|
Post by JayUtah on Nov 24, 2007 3:15:18 GMT -4
Yep. The goal is to hate authority. You have to personify the authority, or at least define it and give it a name. And you have to provide reasons to hate it, even if they're trumped up.
Enter the people who disagree with your trumped up reasons, even if they don't care about your hatred of authority. Naturally you interpret their disagreement as an opposition to your goal, not just to your method. They just want you to stop being dishonest about something they care about (in this case, space exploration). They don't care if you continue to dislike authority.
|
|
|
Post by oldman on Nov 25, 2007 20:02:03 GMT -4
"so there will be photographic evidence that can't be disputed"
"But I wouldn't be surprised if some hardcore HB (Jarah, Percy, Jack White) still maintain the hoax."
...
Wow! You obviously believe this. By the kind of "reasoning" that must have led to the statements above, someone accused of a crime should automatically be considered innocent and released from custody just because they produced an affidavit from their mommy saying that they were innocent. If that's how it should work, then we're gonna have to let a lot of folks out of prison! Do you guys actually believe that a NASA probe (or any other for that matter) would justifiably answer the question of whether man landed on the moon? You must not fully understand what NASA is being accused of!
|
|
|
Post by JayUtah on Nov 25, 2007 20:24:17 GMT -4
...answer the question of whether man landed on the moon?
There's no legitimate question.
That said, there are two general groups of people who want to make it appear that there is some ongoing controversy. One group are those who get some personal recognition for promoting the hoax theory, and generally some money too. The other group are those who need some pretense to justify their paranoia and feeling of inferiority.
Believe me, neither of those groups wants an answer either way.
You must not fully understand what NASA is being accused of!
I fully do. And I fully understand the utter worthelessness of the "evidence" that has been put forward in support of those accusations.
|
|
|
Post by PhantomWolf on Nov 25, 2007 20:34:07 GMT -4
Well there we have it. Proof that whatever the evidence, no matter how damming to their beliefs, some people will refuse to accept Apollo actually happened. A little depressing isn't it.
|
|
|
Post by oldman on Nov 25, 2007 22:33:34 GMT -4
"There's no legitimate question."
If there's no legitimate question, then what's the purpose of this forum?
"I fully understand the utter worthelessness of the 'evidence' "
Evidence is always "worthless" to those who are inconvenienced by it.
|
|
|
Post by JayUtah on Nov 25, 2007 22:49:45 GMT -4
If there's no legitimate question, then what's the purpose of this forum?
To correct the ongoing misconceptions perpetuated by those with a vested interest in keeping the question artificially open.
Evidence is always "worthless" to those who are inconvenienced by it.
Except that most of the regulars here can knowledgeably explain exactly what's wrong with the alleged hoax evidence, thereby demonstrating what makes it worthless. That stands in marked contrast to most conspiracy theorists, who have little more than a few handwaving pseudoscientific claims floating in a sea of rhetoric and distraction that might fool a few people for a while.
It may surprise you that not everyone who opposes conspiracy theories does so ignorantly, or out of some irrational love of authority.
The question now is whether you can do more than talk big about the accusations against the authenticity of Apollo. Around here bluster only lasts so long. The typical approaches you'll want to avoid include referring us to long-debunked authors and web sites whom you've trusted implicitly (and which we've all read) and trying to dismiss us all as some sort of hyper-American disinformation agents.
|
|
|
Post by Jason Thompson on Nov 26, 2007 6:43:20 GMT -4
Do you guys actually believe that a NASA probe (or any other for that matter) would justifiably answer the question of whether man landed on the moon? The question has been answered by the evidence produced at the time. Other probes will provide some nice pictures to add to the evidence, but many will remain unconvinced. Anyone who can dismiss tens of thousands of photographs, hours and hours of film and video, millions of pages of technical documentation, surviving hardware, personal testimonies of thousands of individuals, and the very visible evidence of the huge construction and development work that went into the entire space program is not going to be convinced by digital images taken forty years after the event, whoever takes them. Hell, you could actually send some of these people to the Moon and tour them round all the Apollo sites, and they'll just say the stuff was put there recently just to fool them.
