I'm a little confused. Are people claiming that NASA has been withholding information about water on the moon for decades?

National Geographic, September 1973, page 325, has a 4000-times high-magnification photo, by Dr David S. McKay and Dr Uel S. Clanton of the Johnson Space Center near Houston.

The caption says: "Flowerlike iron-oxide crystals of a rusty rock (right) collected by Apollo 16 contain water, possibly from a comet, a water-bearing meteorite, or contamination in handling. Apollo's payloads of rocks and data will challenge scientists for decades."

The two researchers are shown on page 322 of the magazine with other photos of Apollo samples, taken with a scanning electron microscope. Dr McKay is mentioned in this old thread: Moon Rocks - List of Investigators, July 1969

At the time, NASA appeared unsure about the presence water on the moon, but it wasn't withholding anything.

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Don't criticize what you can't understand. — Bob Dylan, “The Times They Are A-Changin'” (1963)
Some people think they are thinking when they are really rearranging their prejudices and superstitions. — Edward R. Murrow (1908–65)

Not people, just Jerry. He likes to construct conspiracies where none exist.

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

The worst traffic jam in my neighborhood's history occurred when the Washington Post announced that the Goddard Visitor's Center was having a viewing party to see Halley's Comet. The main local road was backed up for five miles for a place that has parking for maybe a hundred cars, if that.

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.

Asking for timely data is a reasonable thing.

Asking for researchers who have seen the data and have begun to form conclusions, to release their own preliminary thoughts about the data without having the support they need to form actual firm conclusions, is simply antiscience.

How dare you demand that scientists expose their inner thoughts? That's not requestng data. That's invading their privacy.

All scientists, and fans of science, every person, should be insulted by, and dismissive of, such demands.

Thoughts are not information you have a right to access. Retract and withhold your requests. They are meritless.

Get out of their heads. Now.

You have been caught red-handed.

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This is exactly what P&F did although no one needed to ask them. They had preliminary data and jumped to their premature and wrong conclusion. The high temp superconductor research, while quickly released, was in a much more mature state than anything P&F could have accomplished. The speculation, which is still ongoing, revolved around why these materials were superconducting and what it would take for actual applications.

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"I often say that when you can measure what you are speaking about, and express it in numbers, you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, when you cannot express it in numbers, your knowledge is of a meagre and unsatisfactory kind." - William Thompson, 1st Baron Lord Kelvin

"If it was so, it might be, and if it were so, it would be, but as it isn't, it ain't. That's logic!" - Tweedledee

This isn't right. This isn't even wrong. - Wolfgang Pauli

Withholding information retards the learning process...

Only if the information is known to be correct. Disseminating wrong information is detrimental to learning; once incorrect information enters the brain, it's often very difficult to dislodge it. Hence in science it is better to assure oneself of correctness before publishing, especially when the popular press may take the ball and run with it -- often in a direction you don't agree with.

Scientists are criticized when they release findings prematurely. Scientists are criticized when they wait for confirmation before publication. It seems that the problem is not with the scientists, but with the critics.

What if NASA would have sat on the images showing bizarre braiding and spokes in Saturns rings...

Apples and oranges. Ordinary photographs require very little analysis prior to drawing merely observational conclusions. This is not the same as data allegedly supporting the presence of water, which must be carefully calibrated, analyzed, and thought about before it can support a conclusion.

It sounds like the Cassini water-on-the-moon data was is solid as it is surprising.

Hindsight is a remarkable thing.

Sitting on data because you have low confidence simply because the results are unexpected, and waiting for confirmation is chicken.

No, it's responsible scientific methodology. To do otherwise is reckless.

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

Not the comet, but I do remember the hype about it.
Cover of Popular Science... "THE SKY SPECTACULAR OF THE CENTURY".

(Oh, and take note of the "Shape of the Five-Times-Faster-Than-Sound Airlliner of the Future" and "are you ready for metric"...doozy of an issue)

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Numbers are not case sensitive. (me)

The Griffith Observatory had one every night the comet was visible; I saw it very close to dawn on one of the last nights possible--and slept in the car on the way home.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

I hope you weren't the one driving.

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Dave

Anyone seen my marbles? Anyone ... ?

What utter rubbish. Let me assure you that, as a professional scientist, if I did not confirm my unexpected results and published them straight away, then found they were wrong, the consequences to myself and the company for which I work could be dire. I could lose my job for starters, and depending on the results and the importance of the data the company could lose funding and fold.

Every responsible scientist and scientific organisation confirms their results, preferably by repeating tests or having them independently verified, before publishing them and building on them. The whole basis of science and scientific progress is repeatability of results. Everyone who tries the same test should get the same results. If they don't you do not have a solid scientific result or conclusion.

This is why the discovery of water on the Apollo samples was not widely published, except as a note to say 'we found water but can't be sure it is not from contamination'. If we were to now reanalyse some Apollo material it would quite possibly confirm this finding of water on the Moon because we have a better idea of what sort of quantities we can expect to find and where to find them.

