We're well into the school year. In my own experience, someone who is currently in school would say "I'm in the ninth grade," not "I have completed the eighth grade."

My interpretation is the same as Trebuchet's: He's an adult who made it through eighth grade. But let us belay such talk and let rdbob himself clarify the situation, or not.

So back to the discussion: Apollo was not performed in a (as it were) vacuum, and Apollo 11 was not the first or only flight. Mercury, Gemini, and the early Apollo flights all helped NASA gain valuable insight and information on how things work in space, and what are the the best solutions to particular problems. Add to that the unmanned satellites and lunar probes (crashers, orbiters, and landers), and you find that there is a wealth of information about near space and the lunar surface -- sufficient to let you design a mission to land a man on the moon and return him back safely to the Earth.

Fred

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"For shame, gentlemen, pack your evidence a little better against another time."
-- John Dryden, "The Vindication of The Duke of Guise" 1684