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Old 22-October-2003, 04:33 PM
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JayUtah JayUtah is offline
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When testing the feasibility of humans in space, tests were first conducted using animals. No animal however was used to test a return Moon journey.

Animal tests were not intended to validate the flight hardware. They were intended to verify that a complex organism could live and work in space. Once that is done it doesn't have to be redone for every new spacecraft.

The U.S. and Canada both tested the cislunar radiation environment using biological samples aboard balloons and sounding rockets. Those tests did not have to be done inside an Apollo capsule.

"They had trained for years on earth in simulated conditions is this good enough (someone pleease expand on this)"

You don't have to buy into his hidden presumptions. This is known as the argument of, "If I Ran the Zoo." The author is simply explaining how he would run a space program. And since NASA didn't follow the same procedure he would have, it must have all been faked.

The astronauts trained generally, but also individually for specific mission. Training for Apollos 12 and 13 was already well underway during Apollo 11. Astronaut training is especially rigorous, and you cannot subject the same person to multiple cycles of closely-spaced mission-specific training. He will "burn out" and make mistakes. Further, repeatedly assigning the same experienced astronaut to mission after mission accumulates all the flight expertise in one person. If that person should be killed, that expertise is lost. By training an entire astronaut corps, the risk of losing expertise is mitigated.

The author here begs the question that it's logical always to assign the most experienced astronaut. When closely examined, it's not logical at all.

The first was LAUNCH CONTROL, who communicated with the astronauts from the moment of launch, up until they were in Earth orbit.

No. Control handoff occurred when the Saturn V cleared the tower.

Mission Control is in Houston because Lyndon Johnson wanted it that way. And when you get right down to it, it doesn't really matter where on earth you put a control station. Houston is as good a choice as any.

Launch Control is in Florida because that's the best place to launch from inside U.S. territory.

For what other reason would they have two separate communication links...

Typical argument. He can't think of any legitimate alternative, so the wacky theory must be true by default.

First, it's not two "separate communication links". It's all the same loop. Sometimes it's over VHF and sometimes it's over S-band. One group can hear the other group.

Second, there are dozens of links in the MSFN configuration. Why is this particular set of links the only one the author can explain?

...and why is this practice not operated today?

It is.

...it was here that he got the idea for filming the mock lunar module, and command module separation and docking.

Pure speculation.

Think about it, how could you install a camera in the center part of a rocket booster engine without it being burned to a crisp?

It wasn't installed in the engine.

TV pictures allegedly beamed back to Earth showing the lunar module separation, were razor sharp color images

The booster sep images weren't TV images. They were 16mm film recovered later.

...why therefore were the TV transmissions from the Moon gray and fuzzy, after all they were supposedly transmitted across the same distance in space

Only one set of transmissions was "gray and fuzzy" -- and there was a good reason for it. The rest were in color and fairly good quality.

The CSM television camera was connected to a fuel-cell powered transmitter with a high-gain antenna. Apollo 11's LM camera was connected to a battery-powered transmitter with a comparatively small antenna.

It's unbelievable that the USA ever got into space at all, let alone to the Moon and back, which of course they did not.

The author fails to describe how those problems affected the mission and what was done to solve them. No space mission is ever expected to go flawlessly. The author begs the question that only absolutely flawless space missions can be credible.

Many NASA space problems and failures continued long after the Apollo program, and still continue today. If NASA could achieve such amazing feats over 34 years ago, then space technology has gone backwards instead of forward.

This presumes everything else is held equal. Mission complexity has increased. Budgets have decreased.

Russia was of course the first in space with sputnik, an animal, a man, a woman, a space walk, and finally a space station.

Sputnik is a red herring. The space race began with Sputnik. For political reasons the existing technology was not used to launch a U.S. satellite.

Putting a woman in space is a win for equal rights, but there's no technological advantage to it.

The Russians got the first space walk, but only by subjecting Alexei Leonov to extremely dangerous conditions.

The first space station was the silver medal. After failing in their attempts to reach the moon, the Soviets turned their attention to space stations.

They were the first in everything to do with space.

Including most of the first fatalities.

After about 1965 or 1967, the U.S. had caught up to the Soviet Union and surpassed them in many respects, including a three-to-one superiority in space hours. The U.S. held the endurance record, the altitude record, and was the first to conduct an orbital rendezvous.

Now that we can look into the former Soviet space program, we see the reason for this. The Soviets under Krushchev were geared toward breaking records. They weren't geared for creating an infrastructure. It's the classic tortoise and hare story. When the firstmanship efforts came crashing down, the U.S. was able to catch up.

Scientists knew there and then that it was an impossibility, but Kennedy had said it...

False. The Apollo program was already under way when Kennedy made his speech. Most conspiracists don't realize this. Neither do they realize that it was NASA who came shopping to Kennedy for more space money. Kennedy's speech was an answer to NASA's requests, not a challenge.

Top NASA officials met in secret, and decided the only option was to fake the Moon landing in 1969

Pure speculation.

Nixon took office shortly before Apollo 11, but continued the lies under guidance from the CIA in order to boost American pride which was at an all time low.

Standard conspiracy rhetoric: the CIA is really in charge, etc.

Nixon hated Kennedy, Johnson, and everything having to do with them. In public Nixon shook astronauts' hands and congratulated them because it was good politics. In private he dismantled Apollo.

the classified material is probaly reserved for the military...

But if it was all a hoax, of what possible use would any of that have been to the military?

One does not have to be a photographic expert to spot that the pictures are 100% fake.

Then why do we employ photographic experts at great cost to validate or repudiate photographs in other cases when we really need to know? If no special expertise is required to authenticate a photo, then anyone at any time could act as a photographic expert.

