Ok, ok. Folks. I just found this new animation. Apparently it was taken from a Russian space probe around the moon in the middle of the 90s. The video shows what apparently is a crater with an "odd" shape. If you can get a closer look at the images you can even see a very very sutil difference in the surface composition. Perhaps I´m seeing things I don´t know, but maybe Rick´s right!

Link
:wink:

Right. It rotates. It will appear to rotate from the point of view of any external observer, including one on the Earth. Do you understand that "always seeing one face of the Moon" is not the same as "not seeing the Moon rotate"? If it didn't rotate, we would see all around it as it revolves around the Earth.

You are "turning around" the Moon's axis. That's what rotation is. At a rate of once every (about) 28 days, or roughly 0.000025 RPM.

You are revolving around the Earth. Revolving means a gravitationally bound motion around another body. Rotation means turning around your own axis.

Yes, you are, otherwise there would be no "far side" of the Moon. Again, you seem to have confused the tidally-locked rotation of the Moon, which means we see only the "near side", with the Moon not rotating at all.

Exactly backwards - see above.

The Moon spins on its axis. It has angular momentum. The Sun, or Mars, or the Local Group doesn't enter into it.

However, the Earth does have everything to do with why the Moon spins so slowly. Tidal-locking. However, if the Earth went pffft right now, the Moon would continue to spin, very slowly, as it continued to revolve around the Sun - in a somewhat different orbit.

No trouble here, thanks :P I'm just hoping to clear up some misconceptions you have.

As far as the Dyson sphere idea, I haven't looked at your images and whatnot, but I'm afraid I can rather easily falsify that. If the Moon was really a Dyson sphere, then it must contain a red dwarf, as you said earlier. The minimum mass of a red dwarf star is 0.08 solar masses. However, the Sun is about 330,000 times the mass of the Earth. Thus, a Dyson-sphere Moon would necessarily have a mass well over 26,000 times that of the Earth!

Needless to say, this is obviously not the case. Otherwise we would be whipping rather tightly around the Moon, instead of the Moon's leisurely revolution about the Earth-Moon barycenter (which is inside the Earth).

Sorry. It was an imaginative idea: "Fortress Moon".

Oh, it's quite easy to falsify the Dyson sphere idea. Simply put, a red or white dwarf star is larger in volume than the Moon. I think that pretty much seals that deal.

Oh, well, yeah, that too. And it would be toasty. "Moonshine" would have a whole new meaning :P

[-X ......

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It's actually worse than that! Rick is of the opinion that there is a White Dwarf in the middle of the hollow moon. That would give the moon a mass of some 300,000 times that of the Earth. No wonder the Apollo astronauts couldn't jump high enough to appease Cosmic Dave and his mates! :wink:

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"Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful." - Ian Faith

You caught me.

Schickele's complete statement was:

"I'm sure that many of you know that Robert Schumann when he first became acquainted with the music of Brahms wrote in his magazine "Hats off gentlemen. A genius.". In the next issue before the publication of which the music of PDQ Bach became known to him he wrote "Hats back on again gentlemen. An ......" (well, you know the quote)."

Unfortunately Schickele's reference isn't historically accurate. Schumann was referring to Chopin, not Brahms, when he made his "genius" remark.

Just wanted to make sure the references were accurate. :wink:

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Ah, the wonders of the internet. It just goes to show that there's no interest, no matter how perverse, that isn't shared by someone on the net.

So you probably have listened to the Pervertimento for Bagpipes, Bicycle and Balloons, S. 66 by P.D.Q. Bach and its five regular movements:

Allegro moulto
Romanze II (Adagio Sireno)
Minaret and Trio
Romanze I (Chi Largo)
Presto Changio

What a dynamic work! It caused a real "chain" reaction in the audience when I saw it years ago. Unfortunately a repeat performace turned out rather flat. :wink:

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It is what we are discussing. There is also no dark side of the Earth, for the exact same reason. That reason being that the Earth spins. As does the Moon.

You do not appear to be convinced that the Moon does not rotate. Otherwise, you would not admit that it does when viewed from the outside. Again, it cannot spin and not spin at the same time. I have explained why. You have chosen to not only to not acknowledge those explanations, but ignore them entirely.

This page says nothing. It does not support your groundless suggestions. You give no reason for even pointing to this page. All it says is that the density of white dwarves is not precisely known.