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"The very powerful and the very stupid have one thing in common: They don't alter their views to fit the facts, they alter the facts to fit their views." The Doctor, Doctor Who: The Face of Evil.

Notice how Jerry hasn't been back to this thread to discuss his accusations? I think he's done the equivalent of stirring up an ants' nest and is now laughing at how everyone's running around.

I say let this thread die.

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

What is it with people constantly over-scrutinizing NASA and seeking to attribute nefarious underhanded motives to it?

If you think NASA is slow to return data, try ESA. They are slow and stingey towards the media by comparison! No offense to Europeans here, but it's something I've noticed over the years; the Huygens probe to Titan was a good example imo.

NASA is not an evil Satanic organization okay? Sheesh.

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There in the valley of Scorpio, beneath the Cross of jade
Smoking on the seashell pipe the gypsies had made
We sat and we dreamed a while...in that crystal thought time in Mexico. ~Donovan

Not A Satanic Association? For sure.

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

I could tell you, but then somebody would start a thread here with my post as the OP. So I ain't saying nothing.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

Given I was born in '76 and this was Halley's Comet? So does everyone else!

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

Ha-ha! My friend Chuck and I invented a phrase from that for any disappointing occurance: "What a Kohoutek."

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If they can get you asking the wrong questions, they don't have to worry about the answers.

Page 88, "Maximum speed and altitude will be about 1000 mph and 70,000 feet."

Page 92, "Monorail Golfcarts!"

see it here

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

Jerry has been posting here for 5 years. I'm guessing he forgot that he started this topic. It happens to me all the time .

Pete

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PJE

There's so much I don't know about astrophysics. I wish I had read that book by that wheelchair guy.

The essential questions about why NASA (or any other publicly funded agency) holding on to science discoveries is a valid question.

It's surprising that many taxpayers, who paid for the scientific missions/equipment/salaries etc, will defend the institutions that won't reveal what is found.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

Could you be specific about which other withheld discoveries you refer to? Do you think this one is a good example, having read all of the above?

I certainly defend NASA (although I don't live in the US). As far as *any* large organisation goes, be it gov't, commercial or hybrid, I perceive it to be very open, effective and accountable. Sure, it gets stuff wrong, but when you look at marvellously successful projects like Apollo, SOHO, Hubble and many others, and then consider the environment they are working in..

Compare it to, say, some of the big agricultural and pharmaceutical businesses..

Are you satisfied that the specific questions raised in this thread have received valid answers? If not, why not?

Do you find the specific defense offered in this thread inadequate to the specific accusations raised? If not, why not?

If so, do you have other specific accusations you would like to make, or do you consider the matter resolved.

It's easy enough to sling around innuendo; perhaps you'd prefer a forum less interested in specifics?

If you have a specific conspiracy theory in mind about NASA, that you believe is worth defending, why not start a thread and make your case?

The obvious example is that the data, the pictures, the actual discoveries made by modern, very expensive instruments, paid for by taxes, is simply not distributed.

It is not available. You, as well as most everybody else in the world, can not see what is being imaged right now. You probably can't even find out what is being looked at.

But by all means, prove me wrong.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

There is no conspiracy. It is just how science is done.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

Oh, dear.

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Gillian

"Now everyone was giving her that kind of look UFOlogists get when they suddenly say, 'Hey, if you shade your eyes you can see it is just a flock of geese after all.'"

"You can't erase icing."

"I can't believe it doesn't work! I found it on the internet, man!"

First up, YOU be specific.

Do you mean things like the real-time feed from SOHO?

The images coming in from LRO?

The ENTIRE Apollo image archive?

Hmm, those specific examples seem to indeed prove you wrong.

Oops. I should have said, "Like the Hubble, Kepler, MOST, SIM Lite Astrometric Observatory, Swift Gamma Ray Burst, Explorer, COROT, Dark Energy Space Telescope, Terrestrial Planet Finder, those kinds of expensive data gathering devices.

And yes, they are not all American telescopes. But they are all payed for by taxes. Yet the people who pay can't see the output. As it comes in.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

Conspiracy? Nope.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

Then there is the Submillimeter Wave Astronomy Satellite, the Wide-field Infrared Explorer, the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, the Spitzer Space Telescope, the Herschel Space Observatory, the Planck satellite, the WMAP, the Astromag Free-Flyer, the Payload for Antimatter Matter Exploration and Light-nuclei Astrophysics and a slew of others.

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smile, and the Universe smiles with you

In most of those cases, the output as it comes in wouldn't make a whole lot of sense to people who aren't deeply familiar with the instruments generating the output. And even to those who are deeply familiar, the data requires considerable analysis and massaging to be meaningful.

As for Hubble, all the data that's more than a year old (and some more recent than that) is freely available.

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Everything I need to know I learned through Googling.