse, saying we were trying to get rid of them/they were brainwashed/something. Basically, any evidence you may have was faked by the Evil NASA, up to and including the laws of physics.
And the l33t shall inherit the 34r7h.
It seems that the root of most crackpot theories is confusion borne from misunderstanding and misinterpretation of NASA press releases and publications. Looking at bizarre theories provides insight into points that are unclear to the layperson.
Also, the details that conspiracy theorists point out as evidence of forgery actually have interesting stories behind them. Often, these seem to be the product of "common sense" not applying to how things behave in microgravity or vacuum. These could be worked into engaging educational materials, surprising and entertaining schoolchildren.
Yes, we should all believe NASA because as a government
o n_ belt
t .h tml
w er s/970630a.html
agency, they would never lie to us. And we should all
believe Tom Hanks, because as an actor (ie, someone who
pretends for a living) he is an instant expert on any
subject he makes a movie about. And we should all
remember that anyone who disagrees with us, or who
requests further proof of things we say are true is
automatically a kook and should be ridiculed!
More likely, is that Aldrin wouldn't swear on a Bible
while on camera because he believes in God (and knows
doing so would be a sin). And hitting a man who is
simply talking to you is not legal (unless of course
you are an Astronaut). If we could go to the moon
before, and I'm still not sure either way (I was a
believer, but I now have some doubts - which is not
a bad thing), then lets do so again. Right away!
And lets use that same foil we used to block out the
radiation from the two Van Allen Radiation Belts
before! Oh what fun...
http://www.wikipedia.org/wiki/Van_Allen_radiati
http://www-istp.gsfc.nasa.gov/Education/wradbel
http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/ask_astro/ans
Picture taken. Figure added to base picture at a later date. Argue the point arrogant fuck.
Crackpots? All of the sudden, when you question things that are commonly presumed to be true but never actually proven, you're a crackpot? Well, that sure doesn't sound like the hacker mindset (hacker as in the real hacker, not those 14 year old punks who WinNuke yahoo.com) to me. Sure, NASA should have to prove that they really landed on the moon when they said they did. Why shouldn't they have to prove it? I mean, if they can't prove it, then why should we believe it happened? There's no reason why we should be going around taking the word of a government agency in this government, that's for sure. -TS
www.moontruth.com
HBs- The astronauts would not have been able to withstand the exposure to the radiation received after passing through the Van Allen Belts.
NASA- The astronauts were only in the belts for a short time and thus would not recieve enough radiation to do them any harm.
-
Thats not the point, NASA. The point is that once the astronauts went beyond the Van Allen Belts they would be subjected to MUCH higher levels of radiation than we receive here on earth. The suits could not protect the astronauts and neither could the ship. Thats the point. Please argue the point. Of course you would need to know the extent of the radiation exposure; the amount of time spent beyond the Van Allen Belts; protection provided by ship and suits. Information that unfortunately is NOT provided on the web.
-
The problem is that NASA is dismissing these people as crackpots and their anger clouds their ability to argue the points logically.
how about nasa making it possible for US to get into space, and let US make our own descions?
sci.physics' home boy.
Even if you're lax and give the intern a week, that still doesn't cost $15k unless you're paying the intern three quarters of a million dollars per year.
Wacko thought of the day: this was all just a left-wing conspiracy to discredit Fox. ;-)
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
Transforming the theories' inherent silliness into laughter is the best way to get people to see that silliness. . .and, perhaps, to cause them to think a little more critically the next time they're confronted with an "urban legend."
As for the argument that "nothing will convince the crackpots": If the public can be educated to know they are crackpots, who cares?
DDB (live from the mothership)
Life is like surrealism: if you have to have it explained to you, you can't afford it.
Refuting crackpots means that NASA has to take a scientist away from his work, and pay him to read a crackpot's rant, and then write a rebuttal. After that the rebuttal has to be proofread, edited, and approved for public release, all of which would involve multiple people not doing their regular work. NASA has enough budget problems as it is, and spending money refuting the work of idiots is just wasteful. As the popularity of blogging grows, the number of crackpots spouting on the internet will too, and eventually NASA could end up devoting most of its current resources debunking the theories of people who insist that the world is flat, and that the moon landing was faked.
Better to just prepare for Mars.
Hey John, we need your spaceflight program right about now! But take all the time you need to make sure it's safe.
Should SLASHDOT Try To Refute Crackpots?
Posted by Don Harper on Monday December 23, @10:35AM from the crackpots-are-interesting dept.
Don Harper writes "Slashdot.org has an interesting article on a CNN article on the dilemma faced by (Slashdot)NASA: what is the proper way to deal with far-out theories given exposure (and legitimacy) by the media--ignore the crackpots or refute them? Let them post MORE stuff on Slasdot?"