There is no life cycle to a white dwarf. A white dwarf is the degenerate core of a low/medium mass star. It is a dead star. The only difference between a white dwarf and a black dwarf is temperature. A black dwarf is much cooler than a white dwarf because it has already radiated away the bulk of its heat. White dwarves are hot for the same reason a piece of fish is hot when you take it out of the oven. When the fish cools, it does not magically transform into a new object. Black dwarves are just cold white dwarves. Therefore, even if there were a white dwarf inside the Moon, its cooling would not send it crashing into the planet.

However, even if that white dwarf existed, there is no danger of it becoming a black dwarf for billions of years. It's widely believed that the universe isn't old enough for low-mass stars to have lived, died, and then cooled by this point.


Yeah, it's been something...

Next time you feel the urge to learn something, do everyone a favour and just don't.


Additional rant.

You did not once answer one single question asked of you. There is absolutely no reason whatsoever for anyone to listen to you. You ignored everything said to you. If no one here is going to listen to your mindless, unsubstantuated babble, and you're not going to listen to anything said to you, why did you chose to waste your time here?

Frankly, I never expected you to listen to anything that was said to you, but you didn't even defend yourself. You made a complete and total fool of yourself simply by ignoring any and all cricitisms. What this tells me is that not even you yourself believe the things you were saying. I hope everyone else is capable of seeing this, too.

The next time you want to make someone play the fool, at least find some means of supporting your argument. I could have done a better job than you with carpet samples from Wal-Mart and my cat-shaped clock. The key, you see, would have been to EXPLAIN whatever evidence I wanted to present, no matter how rediculous or fake it may be. Random pictures and webpages that have nothing to do with what you're saying are completely without meaning.

I hope you had fun. It's been a hilarous experience.

My daughter loves it (my wife doesn't. So far, though, she hasn't accused me of performing diverse perverse and unnatural acts in front of my daughter).

Following your logic is like passing a wreck on the freeway. You don't want to look, but the horror is somehow spellbinding....

Can you not understand that these two points are inextricably bound? If it is proved that there is no dark side to the moon, it is ipso facto (one of your favourite terms) proved that the moon rotates on it's axis. (Amended to note that I am referring here to a time frame of one lunar orbit of the Earth, ie ~28 days).

Your inability to face reality is truly breathtaking.

UT, and all other rational human beings, are convinced that the moon does spin on it's axis and are happy to admit it to anyone who cares to listen. Indeed, they have been through 6 pages of your fantasy. Can you not read either?

No, the moon in fact is not a Dyson Sphere. It does not contain a white dwarf for reasons my goldfish could understand. By the way, do you have any concept of the time frame that it takes for a white dwarf to become a black dwarf? Heres a hint - it is probably yet to have happened once so far in the entire lifetime of our universe.

Secondly, anyone with just a passing acquaintance with orbital mechanics will tell you that even if someone did forget to pay the gas bill on the white dwarf & they turned off the power, it would have zero impact on the orbit.

Really? Who told you that? The King of the Potato People?

__________________
"I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day." - Douglas Adams

"Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful." - Ian Faith

That's impossible, for I am the King of the Potato People! Isn't that right, Uncle Arnie?

[-X Techy. Techy, techy, techy!!

Just for that, you get 3 hours W.O.O. !! (Then I can get my three-seater back!) =D> \/

__________________
"I'd take the awe of understanding over the awe of ignorance any day." - Douglas Adams

"Certainly, in the topsy-turvy world of heavy rock, having a good solid piece of wood in your hand is often useful." - Ian Faith

Hey, good for your daughter! Most women seem not to like old PDQ (my wife actively disliked Herr Schickele). Maybe she (your daughter) will grow up to be an exception to the rule! You go, girl!

And now for the Echo Sonata for Two Unfriendly Groups of Instruments, Schickele Number 9-9-9-9--9-9-9999...

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Fortunately, we now have access to the entire transcript of the Apollo missions on the Moon, courtesy of the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal (ALSJ): http://www.hq.nasa.gov/office/pao/History/alsj/

Not only can we read the transcripts, we can also listen to them.

The explanation for the comments on http://www.v-j-enterprises.com/astro2.html are very simple.

In the case Rick listed, it starts as follows:

Duke: These devices are unbelievable. I'm not taking a gnomon up there.
Young: O.K., but man, that's going to be a steep bridge to climb.

However, the ALSJ reads as follows:

124:30:19 Duke: Okay. (Pause) And if you'll notice, I'm carrying John's bag, and the shovel, and I'm not taking the gnomon. (Pause)
124:30:42 Young: Okay.
124:30:45 Duke: Man, that's gonna be a little steep ridge to climb. (Long Pause)
The numbers represent the time after launch, for reference purposes (hours:minutes:seconds).

So Duke says he climbs a ridge, not a bridge. This is a fairly significant difference, because “bridge” usually connotes a man-made construction, while “ridge” is usually a natural land form.

