|
Post by blackstar on Aug 21, 2010 20:35:04 GMT -4
2) why don't I trust NASA? I do- for most things. But they are a government agency. So I suppose this question really comes down to "how much do you trust your government?" I trust them, but at the same time they are the government. What I'm saying is they can and do hide things from us, especially in the military. How much do I trust my government... I trust them with the essentials, such as protecting my rights, etc. Governments and military organizations certainly try and keep secrets but the truth is that they never seem to keep them for very long, especially where they are trying to cover some scandal or deception. Even where you have a genuine national security issue, a dedicated pool of trustworthy people, and the simple requirement to just stay silent rather than tell lies the truth comes out. That's not a theoretical notion by the way, it's what happened with the WWII ULTRA code breaking effort. It was kept secret for several decades but eventually somebody wrote a book about it and now it's a part of the historical record. No secret last forever so why would anyone create a hoax that could never be revealed without causing massive damage to the political and scientific establishment?
|
|
|
Post by JayUtah on Aug 21, 2010 20:44:22 GMT -4
...yet for some reason (can't put my finger on it) I remain skeptical.I'll put a finger on it: preconception. You desire to believe that the Moon landings were hoaxed, and so you're trying to find a way to make it seem true intellectually. Don't feel bad; cognitive psychologists have actually identified a measurable thrill that comes from believing something you think is secret or forbidden knowledge. It must be my nature to question.It's apparently in your nature to question selectively. You've put forward a number of hypotheses that are patently absurd, and you didn't seem to question them yourself before making them. It's your nature to question what opposes your belief, but not what supports it. But they [NASA] are a government agency.So is the Forestry Service. Ad hominem. So I suppose this question really comes down to "how much do you trust your government?How much do you trust the Soviet government? You don't seem to question their retroreflectors or their sample-return missions. Why do you question only NASA? What I'm saying is they can and do hide things from us, especially in the military.Yes, the government hides things from us. So does your employer hide things from you. And your doctor. And the boards of directors of every major company on the planet. And so does your mother. You don't get to single out government agencies as implicit liars. Oddly enough you don't seem to be willing to consider that the hoax authors are the ones hiding something. Why does someone have to work for the government in order to be dishonest? Why is it so hard to believe in a handful of charlatans trying to make a quick buck off the gullible? Thankfully we don't have to trust anyone. We have evidence. You're working on the basis of trust. We're working on the basis of evidence. We believe that the Soviets obtained 300 g of lunar surface material by unmanned means because that's where the evidence points. Similarly we believe that NASA acquired 350 kg of lunar surface material by manned exploration because that's where the evidence points. For some silly, unexplained reason, you want to believe the evidence in one case and ignore it in the other. That double standard indicates a simple unwillingness to believe in manned lunar exploration no matter what the evidence says. That's what you have to get over. You're explaining your position very clearly. The problem is that the position you're explaining is blatantly illogical. why do I remain skeptical? I guess #1 answers this...No it doesn't. You don't answer the question; you just state it.
|
|
|
Post by chew on Aug 21, 2010 20:48:24 GMT -4
Forgot to add- you guys really are helping and are chipping away at my skepticism. Thank you! Losing your skepticism is not a good thing. Perhaps you are confusing skepticism with doubt?
|
|
|
Post by kallewirsch on Aug 21, 2010 23:58:24 GMT -4
It's possible that the rocks were collected by rovers No, its not. Even today we could not do it. What we can do is to send some rovers to the moon which use a small shovel to dig a little dirt into a container and send that container back. But that is not what the Apollo samples are all about. There are rocks! Large rocks with large masses. There are core samples, which require somebody to drill into the ground. Both things, collecting heavy rocks and drilling 2 meter long core samples, were not possible with rovers in the 60ties and are still not possible with rovers today.
|
|
|
Post by kallewirsch on Aug 22, 2010 0:15:29 GMT -4
As for the radio tracking and that the russians did it wrong. It is as simple at that: You know those satellite dishes you see all over the country since a number of years? It really is very simple: either you point that dish at the emitting TV-satellite and get a signal or you dont point it correctly and dont get a signal. So all the russians needed to do is point their dishes in such a way that they received a signel and then glimpsed along the dish axis. If they see the moon in the dish axis, then the signal originated along a line in the direction of the moon. There pretty much is not very much one can do wrong. In fact it is very simple to do. Millions of people can do this when mounting there satellite-TV-dishes. What the russians did, was done in Australia, USA, Germany and a lot of radio amateurs all over the globe. In each place the dish has to be oriented differently, because we live on a sphere and the same celestial object is visible in differen sky spots in different places on the globe at the same time. All those line of sights intersected at one point- the Moon. So there really is no doubt that the signal indeed was sent from the moon.
