ApolloHoax.net
Apollo Discussions => The Hoax Theory => Topic started by: SpaceFrog on February 18, 2016, 12:39:44 PM
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As this is my first post, I will tell a little about me.
I am not a scientist, engineer or any other type of credentialed person. I spent 20 years in the U.S. Army as an enlisted Nug (highly technical term) mostly serving in infantry units. I claim no expert knowledge on any subject.
I was born in 1967 so I was too young to appreciate Apollo at the time it was happening. Both my parents worked for NASA at Ames Research Center in California (Not on space programs) and as I grew up I was greatly interested in the Space Shuttle. This interest in the Shuttle naturally led me to Mercury, Gemini and Apollo.
While searching the internet for videos and news on Apollo I kept coming across Hoax videos and websites. I believe that I have an open mind so I started to watch these videos. I thought that I would try and give them a chance to see if they had any merit. However, it seemed that each time I came across a theory that sounded plausible, it was quickly debunked by research, watching other videos or just using common sense. I can no longer stomach videos by Jarrah White. It seems like he has a chip on his shoulder and a total lack of scientific training and common sense. He is very good at setting up straw men and then trying to knock them down. Additionally, all of the Hbs have no interest in finding the truth. I believe that they are too invested in the conspiracy to really be objective.
Each of the conspiracy theories I have looked at have ended up, for me at least, in the round file. There is just to much overwhelming evidence that says we did in fact go to the moon that I cannot believe that there are still people out there that do not believe that we did go. I am impressed at the ingenuity and tenacity of the Hoaxers in coming up with some of these ideas even though most of these ideas are easy to debunk.
My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think or were difficult for you to disprove?
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No.
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As this is my first post, I will tell a little about me.
Welcome to the forum. You don't need to be a rock star or a rocket scientist to have good sense, good research skills, and appropriate skepticism.
I think we agree that hoax claimants have ulterior motives, although maybe not the same ones. There are those who indeed seem to be in it for the money or the following, or just to stir the pot.
My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think or were difficult for you to disprove?
There are some claims that require those of us with relevant knowledge to do what would amount to billable work in order to affirmatively refute some of the claims. For example, the claim often arises that the spaceship wouldn't adequately protect the astronauts. It's an offhand claim, not made with any sort of science or computation behind it. But one of our number went to quite a lot of effort to model the radiation environment on the Apollo trajectory and model the absorption of the spacecraft structure and prove indeed that the Apollo spacecraft offered sufficient protection. Many years ago I did something similar with the lunar module ascent trajectories and the fuel loadouts.
These are difficult in the sense that they require a professional level of expertise to work through. But they're not difficult in the sense that the claims resulted in any meaningful doubt of Apollo's authenticity.
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Depends on how you mean. I was an English major in college, and the highest math I've taken was a pre-calculus class in the 1993-1994 school year. I really don't have the skills to deal with a lot of the more technical stuff. Some of the quotes that certain people around here think are absolute howlers, I don't have the education or experience to disprove. I don't know the math.
On the other hand, since no one has put together a cohesive explanation of how the whole thing was faked, there's nothing that isn't easy to disprove with "okay, but that only explains <x> at best." Often, even I know enough to know that it doesn't really explain <x>, but if it did, Apollo was invariably a lot more than <x>, and the answer is then, "Oh, they faked it somehow." Which is not an answer.
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(sorry - put this in the wrong thread)
To elaborate: Most hoax claims fail on some very basic level, like not knowing how the acutal missions were performed. Like claiming the astronauts would have been "fried" in the LEM while passing the Van Allen Belts, or that the LEM never could get off the moon, because all 8 tonnes of fuel was spent during braking and landing.
Once such simple errors have been bypassed, then there's a whole other level of ignorance (mostly willfull ignorance) where the hoax claim has been addressed countless times, and is thoroughly explained by multiple sources. Then there are the arguments from authority (like hunchbacked tried) where some obscure technical detal is claimed to be impossible and therefore the entire programme "must have been faked".
Then there are the scientific illiterate who claim the Earth is flat, rockets don't work in vacuum and so on. "The Earth Is Flat" is just a silly claim, and everyting from that point on is pointless. IF the hoax proponent then has a history of dubious ideas, like "nuclear power doesn't work", then there's usually no point in continuing. I know "even a blind hen can find a kernel" (danish proverb - don't know if it makes any sense in english), but most of the time they are just pecking at dirt.
Also the "guilt by association" has been tried - "The Government always lies" - guess what? The US Government is actually changing all the time - and other governments agree that the moon landings were real. Even the sovjet congratulated US on the landing of Apollo 11.
IF there was a scientifically correct, plausible problem with the moon landings, I haven't seen one yet. And I have been looking for the best part of 10 years now.
(The astronauts were in the much more substantial Command Module during VAB transit - and the LM had two stages - descent stage with 8 tonnes (apprx) of fuel for descent and the ascent stage with a further 2.5 tonnes of fuel for the ascent).
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I have never seen anything posted by a hoax claimant that has made me doubt Apollo, but I have seen plenty f things posted that have made me go do more research to increase my knowledge of the subject.
This is something that hoax claimants seem unable to do.
I have also seen plenty of people feign naivety and who 'just want to ask questions'.
Rarely is that the case and rarely are they interested in just listening to answers.
Let's see how this pans out.
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Thanks for the responses so far. I think that the professional tone and the well reasoned responses from members here are awesome for all threads.
