Watch a movie called Capricorn One. It relates. Brilliant work of fiction.

So we can bounce a laser off a mirror left on the surface of the moon… How do you fake that??

My Aunt was one of those “nearly half a million people” that made it happen.

She was IBM Federal Services Division, assigned to NASA from late Gemini to early Shuttle, and her team of programmers were the people that wrote the LOI program for Apollo 8 (family legend holds that she was pretty much awake from the launch until she heard Lovell say “burn complete”, and immediately drove to our house in south Louisiana-where she slept for almost 20hrs straight. All I can remember (I was 8yrs. old-but was already *into* the program-and had already built my first Estes Alpha, as well! ) is constant commands from my mother to “..LET YOUR AUNT JUDY SLEEP!!!!”

In the article, you seem to have some doubts about the need to have written your original bits against the various morons that would pursue the hoaxers for the sake of financial gain. Don’t *ever* doubt that the work was worth it. Those of us who love one of the people who helped to accomplish this amazing achievement thank you. So it made you “famous”..so what? These days it seems a rare occasion when someone gets rewarded for telling the *truth*. Enjoy it!

Apologies for the length of the comment-I just wanted you to know. And thanks for that great Al Bean pic. Your reaction to it reminded me of the hysterical (but extremely profane, NSFW for most of us) take the satirical site “The Onion” did when addressing the : http://members.shaw.ca/rlongpre01/moon.html

NASA images: AS15-87-11695, AS15-87-11696, AS15-87-11697, AS15-87-11698, AS15-87-11699
http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-87-11696HR.jpg
http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-87-11695HR.jpg
http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-87-11697HR.jpg
http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-87-11698HR.jpg
http://history.nasa.gov/alsj/a15/AS15-87-11699HR.jpg

These images show the CSM (Command Service Module) of Apollo 15. The photos were taken from the LEM (Landing Module or Lunar Excursion Module). The images show the Moon surface in the background.
This could have happened only if the CSM was to land instead of the LEM.
My God, what a mistake!
What we should see is the LEM going toward the surface as on the image:
http://www.astronautix.com/graphics/0/10075156.jpg
These images also prove that the fake Apollo images were created by a small group of experts with only a few scientists and engineers checking the images, therefore some mistakes were bound to happen.

“You remember those little go-karts the astronauts took with them,” he said. “Up there? To ride around on when they explored?”

“The Lunar Rovers,” I replied. “Yeah Dad, we watched every space mission on TV as far back as I can remember. What about the Rovers?”

“I made a couple of parts for those things,” he said. “My fingerprints are up there. On two of those buggies. Just some little parts. Don’t even know what they were. But I held something in my hand that went to the moon. I made something that went to the moon. And it’s still there…”

Makes me proud. Remember, it wasn’t just the science folks who got us there. Thousands and thousands of people working together on little jobs, in shops and factories scattered all over the country did their part. Teamwork got us there. It’ll take teamwork to get us back there.

“One giant leap, for all mankind…”

I was 12 when I heard those words come out of the TV speaker. I’ll be 54 this year. Dad is in his mid 70s. It’s time we went back.

Skeptics come in many varieties. There are Phil’s type that are trying to bring science to the common man while at the same time debunking pseudo-sciences. But there are also skeptics of governments and leaders that fall for ludicrous ideas like the “moon hoax.”

I would not call these people (i.e. those who reject official statements without evidence) sceptics. Phil is a sceptic – he is doubtful of claims unless they are supported by evidence or a logical extrapolation from stuff that we already know. The conspiracy theorists are more like the more extreme religious believers – they reject even hard evidence that contradicts their cherished worldview. Perhaps we should call them “moon-landing deniers” instead?

Most people believe in things they can see, like the huge Opollo efforts at the time plus the later LRO images and the simple logic that it would be impossible for any government to pull off or even attempt such a hoax with the certain knowledge that it would eventually be discovered.

Well, yes. Or they accept the expertise of people who really do know what they are talking about. But this option leads down a potentially dangerous path.

There are skeptics that believe in man’s ability to do things but have little faith or belief in man’s theories. Many religious people fall into this category of skepticism.

Again, this is not scepticism – it is denialsim.

There are skeptics that do not believe in religion, who believe in general science and technology but are individually selective concerning what theories they think have logical merit to them and which seen to fail in this respect. I am one of these skeptics. I believe in no well-known conspiracy theories or hoaxes, am fairly well science educated but think most science theories have little or no merit to them with a few exceptions like natural selection, chemical theory, plate tectonics (the cause is still hypothesis).

I’d be interested to know why you feel this way.