Plueeezzeeeeeeee. The USSR would have hoisted us (US) by our collective nutsack if we had claimed to have done it and then faked it. I'm sure they spend kizzillions trying to find out if we had or not. I'm sure if there was even a shred of doubt, they would have been screaming. I'm not the brightest lamp on the Christmas tree, but gezzz, some of you folks seem to wake up in a new world every day.
So, what other crackpots are out there, besides the moon hoax? And besides, aren't these people an overwhelming minority?
"To confine our attention to terrestrial matters would be to limit the human spirit." -Stephen Hawking
the "face on Mars" is artificial, and NASA *KNOWS* it. Countless photos of the Cydonia site have been tampered with by NASA or not released at all.
Oh, I'm certain that I'll get all sorts of smart ass responses telling me that I'm ignorant or just plain stupid, but I've done my homework, and I know that the face on Mars is not some trick of light and shadows.
The only people who need to remain convinced are the people who fund the projects: congress. Given their access to classified information, I'm sure they will remain convinced that the moon landing was real, etc.
The American people, by and large, believe in NASA, and not the crackpots. Ignore them, I say.
WWJD? JWRTFA!
- The U.S. government enlisted the help of many private defense and aerospace contractors in order to reach the moon. For example, the lunar module was built by hundreds (if not thousands) of engineers at Grumman Aerospace. Are you suggesting that all of these people were "in on" your conspiracy, or that they were simply duped?
- The national (and in many cases, international) media was very close to NASA during the years of the moon landings. Reporters were routinely given access to the Apollo crews in the months and weeks before their launch, whereby they could follow the crew around and record their day-to-day activities. There was also a large amount of technical cooperation between NASA and the media for things such as the live feeds from the moon. Certainly the media would have had some complicity in your conspiracy; have all of these people remained silent, as well?
- The Soviet military establishment would have jumped at the chance to demonstrate that the American capitalist pig-dog "moon landings" were, in fact, fake. Is it your contention that the Soviets, even with their considerable (at the time) intelligence infrastructure within the borders of the United States, would not have known about such a far-reaching conspiracy? Or are they part of it, as well?
Finally, let us not forget the names of three men: Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chaffee. These were the astronauts that perished in the Apollo 1 fire, an incident that almost got the entire program shut down. If we never actually went to the moon, then why would NASA have to have launches in the first place? How do the deaths of these brave men fit into your conspiracy theory? I suspect that you find them rather inconvenient.Lots of things bother me about moon-landing conspiracy theorists, but they way that they callously disregard the sacrifice of the Apollo 1 astronauts is by far the most disgraceful thing about them.
We're going down, in a spiral to the ground
I say they should just have a link on their page that goes to a list of other pages already availible. There are some good people with too much time on their hands who have already done some great jobs at calling others idiots. Just link to them.
-- 'The' Lord and Master Bitman On High, Master Of All
Since then, he's written dozens of other books, which he's sold scads of, and plenty of folks still rant and rave about his theories.
So no, debunking these theories with actual facts just doesn't work...
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
Given the nice videoptape of the punch, and the certainty Sibrel put up a howl, it is interesting the prosecutors tooks a pass. Apparently Sibrel was poking Aldrin with a Bible, lured Aldrin to the hotel, is significantly larger than the 72 y.o. Aldrin, and was yelling insults at him at the time. You can see the video clip online. Details. So it's plausible that Sibrel was not merely annoying but threatening.
I don't think violence is an acceptable or effective way to settle the hoax dispute, or any other situation short of necessity. To Aldrin's credit in this case it appears to have been self-defense, and even if not then it was under extreme provocation.
Indeed violence is good for the bad guys; you can see here how much international publicity Sibrel got, and his fundamental motive is likely profit. I bet he made money off the incident from people inclined to believe conspiracy. Obvious senior citizen Buzz Aldrin is a ninja warrior loosed by NASA to silence their enemies.
The Sibrels of the world are best ignored, and there lies countered discreetly. NASA should focus on communicating its message clearly, not engaging in dialog with scam artists. SO perhaps it should refing its histories with additional details and replies to "but why did..." questions (except for example the allegation they murdered their own astronauts!) without once referencing their critics. (Why a handful of the criticisms are false is actually interesting, like why their are no stars in the pictures, or the source of the fill light, is not intuitively obvious -- see badastronomy and related sites.)
You should shoot the people who do not believe the same thing you do. The species will evolve into one that believes the same as you. Oh hang on, you don't believe in evolution either. Ignore me.
NASA's core business is delivering science and engineering, not education.
They're already there, but it's PR more than education. Have you heard the crack that most agencies have PR depts., whereas NASA is a PR dept. that happens to have an agency? NASA has for decades focused heavily on justifying and continuing its existence.
Also, most of the skeptics like the conspiracy theories better than the truth. They make for better storytelling. If they want to seek out the truth they could do it without NASA's help but looking to the Web sites and books taht already discuss the missions, and the hoaxsters, in detail. If the doubters doubt NASA's credibility, what good is NASA's imprimatur on the debunking material?