As expected, the "anomalies" that these laymen discover in the Apollo photographs are easily traced back to the layman's ignorance of various properties of light, geometry, and materials. This demonstrates quite conclusively that one does have to be a photographic expert.

They have not been involved in anything as big as Vietnam since, so why this feeble excuse

Public funding is a matter of public policy, which is in turn a matter of public opinion. The public does not want to fund continued manned lunar exploration. Therefore there is no money. NASA cannot simply do whatever it wants. It does what Congress directs it to do.

...the technology, ie, tried and tested methods, along with drawings and equipment etc., has apparently already been done.

That equipment is decades out of date. Since there is no money to upgrade it and keep it current, we would have to start all over again. Non-engineers routinely fail to comprehend this.

"Those statistics are waaaaaaaaaaay inflated its really only 2% who beliove was faked"

6% according to Gallup.

Bill Kaysing has offered to appear on a live TV debate with any of the Apollo astronauts...

A move which would make Bill Kaysing a household name -- that's what he wants.

...and could demolish Bill Kaysing's theory in less than 5 minutes.

Anyone with a science education can demolish Bill Kaysing's theory in less than 5 minutes. The point is not that Kaysing's theory can't be debunked. The point is that by doing it the way Kaysing proposes, it only serves to help Kaysing achieve the personal fame he has sought since the mid-1970s. NASA doesn't need to debunk Kaysing in order to continue on their mission. It's Kaysing who needs NASA.

Has NASA taken any legal action to sue Kaysing for labeling them as murderers? No of course not because (A) The statement may be true, (B) If it were not true any legal action would bring into question the authenticity of the alleged Moon landings, and that is what NASA do not want.

The third alternative is, again, that such a suit would play right into Kaysing's hands. Kaysing wants to become famous. He is trying to get NASA to do the hard work to make him famous. Instead, NASA properly ignores him.

The TV series "From the Earth to the Moon", showed just how easy it was to create a Moon landscape, as well as simulated gravity. The film was identical in every way to the original Apollo films, and yet this series was filmed in a TV studio.

Yes, I spoke at length to the people who made it.

The film is not identical in every way. Chiefly, it is composed of very short snips of film, as with all Hollywood films. Each of those five- or six-second shots takes half a day to set up. It took many months of principal photography followed by many months of post-production (digital wire removal, etc.). But the topical references in the Apollo moonwalks plus the scientific direction from the backrooms requires that they have been done live.

A British film crew and I got hold of one of the space suits made for that production. We put an actor in it and had him do moonwalk-like activities. He could only go for about 30 seconds without having to lift up his visor and gasp for air. And this was at night, outside, under only one studio light. (BTW, we actually had some of the same grips that worked on FTETTM.)

even used the same Moon buggy, which was supposedly LEFT ON THE MOON.

The ones left on the moon were not the only ones made.

NASA refuse to answer any questions regarding Apollo

Not true. They just don't respond to conspiracy theorists' bait.

likewise the astronauts are reluctant to talk about their alleged Moon missions, as shown in the acknowledgments section of Tim Furniss's fictional book entitled "One Small Step".

Funny, I can't get them to shut up about it. I have a whole bookshelf full of astronaut memoirs.

He [Armstrong] is nervous, stumbles over his words, and looks down at the table in front of him like some little boy who has been told off by his teacher. This was to hide his guilt from the camera...

Armstrong is a shy person, uncomfortable in crowds. He has always been this way. It has nothing to do with Apollo.

...as if to say "We should not be conning the American people in this way".

Pure speculation.

They dodged the all important questions like a drifter dodges the heat.

NASA has a huge effort involved in publicizing Apollo and talking about it. The notion that they don't want to talk about it is daft. But NASA does have a policy about not talking to conspiracy theorists. Since the conspiracists tend to spin everything their way no matter what was actually said, there's no point.

NASA Chief Dan Goldin when interviewed by UK TV journalist Sheena McDonald. He said that mankind cannot venture beyond Earth orbit, 250 miles into space, until they can find a way to overcome the dangers of cosmic radiation. He must have forgot that they supposedly sent 27 astronauts 250,000 miles outside Earth orbit over 34 years ago.

The techniques used to manage radiation exposure for the Apollo mission won't work for a mission to any other destination or for lengthier missions.

Again this is untrue, as Cuban schools have, since 1969, always taught the Apollo Moon landings as fake.

Circular reasoning. This establishes Cuban schools as enlightened only if one already concludes that the moon landings were fake.

The most baffling aspect of all this, is how astronauts like Armstrong and Aldrin could have been led astray by such a scenario.

Yes, it is baffling. This departure from reality would lead most reasonable people to reject the conclusion as implausible. Yet in the conspiracist world that simply presents another opportunity for conjecture. Such as:

Many believe they, and the other astronauts, were influenced by mind expanding drugs, which were extremely common at about this time. However I have found no evidence to support this claim.

Armstrong, and other Apollo astronauts still alive, have strict instructions not to discuss the authenticity of the Moon landings with any reporter, or investigative journalist.

Not true. Ed Mitchell will talk to you about it. Brian O'Leary will talk to you about it. Buzz Aldrin talks about it all the time.

Most of the astronauts have learned that there is no value in speaking about these things to conspiracists, even to deny or refute it. So that's what's really happening.

This can be best summed up by Neil Armstrong's remark when confronted by investigative journalist Bart Sibrel. "Ask me no questions, and I'll tell you no lies". Would Armstrong make this remark if he had nothing to hide?

Armstrong didn't say anything of the sort. The statement, "Ask me no questions and I'll tell you no lies," is what Bart Sibrel said, attempting to explain why Armstrong refused to be interviewed by him.
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