Moon Hoax. what do you think?

[InquisitiveMind]

I have just read a document I found on the net "Tales from the lunar module guidance computer" which describes how the AGC worked, and it's absolutely hilarious, delirious, incredibly funny, a complete nonsense, a series of insane absurdities.

The Apollo guidance computer is a computer for Donald duck.

Seriously, if the Apollo guidance computer ever landed a lunar module on the moon, then I'm the pope!

Well, may be I am, who knows!!

[lemit]

In Voodoo histories: the role of the conspiracy theory in shaping modern history, David Aaronovitch describes a conspiracy theory as "the unnecessary assumption of conspiracy where other explanations are more probable. It is, for example, far more likely that men did actually land on the moon in 1969 than that thousands of people were enlisted to fabricate a deception that they did."

 

Is Apollo 11 the problem? Do the moon landings of Apollo 12 in 1969 through Apollo 17 in 1972 (the one I wrote up) seem real? If all of them were fake, then all the additional data, all those pictures and videos and stupid moon rocks, and the accumulation of tens of thousands of additional conspirators, including me, is pretty overwhelming.

 

But those of us who say the moon landings were real don't have to prove anything. The people who say the moon landings were fake are the ones challenging conventional wisdom, so the burden of proof is on them. I welcome their evidence, with the understanding that it must be irrefutable to overturn the accumulated wisdom of 40 years.

 

--lemit

[InquisitiveMind]

No you don't. You've already decided. You're seeking strained explanations for your preferred theory. We've got a couple of people here with *first hand* experience on the Apollo project, plenty close enough to have had have been "in on it" if it was a hoax.

 

Richard Nixon could not pull off a third-rate burglary, but somehow he pulled off the most elaborate, convoluted, and expensive hoax in all of human history.

 

 

Well that says more about your programming skills than anything else. I and several others here have taken the time to play with the simulator of the guidance computer and it's really quite an amazing feat of computer science, even if it seems ancient today.

 

More than anything your snotty attitude makes it obvious that this is more an exercise in inflating your own ego at the expense of tens of thousands of hard working people who made this all happen.

 

You ought to be ashamed of yourself.

 

If you simply want to annoy people, find someplace else to do it.

 

The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool,

Buffy

 

 

Buffy, the simulator of the AGC doesn't really reproduce the way the AGC worked, it's just a simple game, it means strictly nothing.

The AGC never really worked, it's a complete nonsense; the operating system is completely absurd, and the program is full of errors, and could not be executed.

And no, I'm absolutely not ashamed of myself, because I just follow my reason.

It's you who are naive to believe in something which is no more credible than Santa Claus.

[InquisitiveMind]

I really complain the abollo believers.

They are dazzled by their dream, they can't see through reality.

The photos are crammed full with incoherences, the AGC is totally absurd, but they can't see it, they are lost in their impossible dream, but it's just a dream.

One day you'll know that it's the hoaxers who were right, and believe me, this day will come!

[InquisitiveMind]

But those of us who say the moon landings were real don't have to prove anything. The people who say the moon landings were fake are the ones challenging conventional wisdom, so the burden of proof is on them. I welcome their evidence, with the understanding that it must be irrefutable to overturn the accumulated wisdom of 40 years.

 

--lemit

 

Yes, I take the burden of proof.

I have many proofs, I have web pages full of proofs.

And the fact that the belief in Apollo has lasted for more than 40 years is not an argument at all.

The belief of the earth being the center of the universe has lasted for much more than that; is the earth the center of the universe for as much?

[modest]

I have never understood conspiracy theorists. A buddy of mine once tried to explain it by telling the following story,

 

When I was very young my mom had a briefcase which she took to work every day. I asked her why she takes it to her job every morning and she said that she couldn't do her job without it.

 

One day when she was at work I noticed the case was still at home. She didn't take it. When she got home I asked her why and she said that she forgot to take it but it was ok because she didn't need it. "I can't do my job without it" is incompatible with "I did my job and didn't need it" so I caught my mom in a lie.

 

I was convinced that she didn't have a job. There was no such place as "work" and the whole family was trying to fool me about where mom goes, if indeed she goes anywhere—she may just disappear when she walks out the door and reappear when she gets home.

