I was rummaging through the dark depths of nasascam to anger myself, and although there are too many ridiculous things there to discuss on a thread or try to e-mail the owner about, I did come upon this puzzling statement:

What the frleckerlies does that mean? What is the "conical space capsule"? As far as I know, the Apollo CM was the only conical part of the CSM/LM stack. Perhaps the astronauts rode into orbit inside the SPS? I believe (wink wink) that this is another example of the confusion of the author of nasascam. What does he think the Command Module is? Does he think it's the LM? I am really befuddled by this statement.

Also, he uses the word "conical" a time too many and the astronauts did not climb out of the top of the Command Module after splashdown, but rather exited through the side hatch. (I know you all know that, but I'll include a picture just for the heck of it.) 8)




BTW, while searching for a decent Apollo recovery picture, I stumbled across this site, a great collection of pictures from the Apollo 17 mission.[/img]

It seems to me that the author has confused the Service Module (SM) with the Command Module (CM).

The SM held the fuel, engines, fuel cells, batteries, etc., The CM was the living quarters, (and more) and its backside held the heat shield.

Maybe you could send him this link to the Virtual Apollo book.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...glance&s=books

Interesting site, but garbage nevertheless.

I would say that this is simply a reflection of straight ignorance. The writer seems to be of the opinion that the astronauts actually travelled in the SM (which he/she has incorrectly referred to as the CM), and then (presumably for re-entry) had to clamber 'through' the heat shield into the "conical space capsule". It is not clear whether 'getting out at the pointed end' refers to egress after splashdown or to transfer into the LM for the lunar landing....second possibility is perhaps a little more understandable but either way, the writer is horribly off the mark. :roll:

By the way, what the frleckerlies does frleckerlies mean?? (Great phrase )

BBCode fixed by The Bad Astronomer :-)

Yes, but has anyone noticed that the person (presumably an astronaut) in the photograph is wearing a bra! This can only mean one thing! The missions were faked, and the person standing on the side of the capsule is a stuntwoman!

Actually they did climb through the top of the command module to get into the LM. After docking, the inside of the docking mechanism is dismantled to allow entry to the LM through a small tunnel.

Look at the nice photo - you can clearly see the rim round the top of the re-entry module of the hatch where they crawled in. What the confused HB appears to be claiming (as I read it) is that the crawl wouldn't have been possible because the chutes are on the top. The picture also shows that they are arranged around the edge of the central hatch.

Basically, this is a simple case of mistaking how the re-entry module is built, and the photo demonstrates what the correct design is.

This particular 'FACT' takes the biscuit. Can you believe on the home page he actually accuses us off not doing any research and then pulls this. Such ignorance would be amusing but the fact that he is so obnoxious and so uncritically sure he is right and we are brain-damaged, it just becomes insulting.

Now you folks see why I do this. The NASAScam site -- which is quoted by many -- contains errors that any elementary schoolchild of my era would have instantly recognized and corrected. The author of that site is easily the most ignorant individual that has ever tried to "educate" his peers about Apollo.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

That's not a bra... that's the 'bro.'

*nods*

You have to consider that we've had loads of threads on this board about Nasascam and I don't know what happened on the old board. This guy gets us so worked up we just can't stop ranting whenever someone brings up the subject.

I was thinking about that. I quote one paragraph from him and immediately get ten angered replies.

Anyway, here are some more facts for you to feast on:
Oh, I get it- so you can't see the curvature of Earth or have light reflected onto your spacecraft if you are not orbiting it.

How convincing this fact is. You really showed me the way of truth with that gem of a fact.

I don't remember the equation for calulating lux or luminosity, but I do remember reading once that the Moon actually provides such little illumination that the sun at Pluto is about 217 times brighter than a fully lit Moon appears to us on Earth. Also, he fails to acknowledge the albedo of the Moon is only around 4%.

I like this. Here he is essentially saying "There claims are wrong, but if someone proves they are right, then they are actually lying as to the source of the rocks."

Here this chump gets confused with software needed to run a graphically appealing lunar landing game and the software needed to perform simple calculations to take LMs to the surface. Although the LM computer could not add two numbers, it was not needed to, whereas a simulation of a lunar landing needs to model a LM, all its systems, a landscape, etc.[/quote]

Not too long ago, I brought up the subject here and yet we all still feel compelled to go at it all over again.

The blue haze issue was rammed down Cosmic Dave's throat numerous times. It the result of scatter due to all sorts of crap on the window. Jay called it New Car Smell. The curvature issue is probably Sibrellian. He's confusing the curvature of Earth with the edge of the outside of the window.