What are your opinions about the following leading scientific theories:
General Relativity;
Quantum Mechanics;
Big Bang cosmology (with or without inflation);
Th Standard Model?

Also, what do you think the “cause” of plate tectonics is? I am only aware of plate tectionics as a hugely successful descriptive theory.

From my skepticism I believe most all the mainstream science theories that we presently relish, within a hundred years or so, will all be replaced and have my own ideas of what will replace them.

And what makes you think that our present theories won’t turn out to be special cases of the more sophisticated theories that will replace them? (I mean this in the way that Newtonian gravitational theory – while “wrong” in the strictest sense of the word – turned out to be a special case of General Relativity.)

To put this another way, why do you think that our present major theories are not at least a pretty good approximation to relaity?

I actually work with someone who believes the moon landings were faked! I work in Information Technology with someone who uses technology on a daily basis. Some of this technology probably came from NASA! I just don’t get it!

Without Project Apollo, we might still not have microprocessors.

NASA ordered a million microprocessor chips so that the manufacturer – having such a huge order on their books – would be able to develop the technology to mass-produce the things (as opposed to making them one at a time).

Obviously the technology would have been developed sooner or later (once the market potential was recognised) but who’s to say that had to happen any time during the ’60s? Or the ’70s, ’80s or ’90s?

The only nation that actually achieved to land a dozen humans on the Moon is also the only nation in the world that actually debates if the endevour was for real. Seriously!

This whole notion of ‘moon-landing hoax’ is so far out that when I first heard of it I actually thought it was a prank. Honest to gods, I thought it was some skeptic joke that was aimed at conspiracy theorists.

When I found out that the hoax claims were for real, I was flabbergasted. It was bad enough that the US was a land of faith-healing charlatans who could cure a dozen people with a wave of hand (Benny Hinn, hallelujah!) on camera, week after week. But this?

#141 MTU: Not to mention, thanks to the LRO images! They have surely killed the conspiracy theory stone dead, at least for anyone capable of any semblance of rational thought.

Yes, absolutely true. Having the old landing sites imaged was as conclusive as it gets really.

Of course, having people actually fly back to the Moon and start colonies there – taking tourists out to see some of the Apollo descent stages, flags and near-eternal footprints in person would be the best refutation of all.

There are skeptics that believe in man’s ability to do things but have little faith or belief in man’s theories. Many religious people fall into this category of skepticism.

There are skeptics that do not believe in religion, who believe in general science and technology but are individually selective concerning what theories they think have logical merit to them and which seen to fail in this respect. I am one of these skeptics. I believe in no well-known conspiracy theories or hoaxes, am fairly well science educated but think most science theories have little or no merit to them with a few exceptions like natural selection, chemical theory, plate tectonics (the cause is still hypothesis). From my skepticism I believe most all the mainstream science theories that we presently relish, within a hundred years or so, will all be replaced and have my own ideas of what will replace them.

Skepticism comes in all different varieties and can serve you well in your life such as the adage that one should be skeptical (or at least a little leery) of what salesman are telling you. It is a word that conjures up different meanings, some favorable and some not, to different people.

cheers

#140 Nigel:
Nice to know that someone actually reads my web site!! A new page, dealing with the LRO images, will ( belatedly ) appear very soon – like this weekend.

Nice catch!

Sorry to spoil a good simile, but it looks very much as though “junk” DNA, ain’t. They just thought it was. Here’s a single example:

http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100221/full/news.2010.82.html

Scientific American listed this change as one of the ten most important scientific developments of 2010.

My brother is convinced thatboth climate change and the Moon landings are hoaxes. He’s a petrolhead, so the first I understand—he really, really wants to be a victim persecuted by those all-powerful liberal tree-huggers; but what is it with Moon landings?

Anyway, both beliefs show a complete failure to grasp what is involved in scientific research. Like, for starters, thousands and thousands of people across the globe, for decades. ‘But they kept the Manhattan Project secret!’ Not from the bloody Russkies they didn’t.

Would it be too optimistic to think that the Moon Hoax Conspiracy Theory (MHCT) is now pretty much completely dead? All done & dusted for all but a *very* tiny (& dwindling?) handful of loons, thanks in no small part to the efforts of people like Dr Phil Plait & the ‘Mythbusters’ team among others?

Can anyone confirm / deny that impression?

Hopefully confirm. I still have just about a micron of faith left in humanity’s semi-intelligence after all ..

(I also find myself thinking – & hoping – that creationism has now passed its zenith following the 2005 Dover trial and is gradually fading into its unquiet grave among the other “fringe” nutball beliefs. Then again, that’s probably what they thought after the Scope’s “monkey” trial in 1925. )