"We live in a society where there is no law in making money in the promulgation of ignorance or, in some cases, stupidity," Hanks said. "There are a lot of things you can say never happened. You can go as relatively quasi-harmless as saying no one went to the moon. But you also can say that the Holocaust never happened."
Followed by a quote from some guy at the Holocaust memorial. Isn't bringing the Holocaust into something as unrelated and relatively trivial as this a big no-no? I always thought so...
Your brain is not a computer.
For something that's small, let the theory die out naturally. For something that's big, make your case, and don't linger on it.
Most important, for those who want to wallow in ignorance, let them, their no helping some people no matter how much you try.
But I don't think it's NASA's job to do these things, there are certainly enough websites that are dedicated to this type of thing. This site for instance.
What about those of us who personally know someone
who has worked on the project. Don't you think
that they couldn't have accidentally spilled the
beans after a few beers?
Those who believe the bullshit of Rene that retired
construction worker who claimed to be a self taught
mechanical engineer, or any other imbecile have
manure for brain.
... you can only give him more ammo.
=brian
<Emily_Latella_Mode>
Nevermind.
</Emily_Latella_Mode>
- "History shows again and again how nature points out the folly of men" -- Blue Oyster Cult, 'Godzilla'
Try this.
:)
The nice thing is that debunking is fun. It makes us feel superior because we can argue a conspiracist under the table, and enlightens us along the way. Some of the debunking explanations -- and badastronomy offers just some of the many -- are quite elegant, like why the lander exhaust didn't carve a giant divot in the Moon's soft dusty surface. I love the Lego demo someone did of why astronauts in shadow were nonetheless brightly lit. And some of hoax contentions are hilarious, like why did the flag stand out straight if there's no air? (It had a rod, you idiots.)
The problem is not proof, which exists. The problem is persuasion, and you can't persuade someone uninterested in being proved wrong. Mark Twain supposedly said, "A fanatic is someone who can't change his mind and won't change the subject." (A favorite of mine, and soooo true.
The whole point of NASA engaging in this is *not* to "win over" those who believe in the conspiracy theory, it is to make sure that people have the information they need to make up their minds for themselves. It would be negligent of NASA to let the "debate" continue without their best effort to explain what they believe the facts to be. Whether or not the hoax "experts" can turn NASA's information and arguments against them is beside the point: not even trying is a worse sin than being misunderstood.
Besides, how can someone on SLASHDOT, of all places, argue against the free sharing of information? NASA should make its case as strongly and definitively as possible so that their voice will be heard, and people will be better-equipped to refute these lame arguments. What happens then is up to the rest of us.
I've got a bad attitude and karma to burn. Go ahead. Mod me down.
Funny. I read all those reports about waving flag and etc. Well they make a point but most of them can be answered. There is another thing that made me really confused. It's a "For all mankind" movie. If you know just little bit of physics you will too have some questions. So I'm staying in the middle. Let people beleive whatever they want. Calling someone moron didn't make anyone drop their beleives.
The obligatory:
4)???
5)Profit!!
Sorry, I had to...
This one is easy. The sceptics state that the radiation shielding is inadequate, but they don't offer any proof. They don't even list a refrence. Along comes person #2 who takes the sceptic's word as gospel, and voila, a conspiracy is born. I could go to NASA and ask them why rabid chipmunks burrowing through the capsule after being launched by Red-Soviet catapults did not kill the astronauts. Bet they won't have a scientific answer, even though it _DID_ happen, honest. Can't find anything on the web about it either. See, google is covering it up! The CIA bribed/threatened them into submission. Woe be we, freedom is doomed.
Getting back to the point, apply the same rigorous standards of proof to the accuser BEFORE you do so to the defendants answer, it is only fair. If you don't, you look like a crackpot and a moron. Remember, deep breaths.....
-Charlie
I read the best argument against the crackpots here on slashdot a little while ago:
You think the Soviets would have been monitoring the transmissions and would loved to let everyone know if they weren't coming from the moon.
Of course the crackpots would claim the soviets were in on it too. And do you think NASA would really fake something like Apollo 13?
X(7): A program for managing terminal windows. See also screen(1).
Here I got UFO sightings for the unbelievers.
UFO Sightings
Take a good look at the one on the bottom right
There is some strange white exaust liquid coming out of it when it flies over people's head.
Look what they're flying - spacecraft designed in the 1960s, Russian space hardware, and upgrades to old USAF ICBMs. (The much-publicized upgraded Atlas booster comes from a program started by President Truman in 1948.) NASA hasn't been able to get an all-new launch system working since the 1960s, despite several expensive tries. Yet NASA still has nine major centers, not counting headquarters in Washington, and 19,000 employees.
What NASA needs is a bankruptcy.
put the disbelievers on the next trip to the moon and leave em there.
"where are the disbelievers?"
"Stuck in a studio somewhere west"
Thanks, I'll look for his book as the library today.