The issue with this is that Homer clearly doesn't know the difference between fact and opinion. His insult as proof of his case clearly shows how obnoxious and irrational he is.

The inconvenience of this of course is that we have to argue about Luna's reflectivity in order to make the shadow infilling case. Obviously there is no reason why it can't be at such a level to fulfill both cases, but qualitatively and to the straw men employed by the conspiracists, it sounds as though we're arguing Luna isn't particularly reflective in this case, but very reflective in other cases. They could accuse us of contradiction. A better response would be to point out that Earth is even brighter than Luna and yet we aren't blinded as we walk down the street.

Indeed. This isn't a fact, but merely a statement of the conditions necessary for the conspiracy theory to not be false. He hasn't actually given us any facts, merely possible implications of other facts. He clearly has no clue what a fact is, much less how the scientific method works. Of course, at this point we ask about the nature of a "radiation oven". It sounds like he's saying they put them in an ACME Moonrock Faking Machine.

[/quote]

We could also point out that his statements about the date of invention of computer chips is wrong. We could also point out that the largest and most powerful computers today are still housed in large air conditioned buildings. Ironically, this is almost cribbed verbatum by Cosmic Dave.

Anyone who's ever photographed with glass in the picture knows that you don't ever see "purely" through the glass. There is always some scatter or reflection. Whether the glow in the CM windows is scatter or reflection or both, it just doesn't make sense to expect to see only pure black through the window.

The NASAScam author's clear inability to employ even basic reasoning and to mistake insults for facts is certainly one of the most annoying aspects of his contribution to this question. I can't see why anyone takes him seriously. Verbal violence is such a turn-off, even if you agree with what's being said.

Luminance of the lunar surface is only partly the issue. From earth, even from a distance, we see thousands of square miles of reflector. If you're actually on the lunar surface you only get a few square meters of reflector. That's what makes the difference.


The moonrock argument is a perfect example of -- can I say it? -- a deranged mind. The ability of evidence to support one's conclusion is directly proportional to its potential to falsify that same conclusion. To simply postulate a Magic Moonrock Making Machine (whatever a "radiation oven" is) is really grasping at straws. Let's say you take an earth rock and irradiate it. Do you get a moon rock? (Which is to say, do you get a rock that looks like an Apollo sample?) No, you get an irradiated earth rock. Geologists can easily tell the difference.

The prevalence of computers in daily life has given everyone the notion that he understands them intimately, and that the only computers possible are the ones with which he has direct experience. Embedded systems (e.g., flight control systems) are vastly different than the desktops and laptops, and even PDAs, that we use today.

BTW, the AGC could indeed add two numbers, but "multiply" was implemented as a subroutine.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

I don't know. I might vote for this guy for that dubious honor.

__________________
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

We had a discussion on that guy in this thread.

That guy may be way out of his gourd too, but the worst he's inflicting on the reader is the promise to give you all his money and let you kill him if you can prove he's wrong. Not that I plan to take him up on his offer, but it's nice of him to make it. He's not calling me "green" or "brain-damaged" for following a careful process of fact-finding and inference. I'd actually be afraid to meet the NASAScam author in a dark alley.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

I think I might enjoy meeting him in a dark alley. (flexes fingers, grins a Kzinti grin). Oops. I didn't type that out loud, did I?


Legal disclaimer: that was a joke. When it comes to dismantling an obnoxious and ignorant person, why take sixty seconds to do physically what can be done mentally in about fifteen? Besides, there's rules 'n' stuff about that. I would never do that. Really.

I've always thought that NASAScam might actually just a big joke. The site is filled with so many obvious and silly errors, like the one that started this post, that I've always suspected that this person is scamming the hoaxers and that some day they'll come out and say so.

Yep, you've convinced me with that one. From now on, anyone that tries to tell me that George Lucas faked the moon landings with CGI is going to get laughed at by me. Phew, that was close.

I wondered that too. On his Apolloscam page, he makes use of dirty jokes in his arguments and you wonder if that reveals his intent to be trollish. However, his behaviour outside the site doesn't seem to imply it. If he's is running a joke, he's making a bloody good show of it. Wasn't he kicked off Apollohoax.com because he was too extreme for them?

I may very well be wrong; I'm not an expert on this, but from A Man on the Moon, Chapter 3:

[/quote]

From the Apollo Operations Handbook

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Alright. Thanks for straightening me out.

Sorry, I can't help myself. Just one more....

From "Apollo Truth" on nasascam:

Hmm. Thanks for pointing that out. Now I know that
Zond was a hoax.