 

But, I don't think that's analogous to a conspiracy theorist's thinking. If the child had more information about a briefcase and a job and the nature of those two things then he'd likely not misjudge the probability of work existing so greatly. The problem in that case is insufficient information as is typical with children—there are a lot of things they just don't know. But, conspiracy theorists do have sufficient information and they easily have the cognitive ability to judge probability.

 

For example, if a conspiracy theorist police officer questioned 100 witnesses to a crime and 99 of them said that person A committed the crime while 1 person said that martians committed the crime the police officer could properly judge the probability of person-A's guilt. In order to function daily they have to make judgment calls like that. So, I don't think the problem is insufficient information or insufficient cognitive ability to properly judge probability.

 

The phenomenon is therefore very inexplicable to me. I have to wonder if conspiracy theorists deep down believe that the conspiracy is false but are for some reason adamant that it is true anyway. I know I was that way for about a year when I started having serious doubts about Christianity.

 

...is the earth the center of the universe...

 

This depends on how you define "universe". The earth is the center of the visible, or observable, universe. But, this is trivial and not an exception to the Copernican principle because the observable universe is defined by our observation of it and we are, of course, at the center of our observations.

 

~modest

[Boerseun]

Yes, I take the burden of proof.

Good.

I have many proofs, I have web pages full of proofs.

The Web constitutes no proof. Using the web, I can prove to you that Beatrice Arthur was the first she-male to walk on Mars without a space-suit. The Web is the most convenient vector for viruses of the mind to spread to receptive hosts who don't want to accept reality. But if it blows your whistle, by all means - believe what you want. The Web is kinda like religion. He Who Maketh The Most Noise Be Right. Us skeptical nerdy science-types with Band-Aids holding our plastic spectacle-frames together know better.

And the fact that the belief in Apollo has lasted for more than 40 years is not an argument at all.

There are many arguments proving the Apollo landings to be a hoax. And each and every one of them have been thoroughly and exhaustively debunked. Here's a good primer on Why You Are Wrong. Read it and repent.

The belief of the earth being the center of the universe has lasted for much more than that; is the earth the center of the universe for as much?

Strawman. The belief that the Earth was the center of the universe or even the belief that the Earth was flat made sense in the context of the knowledge of the day. Nobody even implied that a hoax was being perpetrated about our position in space.

 

You're wrong. Take it like a man and stop bitching about it. It gets very tiresome to repeat the same lame points over and over and over. Do a search on Hypo about the Apollo 'hoax' and witness the countless debunkings. We've heard it all before, believe me. There is nothing new that you can tell us about Apollo 11 being a 'hoax'.

[Buffy]

The AGC never really worked, it's a complete nonsense; the operating system is completely absurd, and the program is full of errors, and could not be executed.

Oh, let's drop into this discussion: what exactly was absurd about it's operating system? What errors did the program have?

 

There's no sense in being precise when you don't even know what you're talking about, :phones:

[Eclogite]

Oh, let's drop into this discussion: what exactly was absurd about it's operating system? What errors did the program have?

Yes Inquisitive Mind, please respond to Buffy's request. There was a time when I could write assembly language programs on Apollo era computers. I'd like to see the details of what you say can't work.

[InquisitiveMind]

Here are a couple of good web pages debunking these arguments:

 

http://www.redzero.demon.co.uk/moonhoax/ -- Good overview of the major arguments and why they're wrong.

 

Phil Plait's Bad Astronomy: Bad TV -- A rebuttal to the pop-sci pseudo-documentary on Fox TV from about 4 years ago but an interesting site on related "Bad Astronomy" too.

 

Comments on the FOX special on the Hoax -- A more comprehensive and readable Fox show rebuttal.

 

Skeptically,

Buffy

 

I know too much this sort of debunking, Buffy.

Clavious and BadAstronomy are full of misconceptions, their arguments don't convince me.

[InquisitiveMind]

Oh, let's drop into this discussion: what exactly was absurd about it's operating system? What errors did the program have?

 

There's no sense in being precise when you don't even know what you're talking about, :phones:

 

I have made a complete web page explaining what's weird with the operating system, and why the program can't work.