Debunking is intellectually challenging because here are a set of facts you can't add to or modify, and here is (hypothetical) cretin who requires the most brutally elegant of persuasion to come around. Imagine explaining something to someone with the mental age of a five year-old, not because the hoaxsters are idiots but because that's the fun of the challenge. To can't send the hoaxsters to the Moon, however tempting it would be, for reasons of expense and that they'll disbelieve the experience anyway. (Thank you Capricorn One.)
Remember, it's not about proof but persuasion. You can't just throw a sheaf of paper and pictures on the table and say, figure it out. A famed critic-killer is Pasteur's swan-necked flasks.
So the challenge: What do you think, based on what we've done so far, can be used to construct the ideal, concise argument that we went to the Moon?
An example is an IMHO irrefutable debunk of the backlighting theories can be found here.
But your mission, should you choose to accept it, is to come up with the killer argument that settles the whole thing. Think of it as the simplest proof of the Pythagorean Theorem (there are many alternatives). Sell the solution to NASA, or in the spirit of free info just post it here.
My joking argument is that it would have been a hell of a lot easier to go to the Moon, and probably cheaper, that create a sinister murderous hoax of such dimensions. More seriously, who really thinks our government is this competent?!? NASA bumbling is ironically a beautiful defense.
... but since NASA thought no one could possibly believe that, they faked the terrain so it looked like the moon.
It's this the beginning of the "yes-men"
Not all of 'em
UF0 sightings!!
(?) It has nothing to do with rockets even by analogy, that's Newtonian physics 101. Same in space or atmosphere, the "pushes against" was always bogus.
As I said, use Google first. Answer is radiation/sublimation of water ice.
Look, I don't buy that goofy illuminati crap about NASA never going to the moon, only faking it for publicity or to scare the soviets or to win a game of checkers or whatever. But there's one question I've never seen satisfactorily addressed. Perhaps there is a really good answer that I just haven't heard, and if so, please provide it. Anyway, why _does_ the flag wave when placed in the ground if there is no atmosphere?
-- Nerds on toast in the new millenium
"As a boy because I was born and raised in Ohio, born about 60 miles North of Dayton and uh, the legends of the Wrights have been in my memory for as long as I can remember" "I guess thats the story of flight in, uh, the 20th Century, uh, from the, from the beginning, to, from the, uh the very first flights at Kitty Hawk, to uh, the various, the very furthest and fastest flights man has ever made." " If we look back a century from now we'll really be amazed at what has been happening."
I see. You have my apologies sir!
:)
Now I feel stupid.
"Take this thing to Area 51"
"But sir, that's where we're building the fake moon landing set"
"Hmmm...then form NASA and land on the moon! get on it"
"Yes Sir"
Make up a resouce book for good (vs. crappy "because so-and-so said so") science teachers. Fill it with cold facts, and LOTS of detailed "try it yourself and see" experiments (everything from photographing mini Xmas lights in the day (to see if stars should appear in lunar photos) up to bouncing a laser off a reflector on the moon).
Spell out very clearly that the resource book is aimed at honestly curious, open-minded people, NOT zealous "it was faked" believers, and NOT sensation-hungry reporters.
Specifically and repeatedly warn well-intentioned folks against trying to convince either reporters {who MUST have stories to have a job, and ONLY have a story if they say "it was faked") and zealots (who are no more interested in real facts than sports team fanatics).
It's easy to make up & spread cool- and credible-sounding stuff. Finding & checking hard facts is hard work.
I'm just glad to hear that Buzz Aldrin decked somebody over the manner. That's a space cowboy.
___________________
Because $15,000 is roughly equivilant to the amount of change that was lost in couches at NASA this year. Even with a much smaller budget than they should have, 15 grand is chump change to NASA.
Honestly, though, I think that saddest part about this debate is teachers who are unable to refute the crackpot claims of FOX (I mean, FOX!)
"Teacher, why are there no stars in the picture?" "Because the flash drowns them out." "Why is the flag moving even though there's no wind?" "Because there is no air to stop the motion of the flag, so the smallest movement will create ripples that go on for a while."
Why should I argue rationally with someone being irrational? I'll just mock them instead.
If crackpot theories get coverage in the media, then definitely respond because this will give more exposure to NASA and real science. It's a chance to truly educate the public (who would otherwise not be exposed to science via popular media channels), and such chances are few and far between. Utilize every chance for education. Those who won't believe you, won't believe you no matter what you say anyway, so you might as well try and reach those who may not be sure of the truth.
Higher Logics: where programming meets science.
HanzoSan is a japanese name and thus probably NOT korean. You dork.
next thing you know, people will claim you can reach India by going West over the Atlantic!
Ignoring them gives them no crediblilty. Refuting them acknowledges their views, no matter how silly. After all, if we never went to the moon, where did that moon rock at the Air and Space Museum in D.C. come from? Just kidding.
TallGreen CMS hosting
The scientific theories of the big bang and evolution are based on logic, observations, and measurements rather than a blind faith in a book written by a bunch of sheep herders 2,000 years ago. Things like background radiation, the red shift, a rich fossil record, and carbon dating all support those theories.