Besides the fact he does not actually mention Jim Lovell, he simply says that Apollo 11 was Armstrong's second flight. He doesn't know if he could have spent 8 weeks in space on Gemini 8. He then simply goes on to say "of course it was in LEO", without actually offering any facts.

Oh. I guess the distance to the Moon has doubled.

He is really into this thing with two communication links and goes on to say that "even Jim Lovell admitted it." Yes, there were, as there were on all Gemini, Apollo, and Space Shuttle flights. Perhaps all of those are hoaxes too.

It is.

Also, if LAUNCH CONTROL didn't know where the astronauts were going, then why weren't there two seperate branches of NASA that never came in ccontact with each other?

It wasn't in the engine. And there is footage of shuttles taking off, you just don't bother to look. By the way, does anyone know exactly where the cameras were?

Even if this were true, (was there some technical problem on a DoD mission, or is he making this up) how does that prove that we never went to the Moon? I have absolutely no idea whatsoever what this has to do with the Moon.

First Space Rendezvous
First Space Docking
First Person to Fly into Space Twice
First Manned Lunar Orbit
First Manned Lunar Landing
First Communications Satellite
First Monkey in Space
First Animals Recovered from Space
First Probe to Reach Venus
First Probe to Reach Mercury
First Probe to Reach Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus, Neptune

Alan Shepard flew 116 miles above Earth on MR-3.

I sincerely doubt you are a photographic expert, sir. That's why he can make such a statement.

Somewhat because of people like you, but where do you get that last statement?

Estimated by you, I presume? Notice, of course, he never quotes a poll with a 60% anti-Apollo rate. Even Kaysing doesn't claim that.

It certainly is.

Instead of continaully telling us about all this "evidence", why don't you cite any of it? Oh, yeah, I remember- the Moonrock Making Machine.

Uh-huh. Sorry. I can't take any more of this garbage.[/quote][/url]

It's like a train wreck isn't it? :P

Another I think is noteworthy is how inarticulate this sentence is. He is so determined to insert his conclusion at every possible opportunity that he ends up making a mess of the sentence to the point that he ends up contradicting his own point. One might speculate he has to state his conclusion so many times in order to help himself believe it.

I think he's referring to the journey there and back.

This point is so stupid, you have to read it to believe it. The popular footage is off a camera on S-II showing S-IC seperation and plane seperation. From the look of it, I'd say the camera was positioned near the SHe tanks. Of course, the technique of filming boosters was used many times before and after Apollo. Fallacy of limited scope.

Firstly, wasn't Russia the first to get to Venus with Venera or something? Secondly, you are exumptly correct they they are clearly exaggerating.

And yet we feel compelled to read it. ops:

It was not possible with Apollo equipment, and there was no need. Animal testing prior to Mercury was needed to show that complex organisms could survive the space environment and do meaningful work there. Animal testing during and prior to Gemini was needed to demonstrate the biological effects of the cislunar environment, since near-earth experience does not necessarily translate to cislunar expertise.

Conspiracists fundamentally misunderstand the purpose of animal testing. It is to (somewhat cruelly, I admit) see if there's any biological effect in cislunar space that's not inferred by knowledge of measured environmental factors. It's not to test the equipment. Apollo equipment couldn't be flown to the moon and back without a human crew.

This is simply the "If I Ran the Zoo" argument. Criticism comes easy from people who aren't associated with what they criticize and therefore don't have to live with the limitations and circumstances which "clutter up" real life, as opposed to the fantasy world in which many conspiracy theorists seem to live.

Each Apollo astronaut was trained for the mission he was expected to fly. Each mission entailed unique aspects in which each individual astronaut was expected to become proficient. The "unknowns" from each mission were to become "knowns" in subsequent missions, which would build upon them and extend them.

In terms of piloting ability, the astronauts were expected to be roughly equivalent. That's not exactly true, but no one astronaut was considered inherently qualified for a specific type of mission. Whether the first man on the moon turned out to be Gus Grissom or Neil Armstrong or Jim Lovell is largely unimportant. The purpose of the flights in many cases was to shake down the equipment and procedures -- not necessarily to train the crew. Lessons learned by the crew were transferred to subsequent crews in the form of updated manuals, briefings, and the informal rapport that has characterized flight test since Kitty Hawk.

Finally, it takes a lot to be an astronaut. People wonder why many of these men left NASA in what seemed to be the primes of their careers. It is easy for the general public to see only the excitement and glamor and forget that being an astronaut generally meant not having a life for years on end. This wears people down. That's why you can't have Neil Armstrong fly all the missions. You have to apportion the responsibility and the preparation among groups of roughly equivalent skill and qualifications.

