posted 01-02-2005 08:43 PM               

The highlight (at least for me) was a series of segments led by Jay taking the NGP camera crew into the desert to re-stage common hoaxer's "evidence" and of course, showing they were wrong.

There are a few issues raised by the hoaxers (specifically, Bill Kaysing and Ralph Rene) that are left without rebuttals, and the show doesn't come out and declare that they are 100% wrong, but ultimately it makes the case that it would be far simpler to go to the Moon then try to fake the journey.

posted 01-04-2005 12:59 AM               

I also loved the esteemed Cultural Vandal crying about the Moon hoax from his cat farm in the middle of the Nevada desert somewhere. He was a sight for TV. I was just curious why they didn't show any of Buzz'z punching bag Bart on the show? I guess the cat farmer was enough!

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Kind Regards

Douglas Henry

Enjoy yourself and have fun.... it is only a hobby!
http://home.earthlink.net/~aztecdoug/

posted 02-07-2005 10:20 AM               

quote:

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Originally posted by open mind:
Has anybody herd the release about there was an English pilot with the Apollo 11 moon lading crew? Just trying to find out more, help would be welcomed

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Not quite sure what youre referring to here Open Mind.

Running Al's website, I get - or used to get - a lot of mail from folks demanding he "come clean and admit it was all a hoax". This was stirred by some nut case website in England who published email addresses for all the astronauts (see how accurate they are giving MINE out? <LOL> ).

My standard answer, when I took the time to answer, was "Do you truly think that with SO many people involved in the program over the years, every single one of them could keep ths secret?" I mean OUR Government can't even keep a press release secret for 5 minutes.

It's so sad the people who promote this nonsense are just opportunists trying to make a name for themselves and take advantage of people the way they do. This special - that I've not had the pleasure to see - is great and we need more of this. The website http://www.badastronomy.com is excellent as well, and I would refer folks to it. Amazingly you never hear back after my comment and the website from the majority. AND if some of these folks took a minute to think it through (the science on the website is so easy) then they wouldn't be so easily fooled.

I have had a few email me later and thank me
and feel foolish. They shouldn't but there are 2 rules:

(1) If its ON the Internet, be skeptical.
(2) Think things through with a TRULY open mind.

Al

posted 02-08-2005 07:54 AM               

I believe that putting "people of faith" into the same category as the nuts who believe that the Apollo program was a hoax is uncalled for. And, does not conform to the rules of this board.

..."but why is it that the country that put man on the Moon... still in bulk numbers denies evolution and other theories of the universe (Big Bang etc)? "

Yes, why is it that so many people that observe the wonders that surround us all come to the conclusion that the universe just might have been influenced by a Higher Power? Whose numbers include many of the heroes who made the voyage from the Earth to the Moon? Why doesn't everybody listen to Carl Sagan?... just like those college students did in another posting.

Religion and politics divide the boards. I would prefer, and so would Robert I'm sure, if we would keep discussions relevant to space and demonstrated tolerance toward other member's beliefs and viewpoints.

posted 02-08-2005 01:09 PM            

Why these folks have such a mistrust of the govt is another story. But they are simply unwilling to believe anything the govt says or does..and the astronauts and the Apollo program are seen as simply pawns of this vast "X-Files like" conspiracy to hide the "truth" from us. Whatever that is.

IF the "truth" was that we never did beat the Russians to the moon and just wanted to make it seem that way, dont they think the Russians (then the Soviets, remember) would have howled bloody murder about a sham? But the Russians never raised one word in challenge to the landing.

Or maybe these people just want to believe that he government will stop at NOTHING simply to twist the truth and lie to us.. even if that means creating false moonrocks, a gigantic movie studio with the magic properties of 1/6 gravity on earth, and a host of other scientific implausibilities.

As someone once wryly noted, given all the fakery that would have been needed to concoct a hoax on earth, it almost was simpler to actually go to the moon!

Of course I do not believe any of this govt conspiracy stuff and neither do most all the folks here. But in reading over the Apollo 12 Surface Journal and re-reading Chaikins chapters on Ap12 I was struck that it even affected otherwise intelligent folks.

I'm thinking of the episode where Italian journalist Oriana Falluci claimed to Pete Conrad shortly after Apollo 11 and before his trip on 12 that NASA (meaning the big bad US government) made Neil Armstrong say the words he said when he first set foot on the moon, and she claimed they would put words in good ol' Pete's mouth as well.
[Right there her case flops over into crass IMPLAUSIBILITY!!]

Conrad, of course, stated flatly that NASA did NOT tell Neil or any other astronaut what to say, and he said he'd prove it. He'd make up what he would say on the moon right there at the dinner party for her, and then actually say it on the moon. Which he DID. And he bet her $500 that he would say it, and he won the bet, but never collected.

If a reasonably intelligent person like Oriana Fallaci could sincerely believe NASA completely controlled what the astronauts said, and wouldn't brook any dispute even when Conrad proved her wrong, it is any wonder that a small segement of the public is still so suspicious of the "government-NASA" that they are not willing to believe we actually accomplished the moon landing at all?

posted 02-08-2005 03:37 PM            

quote:

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Originally posted by MoonMan Jeff:
If a reasonably intelligent person like Oriana Fallaci

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While Fallaci wrote a stunningly good book on the space program in the 1960s, she recently wrote a book comparing Muslims to vermin, igniting a firestorm of controversy and charges of racism. I suspect that "reasonably intelligent" no longer applies...

posted 02-08-2005 11:49 PM            

"I'm thinking of the episode where Italian journalist Oriana Falluci claimed to Pete Conrad shortly after Apollo 11 and before his trip on 12 that NASA (meaning the big bad US government) made Neil Armstrong say the words he said when he first set foot on the moon, and she claimed they would put words in good ol' Pete's mouth as well. "

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"Tranquility Base here, the Eagle has landed"

I think the nomer "Tranquility Base" was also something Armstrong surprised everyone with as it had never been used or mentioned in training.