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:18:18 GMT -4
Fireballs, would you mind answering my question about whether you believe the Apollo flights prior to 11 were real? And have you looked at the videos/transcripts/photographs/ of the reflector deployments or not? Yes, I do think the flights before A11 were real. But I suppose that invalidates my whole position, doesn't it? When you say "videos/transcripts/photos of the reflector deployments" do you mean the links you posted? If so, yes I did look at them, but I didn't read the whole transcripts.
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:20:15 GMT -4
Governments and military organizations certainly try and keep secrets but the truth is that they never seem to keep them for very long, especially where they are trying to cover some scandal or deception. Even where you have a genuine national security issue, a dedicated pool of trustworthy people, and the simple requirement to just stay silent rather than tell lies the truth comes out. That's not a theoretical notion by the way, it's what happened with the WWII ULTRA code breaking effort. It was kept secret for several decades but eventually somebody wrote a book about it and now it's a part of the historical record. No secret last forever so why would anyone create a hoax that could never be revealed without causing massive damage to the political and scientific establishment?Good point that makes loads of sense (no sarcasm intended). This gets me thinking.
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:23:45 GMT -4
I'll put a finger on it: preconception. You desire to believe that the Moon landings were hoaxed, and so you're trying to find a way to make it seem true intellectually. Don't feel bad; cognitive psychologists have actually identified a measurable thrill that comes from believing something you think is secret or forbidden knowledge. It must be my nature to question.It's apparently in your nature to question selectively. You've put forward a number of hypotheses that are patently absurd, and you didn't seem to question them yourself before making them. It's your nature to question what opposes your belief, but not what supports it. But they [NASA] are a government agency.So is the Forestry Service. Ad hominem. So I suppose this question really comes down to "how much do you trust your government?How much do you trust the Soviet government? You don't seem to question their retroreflectors or their sample-return missions. Why do you question only NASA? What I'm saying is they can and do hide things from us, especially in the military.Yes, the government hides things from us. So does your employer hide things from you. And your doctor. And the boards of directors of every major company on the planet. And so does your mother. You don't get to single out government agencies as implicit liars. Oddly enough you don't seem to be willing to consider that the hoax authors are the ones hiding something. Why does someone have to work for the government in order to be dishonest? Why is it so hard to believe in a handful of charlatans trying to make a quick buck off the gullible? Thankfully we don't have to trust anyone. We have evidence. You're working on the basis of trust. We're working on the basis of evidence. We believe that the Soviets obtained 300 g of lunar surface material by unmanned means because that's where the evidence points. Similarly we believe that NASA acquired 350 kg of lunar surface material by manned exploration because that's where the evidence points. For some silly, unexplained reason, you want to believe the evidence in one case and ignore it in the other. That double standard indicates a simple unwillingness to believe in manned lunar exploration no matter what the evidence says. That's what you have to get over. You're explaining your position very clearly. The problem is that the position you're explaining is blatantly illogical. why do I remain skeptical? I guess #1 answers this...No it doesn't. You don't answer the question; you just state it. Excellent post. Thank you for 'putting a finger on it'; I appreciate it. Why do I remain skeptical? Perhaps because there is no 'clincher' that does it for me. There's no single piece of evidence that I can look at and say ""A ha! They are telling the truth!" Now I'll admit that the rocks are from the moon, so obviously they had to get from there to here somehow.... But I'm not quite at the step where I can say "The astronauts did it". I'm not at that step for a reason I'll get into in a few posts.
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:25:26 GMT -4
Forgot to add- you guys really are helping and are chipping away at my skepticism. Thank you! Losing your skepticism is not a good thing. Perhaps you are confusing skepticism with doubt? Perhaps. I think the sentence would better read "You guys really are helping and chipping away at my doubt!"
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:29:15 GMT -4
It's possible that the rocks were collected by rovers No, its not. Even today we could not do it. What we can do is to send some rovers to the moon which use a small shovel to dig a little dirt into a container and send that container back. But that is not what the Apollo samples are all about. There are rocks! Large rocks with large masses. There are core samples, which require somebody to drill into the ground. Both things, collecting heavy rocks and drilling 2 meter long core samples, were not possible with rovers in the 60ties and are still not possible with rovers today. This is what I like to hear, however are there any documents/studies/some kind of paper work that backs this up? I can't go by hearsay or personal knowledge. I need some professional backup. This is what I alluded to 2 posts above this. This concept makes sense to me- the concept that robots can only collect a few grams or maybe a single pound of material. But without documentation I can't totally accept it. Do you follow? If there is some documentation I'll be convinced and embrace it. But until then I'll remain skeptical
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:32:06 GMT -4
As for the radio tracking and that the russians did it wrong. It is as simple at that: You know those satellite dishes you see all over the country since a number of years? It really is very simple: either you point that dish at the emitting TV-satellite and get a signal or you dont point it correctly and dont get a signal. So all the russians needed to do is point their dishes in such a way that they received a signel and then glimpsed along the dish axis. If they see the moon in the dish axis, then the signal originated along a line in the direction of the moon. There pretty much is not very much one can do wrong. In fact it is very simple to do. Millions of people can do this when mounting there satellite-TV-dishes. What the russians did, was done in Australia, USA, Germany and a lot of radio amateurs all over the globe. In each place the dish has to be oriented differently, because we live on a sphere and the same celestial object is visible in differen sky spots in different places on the globe at the same time. All those line of sights intersected at one point- the Moon. So there really is no doubt that the signal indeed was sent from the moon. Makes sense except that dishes for things like satellite tv don't move. They stay in one spot. But I suppose that's because there are multiple satellites that stream tv to the dish so there's always a constant flow. Don't know if that affects the point of the post I'm quoting from though. Does anyone else agree with kallewirsch here?