The NASAScam author here is just trying to impose his idea of roles and responsibilities on people and processes he does not understand. In short, what he thinks ought to be the case is not proof of anything.

Official handoff is tower clearance, not orbit. The link to the spacecraft up until tower clearance is VHF, which is of course not possible from Houston. However, the VHF link is part of the global MSFN from which all the missions are controlled, and whose ground sites consist of a number of relay and reception stations -- not just MOCR in Houston. Although Houston begins controlling the flight as soon as the Saturn V tail clears the tower, the communication is still over the VHF link at the Kennedy Space Center. There is a smooth transition through various communication channels from pre-liftoff to post-splashdown. To try to pigeonhole them into who's talking to whom where is incredibly naive.

The same protocol is maintained today. The vehicle belongs to Launch Control until it clears the tower.

There weren't "two separate communication links," at least not for this purpose. Houston could communicate with the spacecraft prior to liftoff. And Launch Control could communicate after. But prior to liftoff Houston could only communicate via MSFN while Launch Control had a direct VHF link. At a certain point both Launch Control and MOCR would have to use the MSFN to communicate. And at splashdown MOCR had to use the MSFN to communicate, while the recovery forces had a direct VHF link. It's simply a matter of taking advantage of whatever direct links are available at any one time.

But the question is always protocol. There is a clear hand-off of responsibility when the vehicle clears the tower, and that means certain people shut up and certain other people start talking.

Putting DACs in rockets is a time-honored diagnostic technique. Hopefully, if something goes wrong, it's caught on film. Otherwise you'd have to pick through the wreckage and see if you can find out what went wrong.

Nowadays we have much better telemetry and ground-monitoring capabilities so rocket-mounted DACs are less important now that they used to be. But before the advent of advanced telemetry -- which, BTW, coincides with the invention of the Saturn V -- that was the primary means of diagnosing rocket failures.

There are numerous places on the Saturn V where DACs can be placed. The interstage structures afford ample protected mount points. And no, they aren't in the engines. It's not clear that the author understands basic principles such as rocket nozzles and how engines are actually built. It's quite likely he believes the entire bottom aspect of each stage must be some single nozzle.

Showing that the U.S. space program makes mistakes proves only that it's not perfect. You're supposed to assume that only a perfect program or process would be capable of reaching the moon. That's pure fantasy, of course. Engineering is rife with "elementary" mistakes. Quality assurance programs generally check only the "hard" parts of a problem, not the trivial aspects. Since computer software doesn't enforce "natural" units, assuming a value is expected in one unit when in fact it's expected in a different unit is an extremely common error.

I know of no endeavor which has been accomplished without error, or by processes which did not contain error. The author is simply slinging mud hoping that some of it will stick.

The Soviet space program was shrouded in secrecy and announced only its successes. Based on this well known pattern of disclosure, it's completely specious to claim that their failure rate was lower.

It is acknowledged by most that the U.S. could have launched a satellite before Sputnik if von Braun's Jupiter were allowed as a booster. Eisenhower vetoed that one. This is not meant to be sour grapes. If the Soviet's pre-eminence with Sputnik is to be considered proof that the Soviets were technologically more advanced than the U.S., these political aspects to the space race must be explained.

If you want to get picky, Gagarin's flight -- and indeed all the Vostok flights -- should be disqualified because their pilots ejected. The Vostok did not have an earth-landing system. While we charitably agree that the Vostok pilots satisfied all the substantial requirements of the records they set, we note that this does not necessarily qualify the Soviet spacecraft and technology as superior to the American Mercury. After all, the Mercury had an earth-landing system and was therefore more capable than its Soviet counterpart. It was superior technology, and not too much later than the Soviets.

Putting a women in space is a terrific political and social victory, but says absolutely nothing about the state of Soviet technology.

Leonov's space walk was a mess. Again, the Soviet technology was not comparable to the Americans'. Leonov captured the record only by being exceptionally brave (or foolhardy, depending on one's point of view). This characterizes the Soviet space program as one based solely on firstmanship. They engineered their missions to be quick-and-dirty attempts to set records. In comparison, the U.S. space program was aimed more at building a serviceable infrastructure and gathering useful information about living and working in space. This is why the Soviets burned out early. It's the classic tortoise and hare story.