Duke’s description of the crater matches up between the two sources. But what’s said after this differs very greatly. Essentially, the statements quoted afterwards are picked from various other points in the mission, and appear to be jumbled together. No wonder they don’t make much sense.

In case some of the words quoted sound like code, let’s decipher a couple:

Secondary: a crater formed from the impact of a rock expelled in another impact. Secondaries usually hit at a much lower velocity, so these types of craters are distinctive.
Genesis Rock: a very old piece of plagioclase retrieved on the Apollo 15 mission, and so named by the media.
EVA-2: The second extra-vehicular activity of the mission. There were three EVAs on Apollo 16.
EMU: Extra-vehicular mobility unit – the space suit.
PLSS: Personal life support system – the back pack worn by astronauts on the Moon, carrying their oxygen and water. Pronounced “pliss”.

But why stop there? Let’s look at the other apparently problematic conversations on that web-site.

2) More misquoting.

Duke: We felt it under our feet. It's a soft spot. Firmer. Where we stand, I tell you one thing. If this place had air, it'd sure be beautiful. It's beautiful with or without air. The scenery up on top of Stone Mountain, you'd have to be there to see this to believe it - those domes are incredible!

According to the ALSJ, the question and response were as follows:
152:16:32 England: Right. And the Station 4, 5, and 6 area, you mentioned that 5 and 6 the surfaces got progressively firmer. I wonder, could you see any contact or was it a gradual thing?
152:16:51 Duke: No, we couldn't. Just when we got off the Rover and you felt it under your feet. The softest spot was up on the top, at Station 4. Progressively firmer as we went out, like you say, went down to 6. And you just noticed it when you got out.

A couple of minutes later, there’s a very different reference to the air:

152:18:47 Young: Okay. (Pause) I'll tell you one thing. If this place had air, it'd sure be beautiful. It's beautiful with or without air, but the scenery today up on top of Stone Mountain you'd have to be there to see and to believe it. It's just dazzling. And I hope it showed up good on television...
152:19:15 England: It sure did, John. We're really impressed.

No reference to domes, ravines or tunnels that I could find (though I may have missed them).

3) Confusion about Condorcet.

What’s so surprising here? Ron Evans, the CMP on Apollo 17 was observing a crater with a French name. How do you pronounce it? Con-dor-set or Con-dor-say?

4) More crater names

Where’s the mystery in craters named Flag, Buster and Plum? The Apollo crews named the craters they were to explore while planning the mission. They also named craters Gator, Kiva and Palmetto. And Barbara.

5) Some more Apollo 17

Omni Bravo is the name of one of four omni-directional antennae on the Command-Service Module. Not surprisingly, they were known as Alpha, Bravo, Charlie and Delta.

Kilo is quite possibly the letter assigned to a camera magazine. They were usually referred to using the phonetic alphabet (kilo = K), but sometimes the astronauts used other designations, such as women’s names.

Vostok was the name of a Soviet spacecraft. The name was also applied to a crater on the Moon.

A bright spot could well be what the orbiting CMP Ron Evans saw as he passed over the LM landing site, at an altitude of about 100 kilometres (something he was supposed to look for). However, this conversation also sounds like bits of other conversations being stuck together.

6) Lunar formations and strange terminology

Structure, blocked field, beaches, benches and terraces are all quite standard terms in geography or geology. The suggestion appears to be that as these words also have a human connotation, they must mean man-made or alien-made things on the Moon. This is simply an argument from ignorance.

7) Watermarks and UFOs

The astronaut initially says “It almost looks like a pattern as if the water were flowing up on a beach…” It’s not surprising that later the word “watermark” is used, as it’s a lot less to say.

The conversation about the “flash of light” is reasonably easy to follow, even though the site author wishes to turn it into a “flashing light” which is a bit different. As for the LMP referring to a UFO, it’s certainly possible he was joking at the time. (Joking? Surely not!)

8) More watermarks.

See above.

9) Tracks?

There are a couple of cases where astronauts on the lunar rover followed their outbound tracks inbound as additional protection against getting lost. The astronauts sometimes commented about looking out for traffic, but I think we can safely ascribe this to humour. (Humour? Surely not!)

10) What did Schmitt see?

Well it’s hard to say, because once again the statements are completely jumbled. Gene Cernan wasn’t Mission Control, so we don’t even know for sure who replied to Schmitt. And without a timebase, it’s a bit hard to track the conversation down among 22 hours of moon walks.