|
|
|
Post by fireballs on Aug 22, 2010 0:58:04 GMT -4
Just a quick question. I'm trying to make sense of everything still.
In effect, we know the moon rocks are authentic because of the sheer number of scientists who examined them, and with little if any dispute among them that they were not from the moon. So the consensus is they are moon rocks. Am I correct?
|
|
|
Post by laurel on Aug 22, 2010 0:58:21 GMT -4
Yes, I do think the flights before A11 were real. But I suppose that invalidates my whole position, doesn't it? Well, it doesn't really make sense that they would do four manned Apollo test flights but then fake a landing. Why would they do four genuine flights just to prepare for a fake one? "Well, we've successfully completed Apollo 7, 8, 9, and 10. Now we know the Command Service Module works, we know the Saturn V is capable of sending astronauts to the Moon, and we know the LM works. On Apollo 10, they took the LM down to within eight miles of the lunar surface. We're ready to land on the Moon with Apollo 11!" "No, let's fake a landing instead." That would be a very strange way to run a space program, don't you think? If the earlier flights were real, why not Apollo 11?
|
|
|
Post by AtomicDog on Aug 22, 2010 1:12:10 GMT -4
As for the radio tracking and that the russians did it wrong. It is as simple at that: You know those satellite dishes you see all over the country since a number of years? It really is very simple: either you point that dish at the emitting TV-satellite and get a signal or you dont point it correctly and dont get a signal. So all the russians needed to do is point their dishes in such a way that they received a signel and then glimpsed along the dish axis. If they see the moon in the dish axis, then the signal originated along a line in the direction of the moon. There pretty much is not very much one can do wrong. In fact it is very simple to do. Millions of people can do this when mounting there satellite-TV-dishes. What the russians did, was done in Australia, USA, Germany and a lot of radio amateurs all over the globe. In each place the dish has to be oriented differently, because we live on a sphere and the same celestial object is visible in differen sky spots in different places on the globe at the same time. All those line of sights intersected at one point- the Moon. So there really is no doubt that the signal indeed was sent from the moon. Makes sense except that dishes for things like satellite tv don't move. They stay in one spot. But I suppose that's because there are multiple satellites that stream tv to the dish so there's always a constant flow. Don't know if that affects the point of the post I'm quoting from though. Does anyone else agree with kallewirsch here? You really should read this. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geostationary_orbitThe point is, when a dish points to a signal, that is where the source is, whether it is a communications satellite or the Moon.
|
|
|
Post by PeterB on Aug 22, 2010 1:24:48 GMT -4
Just a quick question. I'm trying to make sense of everything still. In effect, we know the moon rocks are authentic because of the sheer number of scientists who examined them, and with little if any dispute among them that they were not from the moon. So the consensus is they are moon rocks. Am I correct? That's basically the case - as far as I know, there is no scientist who's examined the Apollo rocks that has any doubt they're from the Moon. Also, consider the sheer number of scientists who've examined the samples; we're not talking about half a dozen pointy-heads, we're talking about thousands of people from around the world. Now this by itself doesn't prove the Apollo rocks came from the Moon. The proof there is the evidence in the rocks themselves: 1. The Apollo rocks show signs of having formed in a low gravity vacuum. This can't occur naturally on the Earth, and can't be faked by people. 2. The surfaces of the Apollo rocks have tiny craters on them called zap pits, which are caused by the impact of dust particles travelling at tens of kilometres per second. This can't occur naturally on Earth, and can't be faked by people. 3. The Apollo rocks contain essentially no water. This is quite different to Earth rocks, the minerals of which have quite a bit of water bound up in their constituent crystals. It's something which again can't be faked by people. 4. The Apollo rocks have been examined by scientists from countries around the world, including from countries hostile to the USA, and who therefore have no incentive to lie for the benefit of the USA. 5. Some of the Apollo rocks contain minerals which have never been found on the Earth. As I said in reply #37:
|
|