The space station was indeed a Soviet first, and a legitimate engineering win over the United States. And this is likely because the Soviets gave up on the race to the moon and tried to redefine victory in the space race. While the Americans were focused on putting men on the moon, the Soviets shifted their emphasis to persistent spacecraft and long-duration missions. And they became very good at it. This doesn't necessarily make them better or worse in terms of technology. The U.S. and the Soviet Union simply aimed respectively at different specialized goals.

Kennedy thought big. And he gave the nation nearly ten years to accomplish his goal. Politically, this is what the nation needed at the time, and Kennedy knew it. More importantly, Kennedy and Jim Webb of NASA arranged for obscene amounts of money (compared to previous expenditures on space exploration) to be thrown at the project.

On the contrary, one does have to be a photographic expert to realize that the factors cited by conspiracy theorists as evidence of fraud, are actually features of legitimate photographs.

This is a good example of the conspiracists' constant appeal to "common sense." Phrased as above, it sounds as if relevant expertise and careful preliminary study is simply not required; that one can go make defensible assertions about any complicated field of study. Expertise is mostly about knowing when common sense is misleading.

In today's dollars Apollo cost $100 billion. Even governments don't have that kind of cash laying around to be spent on projects that have "already been done." It's a matter of public will. To go to the moon today is to repeat something that's already been done. As the public reaction during Apollo amply demonstrated, it's not something the public is greatly interested in. But prior to 1969 it was easy to justify great expenditure on something which had not yet been accomplished.

Obviously making up statistics is an easy way of lying. Published polls say exactly the opposite. But keep in mind that this author's recurring tactic is to shame you into believing his way. By making it seem like "everybody" believes Apollo was faked, he makes it socially easier to accept his preposterous argument.

I suppose we're intended to think that Bill Kaysing wouldn't make such a dangerous statement unless he had good evidence to back it up. Fundamentally this is an argument from silence. We're supposed to believe that the reason no one has taken Bill Kaysing to court over this statement is because the statement is true and there's no arguing with it. This neglects two important points. First, libel must be credible. You can't sue someone for libel if the claim is so preposterous that no one believes it. Second, NASA has historically not given conspiracy theorists the time of day. The publicity of a trial is exactly what Bill Kaysing wants, and so by not suing, NASA avoids playing into Kaysing's hands.

What "scientific evidence"?

Irregularities themselves do not suggest fraud. Records of true events are always inconsistent and irregular. In fact, many historians consider perfect agreement a sign of collusion after the fact on the part of the record-keepers. Of course we're not told what any of these irregularities are, so we have no way of responding to them.

I've spent a number of years examining the so-called anomalies in the photographs and video, and I've seen nothing but bumbling fools calling themselves "researchers" and exposing their ignorance to a largely gullible and unsuspecting public. I've seen nothing that leads me to doubt the authenticity of the Apollo photographs, and much to lead me to doubt the sincerity of the conspiracy theorists.

Pure fantasy. It's the "If I Ran the Zoo" argument all over.

I don't trust this author to correctly characterize anybody, much less "a man about to make history," whatever that's supposed to mean.

First, Neil Armstrong is a shy man by nature. This is a well-known aspect of his personality. He was chosen to be a pilot on a dangerous mission, not to be a movie star or a media darling. What the media, or this author, expects of him is entirely irrelevant. Neil Armstrong is what he is; take it or leave it.

Second, the author is simply putting feelings into Armstrong's head. "You can tell he's not going anywhere..." Where on earth did the author get that idea? "This was to hide his guilt from the camera ..." Again, pure speculation.

We've already pointed out why Armstrong may have been less charismatic than expected. But what about the fact that he was about to embark upon a highly complex and dangerous mission full of thousands of details for which he had trained for many months. I'm sure he didn't want to be in front of a bunch of largely ignorant reporters answering questions about how one poops in space.

I'm normally pretty charismatic. I act on stage in front of audiences all the time. But there are times when I too am distracted and focused on something and don't want that kind of attention. That's just the way it goes sometime.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base

We could also bring up the point that if the Conspiracy Theory is so widely accepted, why is he producing such a website? I agree that his modus operandi is to intimidate his readers into believing. If they believe, they are intelligent, if not, they are brain damaged pro-Apollo nutters who idely worship lying astro-NOTS. His behaviour is very Mafia-esque.

BTW, no bold type? It's not like you to use the quote function. :-?

And the protocol was established with Gemini, if not earlier.

__________________
Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

BTW, no bold type? It's not like you to use the quote function. :-?

It was convenient in this case because someone had already done it.

__________________
"Facts are stubborn things." --John Adams
Clavius Moon Base