Thread: Apollo hoax

I know this is old news, but I am curious about what Russians think about the possibility of an Apollo moon landing hoax.
I never even considered that it was a hoax until recently; someone pointed out to me that although Americans celebrate almost every conceivable event such as; Labor Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day, tax day, Halloween day, etc; why do we not formally celebrate accomplishment of undoubtedly the greatest technological achievement of mandkind, ever?? This somehow made the hoax argument more credible.
What do you think?

Originally Posted by Siriusly

I know this is old news, but I am curious about what Russians think about the possibility of an Apollo moon landing hoax.
I never even considered that it was a hoax until recently; someone pointed out to me that although Americans celebrate almost every conceivable event such as; Labor Day, Mother's Day, Father's Day, tax day, Halloween day, etc; why do we not formally celebrate accomplishment of undoubtedly the greatest technological achievement of mandkind, ever?? This somehow made the hoax argument more credible.
What do you think?

On one hand I think it very well could be a hoax. Just think about the level of technology then and the risks involved, especially (in my opinion) on take-off from the moon. And why NASA now needs billions of dollars and years of time to repeat the same thing! On the other hand probably nobody cared much about the risks then and if it was a hoax USSR would be the first to uncover it, but it never happened... Of course you could say that there was a secret agreement between the US and the USSR on not uncovering the hoaxes of each other! Seriously speaking, nobody knows where th truth lies, but if you google you will find a lot of good points supporting both sides...

Originally Posted by Siriusly

I never even considered that it was a hoax until recently; ...

If you had access to a moderately powerful laser -- as one might find at small factory or university -- you could easily prove independently that the landings were real. While on the moon, astronauts set up a series a retroflectors in order to take precise measurements. A retroflector is essentially a concave mirror. By bouncing a laser off the retroflector and measuring the response time you can gage the distance with incredible accuracy. The locations of these mirrors are not secrets. Given access to some basic equipment, you can prove they exist. If you think the landings were faked, then you must explain how those mirrors got up there and positioned correctly.

Originally Posted by RavinDave

If you think the landings were faked, then you must explain how those mirrors got up there and positioned correctly.

Aliens

Originally Posted by RavinDave

Originally Posted by Siriusly

I never even considered that it was a hoax until recently; ...

If you had access to a moderately powerful laser -- as one might find at small factory or university -- you could easily prove independently that the landings were real. While on the moon, astronauts set up a series a retroflectors in order to take precise measurements. A retroflector is essentially a concave mirror. By bouncing a laser off the retroflector and measuring the response time you can gage the distance with incredible accuracy. The locations of these mirrors are not secrets. Given access to some basic equipment, you can prove they exist. If you think the landings were faked, then you must explain how those mirrors got up there and positioned correctly.

Правда? Я об этом не знал. Во всяком случае, я верю тому, что они в действительности сьездили Луну. Люди способны на всевозможные поразительные технологические достоинства.

Вот доказательство вкратце:
http://www.thursdaysclassroom.com/15...fpositive.html

I never thought they were fake untill i learned about it in highschool. Watching the video of the flag flapping in the wind... and a whole bunch of other unbelievable crap kinda made me think twice. Plus how the radiation from the sun would burn anything at about 10,000,000,000 degrees on a rock like that with no atmosphere... But whatever. Maybe it happend...

And they could have just launched those mirrors there on rockets, much like they put rovers on mars, or, claim to have put humans on the moon with rockets =).

Originally Posted by Dogboy182

And they could have just launched those mirrors there on rockets, much like they put rovers on mars, or, claim to have put humans on the moon with rockets =).

If you say that we just sent the retroflector arrays up via rocket, you can no longer fall back on "we lacked the technology to get to the moon." It's the same technology.

well we've sent stuff to mars, but not people... Its not the same.

Besidea, launching a peice of shiney fiberglass is a little less dangerous\ expensive than supporting human life, and getting it back up off the moon and back to earth.

Originally Posted by basurero

Правда? Я об этом не знал. Во всяком случае, я верю тому, что они в действительности слетали на Луну. Люди способны на всевозможные поразительные технологические достижения.

Originally Posted by Dogboy182

well we've sent stuff to mars, but not people... Its not the same.

Quite true ... remotely maneuvering and configuring such an array back in 1969 would have been MUCH more difficult than manually doing it. (You've been spoiled by the rapid computer advances since that time.) The odds of nailing it with the accuracy we did with a blind drop (not once -- but several times) are pretty long, even by today's standards. On the other hand, once the actual mechanics of getting an object (any object) to the Moon is solved, the underlying physic of sending a manned capsule there and back are not as esoteric as you imagine. It's suprisingly mundane stuff.

Originally Posted by Siriusly

What do you think?

I think Russia and Iraq don't exist either, there are powerful forces out there to trick you into obedience and paying more taxes.

I think, this "conspiracy theory" is a nonsence. There is a lot of people in Russia (like Yuriy Mukhin), who think the Apollo expedition was a hoax -- but their arguments are entirely unconvincing.

Originally Posted by RavinDave

Originally Posted by Dogboy182

And they could have just launched those mirrors there on rockets, much like they put rovers on mars, or, claim to have put humans on the moon with rockets =).

If you say that we just sent the retroflector arrays up via rocket, you can no longer fall back on "we lacked the technology to get to the moon." It's the same technology.

Not quite. To send a relatively small object to Moon is much easier than to send 3 men there and get them back. Personally I'm inclined to believe in American Moon program but I HAD some doubts about it after watching several TV shows.

Aside from that - you'd need a very powerful laser with very small dissipation characteristic to get a reflection from the surface of Moon (it's about 800000 km for a laser beam to go). Such laser is a very expensive equipment no mere human can afford.

Originally Posted by Ramil

Personally I'm inclined to believe in American Moon program but I HAD some doubts about it after watching several TV shows.

After watching TV shows you can start to doubt about (or believe) anything. That's why I don't watch TV shows.

Originally Posted by pisces

Originally Posted by Ramil

Personally I'm inclined to believe in American Moon program but I HAD some doubts about it after watching several TV shows.

After watching TV shows you can start to doubt about (or believe) anything. That's why I don't watch TV shows.

Neither do I but I've specially made some efforts to watch these. I was interested, that's all.

I think American's expedition to the Moon wasn't a fraud. Let's suppose it was a hoax then USSR spies would have definetely discovered and uncovered this. Since USSR kept silence at that modent, I reckon that Moon expedition was genuine.

I think American's expedition to the Moon wasn't a fraud. Let's suppose it was a hoax then USSR spies would have definetely discovered and uncovered this. Since USSR kept silence at that modent, I reckon that Moon expedition was genuine.

Im pretty sure Russia doesn't have all the answers...


Though she may have most

Originally Posted by Dogboy182

I think American's expedition to the Moon wasn't a fraud. Let's suppose it was a hoax then USSR spies would have definetely discovered and uncovered this. Since USSR kept silence at that modent, I reckon that Moon expedition was genuine.

Im pretty sure Russia doesn't have all the answers...


Though she may have most

Bloody KGB knew EVERYTHING

If the moon landings were a hoax, then the 29 astronauts who travelled to the moon during every one of those Apollo missions must be damn good at BS'ing and keeping secrets for the past 30+ years.

These are the same people who say that the US Gov't flew airplanes into the WTC and used explosives to collapse the buildings, and that a US Missile hit the Pentagon. Simply people whose lives are utterly uninteresting and they want to dream about grand conspiracies and uncovering the 'truth'. Besides, you don't need a laser to measure the evidence, take a telescope and look for yourself.

tdk