Here are some tips: Why restrict the addressing to 12 bits, and make memory bank switching, when memory addressing could perfectly have been made on 16 bits, without the need of using memory bank switching which is extremely penalyzing and doesn't simplify hardware, far from it.

There are some weird instructions, almost impossible to use, whereas some basic instructions are missing.

For example to make a conditional jump, there is one instruction testing the accumulator, which only does a jum if accululator is zero; this is totally unsifficent, all other processors have a complete set of conditional jump instruction; there is another instruction, CCS, which can test the sign of a data memory, but this instruction destroy the contents of the accumulator by computing siomething weird in it which can hardly have a practical use.

Never a normal conceptor of CPU would have made it this way, it makes no sense at all.

And hardware pulses never take CPU cycles, the concept of "unprogrammed sequences" triggered by hardware pulses is a complete inepty; it would be a complete waste of time for a CPU to count hardware pulses, it's always an electronic counter which does it.

There are plenty of other points, but it would be too long to list them here.

 

Concerning the program, it's full of errors, for instance invalid and duplicate labels, incorrectly specified addresses, redundant instructions, undocumented instructions, but what I like most is when a subroutine calls another one with instruction "TC": this is totally impossible since the return address is saved into an unique register, which prevents a subroutine from calling another one.

 

Yes, the operaint system is aberrant, et the program can't work.

You believe me or not, but that's the way it is!

[Tormod]

The belief that the Earth was the center of the universe or even the belief that the Earth was flat made sense in the context of the knowledge of the day. Nobody even implied that a hoax was being perpetrated about our position in space.

 

Uhm...Catholic church anyone? Ask Bruno or Galileo about that one. :phones:

[InquisitiveMind]

I don't like the term "conspiracist".

People often call "conspiracists" men who, instead of accepting without discussing a well established truth, question it instead, and investigate to see if this truth is as solid as it seems, or if it has flaws that most people can't or refuse to see.

Galileo was seen as a conspiracist in his time, he was trying to go against the well accepted idea that the earth was not moving and the center of the universe.

Emile Zola was seen as conspiracist because he went against the well accepted idea that Dreyfus was a traitor.

And when finally the truth comes to light, and that what the "conspiracists" were preaching is finally accepted as the truth, are they still "conspiracists"?

No they become heroes who fought for the truth.

I didn't start to question Apollo all of a sudden, it came progressively; but there has been so much evidence stacking one atop the other one, that my doubts have progressively grown stronger and stronger.

Yes, I do have much evidence, enough to have serious doubts.

You don't have these doubts? So much the better for you, but I have them, and I have to deal with them.

[Tormod]

You believe me or not, but that's the way it is!

 

May I humbly point out our site rules?

 

Hypography Science Forums - Science forums rules

 

Do not endlessly show us that *your* theory is the *only* truth. And don't follow this up by making people look stupid for pointing out that there are other answers, especially if they provide links and resources. It will get you banned!

 

(My emphasis)

[InquisitiveMind]

I have never understood conspiracy theorists.

~modest

 

 

Some conspiracies are certainly dlirious, and are close to paranoia.

But on the other hand, if you never question anything because you are afraind of being considered a "conspiracist", then you never try to think for yourself.

I have never understood those who never try to think for themselves, who accept what they are told without questioning it, without looking for the truth which might be hiding behind.

That's how Hitler succeeded: Because most people didn't question him, were just sheep who accepted him and his lies.

[InquisitiveMind]

Anyway, I know I'll end up banned on this site, like Alexis was.

BTW Alexis was full of common sense, he had much more of it than all of you.

[Tormod]

I have never understood those who never try to think for themselves, who accept what they are told without questioning it, without looking for the truth which might be hiding behind.

 

Hold on. Are you saying that only conspiracy theorists think for themselves, or that those who think for themselves are always labeled conspiracy theorists?

 

So - all scientists, writers, intellectuals etc are conspiracy theorists?

 

That's how Hitler succeeded: Because most people didn't question him, were just sheep who accepted him and his lies.

 

So - Hitler was a conspiracy theorist?

 

Does that mean you support Hitler, or only his ideas? Or just his methods? Or what? :phones:

 

Are you still working the Apollo angle, or are we moving into conspiracies in general now?