You are living proof that we need a moment of science rather than a moment of silence in schools.
I am trying to find out if anyone has any idea how much radiation the astronauts would be exposed to, if they go beyond the Van Allen Belts. What kind of protection would they need? How long could the astronauts take the radiation exposure before damage occurs?
NOONE is arguing the point, everyone is wandering off on their own little rants.
However, I object to NASA spending any money on this when they lack the money to actually fulfill their primary mission. Especially in this "give a man a fish" sort of way. If they want to spend money debunking, it should be spent on "teaching us to fish".
The solution? Open source debunking.
There are plenty of scientifically trained volunteers out there that would be more than happy to compile data and present cogent arguments.
If NASA spent some money to put the raw data up on the web, and opened a slashdot-style forum for people to discuss the data, it would be far better than hiring someone to speak the obvious truth.
If nothing else, if they hire someone to do it, obviously the conspiracy kooks will claim it's just propaganda. So it's useless for NASA to spend money on direct refutation.
Truth is sometimes stranger than fiction.
While I was going to school, I was taught how to take hold of an opinion and defend it, but I was not taught how to evaluate whether I had sufficient experience to be qualified to express an opinion. I was not taught to say, "I don't know." It was never one of the answers on a multiple choice test, and thus, by default, it was never the "correct" answer. While I was taught the concepts of first hand, second hand, and third hand information, I was never encouraged to apply those concepts in a coherent manner.
I remember, from school, an exercise where the students form a line and a message is passed orally form one end of the line to the other. The result is compared to the original message. Has anyone ever seen a variation on the exercise, where the students are trained to use simple feedback techniques for communication and told the goal of the exercise at the beginning?
So what happens when you have a bunch of people, with insufficient data and no experience, forming and expressing opinions without ever bothering to evaluate whether or not they should? You get noise, lots of noise! When the game does not reward those who take care to speak the truth and it does not punish those who say anything whether it is true or not, the truth usually gets buried in the noise! What happens when people talk but don't communicate? You get more noise!
How do you reduce the noise and amplify the signal? Oh, but isn't censorship a bad thing?
"Insufficient data, Captain." This line from Star Trek is an under appreciated gem.
I am not uniformly opposed to censorship. It's who does the censoring, why, and how, that bothers me. Self censorship sounds like an excellent idea! It cuts the noise at the source. How do you train people to do such a thing?
I think reasonable skepticism is valuable. How do you distinguish "reasonable skepticism" from "conspiracy theories"? More importantly, how you get such included in an education?
Don't these stupid moon-shot-was-faked TV shows on the Redneck Network (TNT) basically libel anyone who was involved with the moon shots, calling them liars and frauds?
A civil lawsuit against these wackos might be the most cost-effective solution to getting them to shut the hell up.
Edith Keeler Must Die
I haven't read all the comments yet, so if I'm repeating something, shrug and move along...
I think the obvious solution is to round up all the hoax believers, put them on a shuttle, and drop them off on the moon. Make sure they have spacesuits, since you want them to have time to appreciate the situation. Also, don't forget to film the looks on their faces as you depart without them...
Lets assume NASA was to get specific funding to do this. I would foresee NASA becoming more of a Grand Inquisitor of sorts, and anyone who has independant theories - plausible or not - would have to go through NASA to get any due consideration. Keep in mind the myriad of independant new branches of science and technology which start out with "crackpots". IBM never gave microcomputers a second look, and considered mainframe and minicomputers to be the future until the day came when Apples and DECs were taking up desktop real estate. Big blue had the muscle to catch up, and the free market mandate to give us the PC/AT. NASA, being a government agency, would simply be spending taxpayer money on maintaining an inflexibile artifice while other bodies were forging ahead, or worse, being trampled under by NASA.
For crying out loud, just dig the bodies out of the pond at Roswell, show everyone the "Sport Model" spacecraft and then the non-believers will know that we used alien technology and that we really did go to the moon...
And, of course, the other problem is that the US population isn't exactly up to speed on science
:-), I know about the vast difference between the Sun's and stars' brightness so that I know stars wouldn't show in most landing photos. However, I can't expect every Joe to become an amature astronomer also to verify the star claims.
I don't think this is really about education. It is about TRUST in people or institutions. They don't trust the government.
There is no objective way for a regular Joe to verify the moon landing. All they have are photos. Why should they trust the government? The government has done bad things in the past, such as test nuclear stuff on minorities.
I am not saying I agree with the bunk, but you have to look at it from a regular person's perspective. The main reason I don't buy the conspiracy is that the claims don't hold water. As an amature astronomer (and an amature speller
I think NASA should address the issue because it will only become bigger with time. It is not that expensive. Hire some out-of-work writers and webbies to put up a nice website with lots of illustrations and photos and science experiments that regular people can use to discredit the claims. Things like shadow experiments and pin-hole magnitude comparison boxes similar to what they did centuries ago to measure star brightness, and all kinds of nifty stuff.