Also, I believe the ident used from the ISS in their first transmission was "Space Station Alpha", as opposed to the 'official' one (can't remember what it was), again something which had not been planned.

I am happy to be corrected, but if true, is this something which has a tradition, not only with astronauts but perhaps pilots as well?

Andrew

NB: This is a great forum.

posted 02-09-2005 12:22 AM            

quote:

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Also, I believe the ident used from the ISS in their first transmission was "Space Station Alpha", as opposed to the 'official' one (can't remember what it was), again something which had not been planned. I am happy to be corrected, but if true, is this something which has a tradition, not only with astronauts but perhaps pilots as well?

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With Bill Shepherd and Alpha, he was exercising a Navy Captain's perogative to name his ship. He instituted many other naval traditions (ship's bell, ship's log) during that mission too.

posted 02-11-2005 05:06 PM               

quote:

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Originally posted by David Bryant:
....I wonder (as a teacher) whether the fact that a Moon landing NOW is a total impossibilty has somehow convinced the younger generation that there is something in the 'conspiracy' rubbish. Most of the 7th graders I teach seem to have bought the whole story!

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A young co-worker and I went to get some sushi for lunch one day. He was born in South Korea and immigrated to the USA with his parents. He became a naturalized citizen and graduated from college a year or two ago.

Somehow the subject of lunar flight came up. (I think we were talking about the Bush proposal to return to the moon). He said we couldn't get to the moon. I agreed that it would take time.

But then he stunned me by saying we had never been there since the Apollo flights had been faked. Inside I was flabbergasted but as we calmly discussed it I gently poked holes in some of the conspiracy evidence that he recalled from somewhere.

What was even more interesting is that we both work in the space business and hopefully his conspiracy beliefs extend only to manned lunar missions.

I asked him to explain the evidence supporting a conspiracy and responded to the expected arguments with counter arguments. He seemed sincere when he said his mind had been changed. I only hope it was.

From his earlier conspiracy beliefs and how quickly he had abandoned them I concluded that he was either open to logical reasoning and persuasion or perhaps is kind of gullible.

I tend to think it was the latter because he also expressed his belief that Kerry was smarter than Bush and would win.

posted 02-12-2005 05:14 PM               

Alright, I don't know if its quite as bad in UK, but don't forget, WE'RE ALSO THE LAND THAT HAS NAT ENQ (a lies-rag in US) at every supermarket checkout, and throngs that follow fakey pro wrestling! Well, most of us are just common folks. I recall some old prose that calls Truth sacred. To be LIFTED UP. To be REVERED (that's an interesting word). Having an entire SPIRIT that, of necessity, must go with it. Yet there's a phrase in that same prose that correctly prophesies, "Truth has stumbled in the streets"

DAVID B YOUR MOON-SPIRACY DEBUNKING IS SIMILAR TO THE FACTS I USE. I use the added factor of flight monitoring & TRACKING. If we DIDN'T go to the moon, then the USSR & other powers tracking it would have known & proclaimed the fact. That should be the clincher, it seems.

(Star61 had missed your talking earlier with Rodina &, uh, flash gordon ( ! ) about development of superconductivity for solar power in a moon colony that would preclude nuclear power, excellent. Excellent indeed--from the Astronut that arrived on a rocket! never did hear about intriguing Luing & Oban.)
Is Albatron Al or Dana I wonder


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BUT ITS GOOD FOR ALL THIS SCIENCE TO MAKE ROOM FOR POETRY sometimes, everyone believes in art. Do you agree MSax?Not just open minds for higher learning, but our hearts, what about THE HEART inside--opening up our hearts. Poetry..
A heavenly prank, A celestial joke, 'Cause gray hair & babies leave no room for hope, But hoping was something this hopeless old man learned to do. A cry in the darkness & laughter at night, An elderly couple sit holding him tight, an improbable infant, a punch line, a promise come true. They called him laughter, he was to come after.... They laughed till they wept, then they laughed at their tears, this miracle baby they'd hoped for for years, [ Would be in the line of the one ] who could give us impossible joy. They called him laughter, he was to come after, [ their father ] had made an impossible promise come true. /// I long for your embrace, every single day, to meet you in this place, and see you face to face.
You�re everywhere I go I am not alone You call me as your own To know you and be known I surrender to your grace I can feel your presence here with me, Caught up in the wonder of your touch, Here in this moment I surrender to your love.

posted 02-13-2005 04:03 PM               

PS. Anyone ever figure out where those great photos of yours were taken? Such a deja vu. Its actually disturbing!! They couldn't possibly have been in Garound Huntsville AL could they? [Have to run, catch you tommorow if you get to posting, take care

posted 02-24-2005 11:09 AM               

We have seen the landing sites of the two Rovers on Mars and even imaged the bounce marks from high above on the orbiter. Doing the same on the moon should be a piece of cake, with no erosion, the evidence of man's prescence should be plainly visible, especially the lunar rover tracks.

Gee.....I really hope we confirm it.