|
|
|
Post by Jason Thompson on Nov 26, 2007 6:45:28 GMT -4
If there's no legitimate question, then what's the purpose of this forum? The purpose of this forum is to counter the works of those who insist that there is a legitimate question, and to try and minimise the number of people taken in by the fraudsters and liars out to make a quick buck by rubbishing the achievements of others. I do not use the term 'fraudsters and liars' lightly either. I have personal experience of some of these people that makes it inescapable that they are liars. Contrary to the oversimplifications of those who wish to read some subversive meaning into the existence of such forums as these, Apollo is not intuitively obvious to everyone. It was a highly technical project in a field not everyone out there is au fait with. Many people do not immediately understand that dark sky does not equate to night-time in space; that stars are intrinsically much dimmer than they seem to be; that seeing and photographing are two very different problems; that orbital mechanics is so counterintuitive that you have to slow down to speed up; that radiation exists in different types and these require different shielding techniques; that the outer skin of the LM that looks so flimsy is not the pressure vessel of the craft; that dust behaves very differently in a vacuum than might be expected at first glance; and so on. The truth of Apollo is categorically NOT a common sense problem with an obvious answer unless you have some knowledge of the science and technology involved. If everyone had that, NASA wouldn't need to assemble a team of specialists and anyone could go to the Moon. Forums such as this exist to provide that knowledge to those who don't have it so they may better understand the ignorant claims of conspiracy theorists. [Edited to correct a typo pointed out by Kiwi on page 5]
|
|
|
Post by ineluki on Nov 26, 2007 9:10:23 GMT -4
"I fully understand the utter worthelessness of the 'evidence' " Evidence is always "worthless" to those who are inconvenienced by it. The difference - we, the ProApolloNutters, give explanations why we aren't convinced by the CT-"evidence", i.e. giving explanations how to achieve photografic effects, that the Woowoos claim to be impossible - the CT will either ignore those explanations or just respond with some accusations that everyone who disagrees with them must be a NASA-shill (best example Jack White).
|
|
|
Post by BertL on Nov 26, 2007 12:40:25 GMT -4
Do you guys actually believe that a NASA probe (or any other for that matter) would justifiably answer the question of whether man landed on the moon? It doesn't who anyone who blinds himself from evidence so he can maintain his silly beliefs not based on evidence.
|
|
|
Post by JayUtah on Nov 26, 2007 13:33:20 GMT -4
I do not use the term 'fraudsters and liars' lightly either. I have personal experience of some of these people that makes it inescapable that they are liars.
As do I. I have had some insight into the business world in which these authors operate, and which is almost entirely hidden from their readers. I have been privy to the negotiations for personal appearances, the bitter infighting over "turf," and the wrangling inherent to maintaining only the appearance of rigorous tests of their claims. There is almost no doubt in my mind that the principal authors of these theories have very little stake in the actual evidence and actual conclusions, and are simply doing and saying whatever will keep them in the limelight.
...Apollo is not intuitively obvious to everyone. It was a highly technical project in a field not everyone out there is au fait with.
Right. As long as there are people working frantically for their own benefit to maintain the illusion that Apollo's authenticity is in any kind of doubt, and targeting only laymen who won't intuitively be able to detect the hogwash, there will be an ongoing need for sites like this to remind people that the historical question has been answered, and that ongoing hoax claims are essentially self-serving puffery.
The meta-debate among conspiracists is that if the historical question has been so conclusively answered, then sites such as this should naturally dry up and go away. That violates the central business plan of conspiracism, which is to maintain ambiguity, not to answer the question. Conspiracists don't want to prove the Apollo missions were fake: that's only a short-term revenue/publicity event. Conspiracists want to keep the question open, because that's an ongoing, renewable revenue stream and generates perodic publicity events.
Forums such as this exist to provide that knowledge to those who don't have it so they may better understand the ignorant claims of conspiracy theorists.
And they are entirely ignorant. The hucksters and clients generally don't care. Authors such as Percy, Rene, Sibrel, and their ilk merely want to write their names into history by attaching it to some well-known event, even if that means vandalizing it. Their readers merely want some pseudo-intellectual justification for their distrust and rejection of mainstream achievements and perceived authority. It's a mutually beneficial arrangement.
However, the collateral damage irritates people. In order to continue painting NASA as a powerful, evil enemy, the conspiracists have to tread unjustly upon things that other people take pride in. And that raises their ire. Not because they object necessary to some portrayal of NASA or authority, but because the means to that end are themselves injurious.
Conspiracy theorists generally can't separate the two. They can't conceive that someone might object to a conspiracy theory for reasons that have nothing to do with the greater social and political cause. They can't conceive that someone might be quite okay with criticism against NASA, the government, or whatever, but might object to the specific ignorance that's being promulgated as fact in the process. They don't care that by writing off Apollo missions as fakes, they're essentially "calling out" the entire aerospace industry as liars and frauds, and that those people might honestly object to being accused that way with flimsy evidence.
|
|
|
Post by sts60 on Nov 26, 2007 14:52:58 GMT -4
Hello, oldman. Welcome.