Table-ized A.I.
Photoshop nonexistent in 1969, arrogant fuck. Picture taken, figure added later, crosshairs added last, no problem, arrogant fuck. Bloody stupid example in the first place, arrogant fuck. Not a fucking clue about photography at all, have you, arrogant fuck?
Real Daleks don't climb stairs - they level the building.
We should already have a colony on the moon, but we don't. The real problem is that They didn't take the knowledge learned from going to the moon to higher levels. They gave up on the moon, so all that effort was essentially wasted. How about a real space race? I suggest a race to colonize the moon because I'm not impressed with the pathetic efforts that have taken place so far. As far as I'm concerned those achievements were isolated incidents that might as well not have happened at all.
Colonizing the moon means that we'll be forced to learn to live indefinitely in space, which has collosal implications far beyond a few visits to a lifeless rock in space.
The whole situation reeks of washed up football players spending life trying to ride the wave of successes past. It just doesn't fly! Whoever colonizes the moon will be the lucky ones that don't go extinct within the next few millenia (and I'm being hopeful). Now that's a prize!
The burden is on the media to present an accurate story. I don't think that NASA should expend time and energy to refute the crackpots themselves, but should make sure that they are available and helpful to any journalists investigating these theories.
Under capitalism man exploits man. Under communism it's the other way around.
Maybe I don't know enough about telescopes, but wouldn't it just be a bit easier to point out the flag througha telescope and if it was powerful enough the entire landing site? Maybe afraid that you painted the whole site of the other end of the lens?
what a previous poster said makes sense, how do you get a flag to wave in space, when there is no air? also look at the computing power these guys had. less than my palm pilot, and my palm is a pos that cant even read a flash card out of the box. then there is nasa's billionaire roller coaster policy: if you want a ride on a shuttle, not only must u pay lots, but you have to be drug free (lol first thing i would do is spark a fattie; there are no laws in space. hmm id also have some bitches on the shuttle gettin it on). and you are also not allowed to have ever said anything bad about nasa. but there are more serious clues. Just look at the shadow of that huge patio umbrella in the picture on the cnn site. i bet it was taken somewhere tropical. that guy in the suit must have real sweaty balls. if nasa wants to refute these arguments completely then all they need to do is borrow a few lawyers from M$, and put the word quality in everything they say. and as for fox airing the lunatic fringe, our question is not, what it was on tv so it must be true, but what? tv still exists?
A name you can trust.
I find great humour in the rush to judgement on crackpotness. History is alive with crackpots such as Galileo's bizarre idea that the earth circled the sun. Everyone at that time knew that the sun and all planets circled the earth. It is quite obvious as the sun makes its circle around us everyday!
Other crackpots include Albert Einstein, who so infuriated the scientific community with his nonsense theories that a who's who list of prominent scientists of the day took out a full page ad in the New York Times (I believe) denouncing one of his theories (theory of relativity I believe).
True science is constantly challenged. The problem is that when theories become status quo they develop inertia by those established under those theories. Their adherence can be just as fanatical as any fundamentalist religion.
The significant problems we face cannot be solved by the same level of thinking that created them. -Albert Einstein
An example is an IMHO irrefutable debunk of the backlighting theories can be found here [badastronomy.com].
Those are pretty nifty experiments. The only unconvincing one was the cross-hair issue. IMO the author should have showed various exposure levels, clear up to an over-exposure or two, which would have simulated moon brightness better (no atmosphere). The reader could then see that overly bright objects can wash out crass-hairs.
Table-ized A.I.
...when NASA is thinking of pulling astronauts out of the Space Station and budgets are tight ever where, they need not spend a dime on this crap. Only if a member of Congerss or the President has questions AND will budget an inquiry.
More than anything, this is a failure of the educational system and blowback from dishonest policitians who have made the reputition of American government a farce. Sad.
American society is just breaking down. What of pile of idiots.
Like the space teachers and university explain why the sky is blue and pictures of the Apollo landings show no stars. Let NASA alone. They had so much work to do.
However there are a large number of people out there who aren't part of either NASA or the lunatic fringe, who are trying to decide what to think, and at the moment the crackpots are the only ones trying to convince them.
NASA should go ahead with the plans, but make it clear that they are not addressing the crackpots, they are just trying to make all the facts available so that the average person can judge for themselves. As someone else pointed out, it would be easy to do this without even directly adressing the crackpots or their theories. ("Note that in this picture no stars are visible. The reason for this curious phenomenon is...")
Getting into a knockdown brawl with the conspiracy theorists won't convince anyone, but presenting the facts openly and clearly will convince the people who really matter, the ones who haven't made up their minds yet.
"They don't have a choice! Bob Rumson is the only one doing the talking! People want leadership, Mr. President, and in the absence of genuine leadership, they'll listen to anyone who steps up to the microphone. They want leadership. They're so thirsty for it they'll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there's no water, they'll drink the sand."
