Debunking the Apollo landing conspiracies

[Hatshepsut]

My favourite websites relating to space exploration (and mostly to the Apollo program): Moonbase Clavius, the ultimate Apollo hoax debunking website...

The "moon landing filmed in a studio" story, which emerged before the mission series concluded in 1972, has flummoxed me from both ends. The idea that it was really faked is absurd, yet debunking has usually proceeded on technical grounds, such as lighting in the photos, by way of refuting specific claims the conspiracy buffs advance. This seems unnecessary to me.

I have no doubt that a quality fake Apollo landing could have been put on in a studio with the technology available in 1969, provided enough money and effort were invested. But how would such a monumental effort be covered up? Hundreds of people would be in the know and inevitably some of them would leak. Meanwhile, NASA and its contractors kept some 80000 staff on the job making the rockets or doing other preparation needed to render the whole shindig convincing. After all, the launches had to be real even if the rockets weren't going to reach the moon, because they were witnessed by the general public on the ground.

This implausibility of eternal cover-up is enough reason for me to reject the conspiracy theory on sociological grounds. The government refused to officially acknowledge the existence of its National Reconnaissance Office, the program responsible for satellite spying on the Soviet Union, although it was public knowledge almost as soon as the first film canisters came down. Nixon couldn't shut the lid on Watergate. The government is able to keep some secrets involving technical or obscure material such as the identities of CIA agents. They cannot keep a major public policy initiative or issue of politics from the news very long.

Much simpler to believe that if we can launch a rocket to begin with, we ought to be able to send it to the moon with a few guys aboard. Do we have to answer the conspiracy buffs point for point, or do we simply assign them the burden of proof?

 

[{ Emilia }]

I'll be honest and say that ignoring them works just fine. Sorry.

 

[Ithekro]

Mythbusters did it already.

 

[Dukhat]

Just the fact that the retroreflectors on the lunar surface can still be used (devices that had to be placed where they were by human hands) is all the proof anyone needs that the moon landings were real.

 

[JarodRussell]

You know that the shadow government once in a while "leaks" information so that the population thinks that big secrets cannot be kept?

Just the fact that the retroreflectors on the lunar surface can still be used (devices that had to be placed where they were by human hands) is all the proof anyone needs that the moon landings were real.

Have you ever used one, personally?

 

[MacLeod]

I'm quite sure the Russians esp. at the height of the cold war would have loved to debunk the moon-landings as a fake and expose them.

 

[Dukhat]

Have you ever used one, personally?

Have you? I have not. But I don't need to personally use one to believe that the moon landings actually happened, because I'm not a conspiracy theory whackjob.

 

[Avon]

[yt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6MOnehCOUw[/yt]

 

[publiusr]

Phil Plait's old Bad Astronomy site (now Cosmoquest.org) has made a specialty engaging with these Moon-Hoax Believers (MHBs)

 

[Metryq]

Just the fact that the retroreflectors on the lunar surface can still be used (devices that had to be placed where they were by human hands) is all the proof anyone needs that the moon landings were real.

Wrong. A robotic probe could easily have placed or carried such a retroreflector. Wikipedia notes that Soviet Lunokhod probes carried reflectors.

The evidence for human excursions to the Moon is abundant, and no need to go over it in detail here. There are plenty of sites on-line, as well as books and other sources describing it all in terms the layman can understand.

In the end, the hardcore doubters won't be swayed by anything, even a personal flight to the Moon to visit the old sites. They'd argue that their flight had been cleverly faked (with "spinning magnets" from UFOs to create the freefall—or hypnosis, drugs, the Matrix, whatever).

 

[urbandefault]

How many unexplained deaths occurred after the moon "landings"?

Really, the only people who would have to be silenced are the astronauts, the film crews, and security personnel present. Mission control could have been fed false information from an undisclosed site, probably Area 51. You know, where they keep the alien ships and bodies of their crews.

But hey, there was that documentary in the 70s that played on TV pretending to be a Movie of the Week. That should be enough evidence for anyone.

 

[Kor]

IMO, it's not worth the time or effort to refute crackpot conspiracy theories.

No matter what you show those "theorists," they still won't believe you. That's just the way they are.

Kor

 

[T'Girl]

If some people want to believe the landing was fake, it makes them happy, or gives them a confirmation on their view of the world ...

... let them.

Seriously, in the grand scheme of things what are they hurting? Yes, they're perpetuating a falsehood, but there's more than a few of those out there and this is hardly the worst of the bunch.

 

[JarodRussell]

In the end, the hardcore doubters won't be swayed by anything, even a personal flight to the Moon to visit the old sites. They'd argue that their flight had been cleverly faked (with "spinning magnets" from UFOs to create the freefall—or hypnosis, drugs, the Matrix, whatever).

Always wondered if that's what they wanted to do in the Truman Show eventually. Build an extension of the studio, and then fake a flight to give him his Fiji vacation.

 

[Melakon]

Capricorn One made a lot of moon landing deniers think they were right.

 

[Dukhat]

Just the fact that the retroreflectors on the lunar surface can still be used (devices that had to be placed where they were by human hands) is all the proof anyone needs that the moon landings were real.

Wrong. A robotic probe could easily have placed or carried such a retroreflector. Wikipedia notes that Soviet Lunokhod probes carried reflectors.

I was referring to the Apollo retroreflectors, not the Lunokhod ones. The Apollo reflectors were not placed on the lunar surface by a probe or a rover, since there are no probes or rovers anywhere in their vicinity of the reflector locations. The reflectors on the Lunokhod rover was actually on the rover itself.

 

[HIjol]

THIS is Ceti Alpha 5!!!

 

[Ithekro]

A simple thing. The cost to fake the moon landings in 1969 and into the 70s, would cost more than the actual moon landings. Especially the long zero-G experiance on the Apollo spacecraft. If attempted on a aircraft zero G simulator flight, the airplane probably would have hit the ground before the film stopped. Also filming on a set that is in a total vacuum would be prohibitavely expensive. And that is without the ability to simulate one sixth gravity on the kicked up dirt. The dirt that doesn't billow from air resistance, and follows a long arc back to the surface of the Moon? Also the scientific tests on Apollo 17 that require no atmosphere to get to work properly?

Who is going to built a studio sized set that is a vaccum chamber? Might as well launch rockets at the Moon, it be cheaper.

 

[Crazy Eddie]

 

[Metryq]

Just the fact that the retroreflectors on the lunar surface can still be used (devices that had to be placed where they were by human hands) is all the proof anyone needs that the moon landings were real.

Wrong. A robotic probe could easily have placed or carried such a retroreflector. Wikipedia notes that Soviet Lunokhod probes carried reflectors.

I was referring to the Apollo retroreflectors, not the Lunokhod ones.

I know, and the Apollo reflectors were placed by hand. (I'm not one of the conspiracy theorists.) The point you seem to be missing is that those reflectors are not proof of manned missions. I was contesting your assertion that they had to be placed by hand. The reflectors could have been placed by robots, just like the Lunokhod reflectors—assuming the conspiracy theorists grant the existence of the reflectors at all. The gear needed to prove the reflectors is probably too esoteric for the kind of person who believes the manned missions were faked.

Pointing out that there are no probes near the Apollo sites (except Apollo 12) is also a circular argument, as a conspiracy theorist would have to grant the very kind of documentation he's already doubting.

As noted, there's plenty of other evidence, covered very effectively elsewhere, and hardcore doubters (as opposed to the merely curious) will not be swayed anyway.