Wow! You obviously believe this. By the kind of "reasoning" that must have led to the statements above, someone accused of a crime should automatically be considered innocent and released from custody just because they produced an affidavit from their mommy saying that they were innocent.
No. It's as if that person said he had been climbing Denali when the crime occurred, and he had brought back some fresh wildflowers which only grow there, and the rangers testified they had seen him off on his climb, and folks with telescopes tracked him on his journey, and he made radio calls from the summit which where triangulated by multiple radio operators, and he took highly detailed video and still imagery on his trip. And all the experts in mountain climbing and physiology and weather agreed with him.
If that's how it should work, then we're gonna have to let a lot of folks out of prison! Do you guys actually believe that a NASA probe (or any other for that matter) would justifiably answer the question of whether man landed on the moon? You must not fully understand what NASA is being accused of!
I do understand it, and in fact I do not expect those who are committed to disbelieving the Apollo landings to accept any evidence. Their disbelief is not based on evidence, or lack thereof, and cannot be refuted by evidence any more than any other delusion, or deep religious belief for that matter.
Whether such a "question" would be justifiably answered is irrelevant. Those committed to disbelieving Apollo are not "justified" in disbelieving the mountains of evidence that already exist. Why should even modestly detailed imagery of in situ artifacts make a difference?
Curiously enough, a standard claim of HBs goes something like "I'd believe it if a probe not belonging to NASA showed me evidence." They have never explained why such an image - obtained, processed, and delivered by persons, facilities, and methods of which they have no knowledge - should trump NASA-provided images. Yours is the first post (to my incomplete knowledge) to acknowledge that no image - from anybody - would be sufficient to dispel the committed disbelief in Apollo.
|
|
|
Post by sts60 on Nov 26, 2007 15:00:23 GMT -4
"There's no legitimate question."
If there's no legitimate question, then what's the purpose of this forum?
Discussing the Apollo hoax claims, and educating people about them. You may not be aware of the history, but this forum was originally owned by a hoax believer. He learned about Apollo and became convinced that it happened pretty much as advertised. The current owner, LunarOrbit, picked up the board after it had fallen into disuse.
"I fully understand the utter worthelessness of the 'evidence' "
Evidence is always "worthless" to those who are inconvenienced by it.[/quote][/b]
Exactly. Which is why evidence for Apollo is routinely dismissed out of hand by committed hoax believers; why new evidence (e.g., imagery of Apollo landing artifacts) will be dismissed out of hand by committed hoax believers; and why these same HBs routinely dismiss those who support Apollo as "government disinformationists".
|
|
|
Post by JayUtah on Nov 26, 2007 15:25:46 GMT -4
Regarding the NASA v. non-NASA probe dilemma, the issue of the fox not guarding the henhouse seems as if it would apply. But if we continue with oldman's comparison to individual culpability, it doesn't really apply as intended.
If some individual is accused of a crime, he is expected to be allowed to provide exculpatory evidence that he may have or cause to be produced. One may not simply dismiss that evidence as tainted because it came from someone under accusation. Such a dismissal would be circular. One can certainly challenge exculpatory evidence, but the challenge must be on the merit of the evidence, not the alleged character of its proponent. So for oldman seemingly to dismiss any evidence NASA would choose to provide, simply because it came from NASA and NASA is the one under suspicion, is frankly evasive. Any evidence NASA may choose to provide regarding its earlier claims must be addressed at face value, not merely dismissed categorically.
Unfortunately the NASA v. non-NASA debate is just as much a red herring as every other attempt to control what evidence will be respected. Any non-NASA attempt to image landing sites, as we've seen, is already written off as being under NASA's control anyway. The prejudiced rejection of lunar orbit imagery is based on the tautological supposition that NASA can and will always control what evidence is seen. Appearing to advocate the non-NASA approach is merely a little more rational in the short run. Whether oldman chooses to follow that tautology remains to be seen, but we've already seen others follow it.
|
|
|
Post by PhantomWolf on Nov 26, 2007 15:55:55 GMT -4
Evidence is always "worthless" to those who are inconvenienced by it.Do you guys actually believe that a NASA probe (or any other for that matter) would justifiably answer the question of whether man landed on the moon?While I'm hearing the words "Troll" and "Socks" floating about my head, interesting how oldman's two comments work together hmmmm? Of course the "Evidence" of Apollo being hoaxed really is worthless, but not because it'd prove inconvenient, rather because it's a muddled, contradictory, unscientific, mess that a 10 year old could see through by simply looking out the window. I'm sure that oldschool will be back to wave the "no stars", "non-parrallel shadows" and "missing rover tracks" banner though.
|
|