This Space Intentionally Left Blank
In a decade or so, there will be no living humans who walked on the moon. A sad legacy..
I'm a consultant - I convert gibberish into cash-flow.
One thing that always stood out in my mind was a High School teacher of mine telling us that the computational power used to deliver people to the moon way back when was equivelant to the computational power in "current" (1994?) calculators.
Early 1990's vintage handheld calculators were pretty doggone powerful in what they could accomplish. I graduated college in 1985 and had an early 1980's vintage programmable Casio graphing calculator that did just fine in assisting me in my differential equations class where we had to set up and solve all the systems of equations necessary to put a hypothetical satellite into Earth orbit and once there, to also accelerate it out of Earth orbit and send it on a trajectory to intercept Mars and then inject it into orbit there. It takes much more brain-work than raw machine computational power to do the math necessary for a moon mission. The Russians beat us to getting an object into Earth orbit first mainly because they figured out how to solve the necesary 3rd order diff-eqs before we did, and they did it the old fashioned way, no fancy computers needed.
As to any doubt about the moon landings, I was a child in elementary school in Houston during the Apollo moon mission era. I'm *very* certain the missions were not faked. My family's whole life revolved around NASA during those formative years. My father worked as an electronics technician with mission control during the Apollo 13 crisis, when even though I was only in 1st grade back then, I thoroughly grokked what was happening. Last time I checked, the Apollo 13 capsule was being restored for display at the Kansas Cosmospere in Hutchinson, KS. You might want to go vosit the place and see for yourself, I plan to go there myself this next summer.
You might have noticed several links to Bad Astronomy. The reason people keep pointing to that site is quite simple: it contains answers to these questions. Your particular question is dealt with here.
Quoted from NASA:
h tml . html 2 .htm
The Apollo program was designed to land humans on the Moon and bring them safely back to Earth.
President John F. Kennedy gave his historic speech to congress on May 25th, 1961. "...I believe this nation should commit itself to achieving the goal, before this decade is out, of landing a man on the Moon and returning him safely to the Earth."
Starting in October 27, 1961 there were 5 Saturn Rocket Test Launches, 5 Saturn Apollo Boilerplate Test Launches, and 3 Saturn/Apollo Vehicle Test Launches ending on July 5, 1966.
Remember the first attempt: Apollo 1. On January 27, 1967 one of the worst tragedies in the history of spaceflight occurred when the crew were killed in a fire in the Apollo Command Module during a preflight test at Cape Canaveral. The changes made to the Apollo Command Module as a result of the tragedy resulted in a highly reliable craft which, with the exception of Apollo 13, helped make the complex and dangerous trip to the Moon almost commonplace. The eventual success of the Apollo program is a tribute to Gus Grissom, Ed White, and Roger Chafee, three fine astronauts whose tragic loss was not in vain.
No missions were ever designated Apollo 2 or 3.
Apollos 4, 5, and 6 were uncrewed.
Apollos 7 and 9 were crewed in Earth Orbit.
Apollo 9
Apollos 8, 10, and 13 were Lunar Flybys.
Apollo 10 Command/Service Modules seen from Lunar Module after separation
View of damaged Apollo 13 Service Module
Telescopic Picture of Apollo 13
Apollos 11, 12, 14, 15, 16, 17 landed on the Moon.
No amount of message threads is going to convince anyone. Take a look at NASA's images and decide for yourself:
http://cass.jsc.nasa.gov/expmoon/apollo_landings.
http://cass.jsc.nasa.gov/expmoon/Appendix.html
http://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/lunar/apollo
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2001/ast23feb_
We don't pay NASA to refute crackpots, we pay them to fly missions.
- The Americans had to show a success in getting to the moon, because they were locked in competition with the Russians.
- It is impossible to send men to the moon, because they would be killed by the radiation.
From this, two conclusions are inescapable:- The competition with the Russians was pointless, because the Russians could not have sent men to the moon either.
- The Russians were too stupid to know this, because they kept building the N-1 booster despite the knowledge that they could not put men on the moon. Yet they did.
Making such a conspiracy theorist look like a complete idiot in front of their friends and family is a good way to get them to shut up, and if they are afraid to talk about such nonsense for fear of a severe beating about the concepts with logic, the meme will stop spreading. The real problem is that most people are so ignorant that they have nothing to use as a template for calibration of their bullshit filter.Scientists restrict study to entire physical universe; creationist
If the space program is fake, presumably the doubters can produce the Challenger crew.
(Oooooh... that was in poor taste.)
Vino, gyno, and techno -Bruce Sterling
Take them to the moon and show them the lander in person, and they say it was planted.
But it was planted! How could NASA have gotten it there other than by going to the moon? Taking the crackpots to the moon and showing them the lander ought to satisfy them, although it would probably be a bit more expensive than writing a book about it...