11) Mysterious objects flying by

Once again an argument from ignorance. There’s no description of object size, so the author speculates they were UFOs. How about them being ice particles dislodged from the LM as it maneuvers? It makes sense in context.

12) Back to Apollo 11

TV coverage was interrupted? Well, we have access to the entire TV record, so any two minute interruption could easily be picked. And where are the recorded ham radio conversations? We know ham radio operators picked up transmissions from the Moon, so it should be possible to cross-reference.

Also, no one ever referred to “Mission Control” on the radio. It was either “Houston” or the Capcom’s name.

And anyway, if the TV coverage was out, how did anyone know that one astronaut had grabbed the other’s arm?

And the last bit? Well, let’s just say those “astronauts” don’t speak like Armstrong and Aldrin. Read the ALSJ to get an idea of how they (and Houston) speak.

Reading this thread, I'm reminded of the following line from Red Dwarf...


WAY too many commas... [-X Let's hope there are little green men piloting the moon...

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you guys crack me up- and get me thinking. I am just a guy with a passing interest in these subjects- the "nova" in my name is a reference to my car, not an exploding star- and the only reference I've EVER heard to a Dyson's sphere was on that episode of Star Trek:TNG where they found Scotty suspended in a transporter buffer in a shuttle craft stuck on the surface of one.
anyways- reading this thread got me thinking about something that hasn't quite gotten touched on- since the same side of the moon is always facing the earth- then why does the earth "rise" and "set" like the sun and moon do on earth? I know they got the earth rising or setting filmed on at least one of the Apollo missions.

It doesn't, on the surface of the Moon. That was from orbit around the Moon, where you'll see everything rise and set much more often, much like astronauts in low Earth orbit see a sunrise every 90 minutes or so.

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hmmm.. i swear i saw it during a moonwalk. like i said, i'm not much into this astronomy thing like some of you are, but it is fascinating stuff.
i just have to ask- what's you excuse for being awake at this ungodly hour? i'm just about ready to go to sleep..

White Dwarf on the moon.

Please forgive me I couldn´t help it. ops:

No, that's exactly what people have been pointing out to you for several pages: the Moon spins on its axis.

The Moon is not a Dyson sphere, and not just because it resembles a natural body in every respect. It's flatly impossible for it to be one, because, as has been pointed out, the star you say it must contain is larger than the Moon itself, and is so much more massive that the Earth would be rushing madly around the Moon - perhaps as a ring of debris if the orbit were inside the Roche limit.

Nope. The Moon orbits the Earth. It's not "held up" by anything except its own motion. Just like every other planet and moon in the solar system. In fact, as has been pointed out, the Moon is actually moving slowly away from Earth due to tidal interactions.

But aren't you interested in the explanations you have been given? What do you think, for example, of the problems pointed out with the idea of a dwarf star supposedly contained inside the Moon?

Loosen the clamp that secures the vise to its base. Now simply spin the vise with the bolt and the attached ball (moon). If you put an X on one side of the ball, you will see that the moon rotates once every time it goes around the vise (earth).
If you're standing on the moon and your line of sight is the bolt, you will be looking down the bolt to the vise (earth) which will always be at the same spot in your sky. If you're on the vise and look up to the moon, you will always see the same face of the Moon. If you are on the moon and look past the vise to the shop walls, you will see all the walls as you travel 360 degrees around the vise. Why? Because the moon you are on is rotating on its axis. Just like the real moon.

I can't either. Surely from all the different examples and models you've been shown you can see that this is true. You really don't have to know anything about physics, orbital mechanics, or any other exotic science. A child could understand that the ball rotates as it revolves. (In fact I might try one of these tonight with my daughter when I get home). Your failure to admit it is because of one of two reasons. Neither is very encouraging.

Six pages.....Sheesh!

Six pages with two Red Dwarf references. I think it was worth it! Twelve smegging pages would have been worth it!

Oh smeg, there's another one...

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Edoltc, that dwarf's outside the Moon. Sobie's is inside the Moon. Here's what he's talking about:

Bryson

Notice the difference the internal mass makes relative to the overall center of rotation (spin) and the influence on the two-body (Earth-Moon) orbital system?

No need for

or

:wink:

Pretty sure this dwarf's name is Bryson, though. Oh well...

[edited to change image URL]

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Bryson appears to be a brown dwarf. I'm not sure he counts.

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In a couple of the missions the location they landed put the Earth low on the horizon - this may have given the impression it was 'rising' - but it really wasn't going anywhere in a hurry...

The moon does wobble a bit in its orbit--there are places where the earth may actually rise or set over the course of a month. I don't know if the amount of the nutation is sufficient to take the earth from completely below the horizon to completely above the horizon or not.