Whay am I saying all this? Well it ain't gonna change! Americans only understand history as a narrative about heroes. The US space program succeeded because it was a heroic venture and had popular support. I can't imagine it succeeding any other way. You think the public actually care about science? You're lucky any publicly funded science happens at all. NASA needs to compete with Hollywood for our dollars in order to succeed and that's not going to happen by explaining science to an uninterested public!
Doesn't it make you feel good to know that our freedoms are protected by politicans, lawyers and journalists.
30 years ago this month the United States unveiled a 50 ghz computer.
30 years ago this month the United States annouced mobile phones smaller than a pack of cigarettes that could display color pictures taken by a camera which is a part of the phone.
30 years ago this month the United States landed men on the Moon.
Which really sounds more unlikely ? The truly odd thing about the moon landings is that today we can not readily duplicate them. Shuttle is not capable of dealing with the thermal loads that it would be subjected to on a trip to the moon and yet it is more advanced than apollo. This seeming contradiction is one the general knowledge of the public is not readily equiped to explain. Same for the incidental details like the rod stiffend flag and the lack of stars in the landing pictures.
NASA is paying the price of having such a monumental achivement in the past which dwarfs its current efforts in the imaginations of the general public. Sort of like a one hit wonder rock band that never duplicates or extends its one successful song/album.
I think their time and money would be better spent doing things which released the doubt of the public by re-capturing their imaginations with current deeds instead of tired archival footage and head to head rebuttles of people who doubt what they have done in the past. In short stop telling us about all the wonderful things done and start doing more wonderful things.
I don't ask you to be me. I only ask you not expect me to be you.
The thing is, NASA is taking this exact approach in exploring Mars. But even this approach doesn't stop the conspiracy theorists. They just claim that the data from Mars (which they accept as real data) has been tampered with by NASA/scientists collecting the data.
There are (at least) two fundamental issues that prevent NASA or anyone else from addressing hoax claims:
1) You can NEVER prove a conspiracy theorist wrong, because you've made up all your evidence. They, on the other hand, are never obligated to provide any evidence (it's all been covered up, after all). Even when you do provide new data that refute the hoaxsters' claims (e.g., higher resolution photos of Mars), they just change their theory and accuse NASA of more cover-ups. There's nothing NASA or anyone can ever do about conspiracy theorists except to continue to point out to the general public that they are ultimately out to sell something (books, advertising time/products, etc.) and make money.
2) Until the public at large is willing to raise its collective level of intellect and actually THINK for a few minutes, this kind of drivel will continue. If the public rejects these tv programs, books, and hoaxsters by refusing to watch/buy/attend, a much stronger message will be sent than any NASA could provide.
Hmmm quite a perplexing problem... Perhaps it would take a rocket scientist to solve it... Wonder if NASA has any of those?
"Fox" does not qualify as "media", and "media credibility" is antithetical to the goals of Fox News. Rupert Murdoch is only interested in exploiting the ignorant masses for profit and furthering the agenda of right-wing conservatives.
I think it might be possible that when we sent people to the moon, the footage wasn't as spectacular as they had hoped. Perhapse the did make a few fake pictures on a sound stage at Area 51. There are worse things than a few doctored photos.
Someone hates these cans.
All NASA needs to do is send some key people back to college for courses in Psychoceramics. I guarantee that, after a semester or two of such, they'll be well trained in dealing with crackpots.
Bruce Lane, KC7GR,
Blue Feather Technologies
I categorize this question as a fallacy of "Complex Question". It asks you to give implied consent to a different conclusion that these people are "Crackpots". Support that conclusion first, then we can deal with your question.
So: Are they crackpots?
On the moon -- without the earth's atmosphere to block any of the sun, I would expect that sunlight would have a measurable effect -- perhaps even enough to produce a measurable bend in a flag. I don't think, however, that there would be enough variation in the sun's light strength or in the actual 'solar wind' (streams of particles (gasses) ejected from the sun) to cause ripples in a flag.
About the only time I remember seeing the lunar flags ripple is when the astronauts do something to shake them. I could definitely see this as being a big more pronounced than usual on the moon -- in a vacuum there would be no air to help dampen the movement. Perhaps this could be actually used to help prove that the videos are legit!
Given that the nay-sayers brought this effect to our attention, using it to prove that the pictures were taken on the moon (or at least in a vacuum) might put a nice bullet in their foot.
OS Software is like love: The best way to make it grow is to give it away.
Why is there no dust flying from the breeze that makes the flag wave ?
Why is the dust thrown in the air by the Rover's wheels going in a perfect parabollic, ballistic trajectory ?
There are so obvious flaws in the "evidence" of non-moon-landing that I'm starting to seriously think the "Moon-hoax" people are aliens trying to convince we humans that our technology sucks and that there's no hope to fight you back into space.
"The issue of trying to do a targeted response to this is just lending credibility to something that is, on its face, asinine,"
That is the same reason I never wrote an article on why Linux doesn't make a good desktop