I agree with Allan F that most of the theories fail on a very basic level. But it seems that the most common persistent theories are the ones that fail at the most basic level. For instance the theory that the shadows on the moon converge/diverge and therefor there must be multiple light sources. Anyone with decent sight can go outdoors on a sunny day and empirically determine that the shape of the ground can easily make shadows appear to converge/diverge. Unless you believe that light reacts differently on the moon, how can you not dismiss this theory.
So why do these theories persist? The shadow theory, Buzz being lit while exiting the LM, the “C” Rock, the waving flag among others. These are so easy to debunk and yet they stick around.
I guess this ties in with my initial question. Is there one piece of evidence or theory that “HBs” hold onto religiously that make them unable to accept the facts and debunking of all these other theories?
If it is willful ignorance, what is the motivation for being so obstinate? Maybe this is more of a psychological question.
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My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think [...]?
No.
The reason why is easy to state: any hoax theory's big picture doesn't make sense. The big picture is addressed by questions like "Who was in on the hoax?", "Why fake it six and a half times when one would do?", "How to keep the secret?", "Why no death-bed confessions?" and many more. The moment you answer any of these, a contradiction arises.
Compare this to this mathematical proof: On a chessboard, can a knight move from one corner to the opposite corner in 63 moves and touch each square once?
Hoax believers say yes it could be and start making knight moves, in a futile attempt to test all possible sequences of 63 moves.
The rational mind looks at the big picture of black and white squares, notices that a) opposite corners have the same colors, b) a knight move changes color, and c) that after 63 moves you're on the opposite color. So there's no solution. QED.
For some reason, hoax proponent minds tick differently. I have no explanation for that, as I'm not a psychologist and won't speculate. But some have a room-temperature IQ (in Celsius) as evidenced by the videos they make :-)
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The most persistent "evidence" the hoax crowd clings to, is their own conviction that they themselves are "special", have special knowledge, have seen through the "veil" of the establishments lies. Mostly it's a crutch to prop up their own self esteem.
Another mainstay is the usage of old, outdated information, like the 1959 Van Allen paper which states that the radiation in the Van Allen Belts is an obstacle which must be overcome before human spaceflight out of low Earth orbit is possible. That extensive work and study in the following years addressed this exact problem, does not matter to them.
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One thing to note is that you never see HBs arguing amongst themselves, even when their hoax theories conflict.
One says rockets don't work in space, another says Apollo couldn't have got through the VABs. How do we know the VABs are there? By sending rockets into space.
One says there should have been a blast crater from the immense rocket exhaust under the LM. Another says the dust should have landed in the footpads. Can't have both, they contradict each other.
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From what I've seen, hoaxers have a tendency of making even ideas that could be possible wind up being crazy.
For example, let's take the Kennedy assassination. The idea that multiple people might have plotted with Oswald to kill Kennedy is not, on the surface, inherently impossible or unreasonable. People HAVE in fact conspired together to murder political figures.
To find out about that, one would need to look in detail as Oswald's connections. Look at his correspondence, his friends, his connections. Find out if he was working with someone. Find out what elements might have needed someone else to plan them.*
But all that is really hard work, so instead the conspiracy theorist makes their "theory" all about how there must have been 3 shooters in three different places and Oswald was really innocent and whoever the mysterious conspirators were really NEEDED it to look like just one shooter (but didn't just use one shooter) because...ummm...because...HEY LOOK OVER THERE! followed by "don't think about it, don't think about it".
Even if the initial premise was plausible, it tends to quickly become implausible.
* Of course, the official investigations DID just this, and came to some very definite conclusions that no, Oswald acted alone.
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Being an engineer, some of the video claims made me stop and do some research to understand why the claims did not stand up to scrutiny. I found this site while actually searching for such proofs. I found many on here had the photo expertise to guide me to a successful understanding.
I grew up with Apollo and never doubted the program or its predecessors. The HB claims made me angry that such a technological endeavor could be challenged. If fact after watching the mocumentary on FOX in 2001, caused me to stop watching the channel for years, since they really NEVER gave any opposing views to the program any time. There are aspects of the program that I didn't know, but research challenges the conspirator perspective lacking. They (HB's) prey on those that are lazy and want quick answers. I think it was Jay that posted a thought some time ago, "do you want a quick answer or the truth(and who to get at it)."
EDIT:Spelliing
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My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think or were difficult for you to disprove?
Welcome to the forum SpaceFrog.
The closest one I can think of is the WOMD reason for invading Iraq. The whole thing stank to high heaven. Dodgy dossiers based on unreliable evidence, which turned out to be a complete and utter load of clap-trap. We all know the domino-like consequences of that particular hoax, but I'll spell it out anyway.
Thousands of allied servicemen and women were killed or severely maimed.
Hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians were killed.
A power vacuum was deliberately created in the Middle East with the toppling of dictator Saddam Hussein.
That power vacuum, and other factors, primed the pump for the Arab spring, to try and take down other dictators such as Gaddafi and Asad.
Attempts to oust Asad led to a 5 year civil war in Syria, with millions made homeless.
Hundreds of thousands of those made homeless seek refuge in Europe.
this is all a primordial soup for the rise of ISIS. The same ISIS who recently behead a 15 year old Iraqi boy for listening to Western music.
And the people who perpetrated the hoax?
One of them is considers himself an ambassador for peace.
The other is trying to get his brother elected as US president.
A simplification, but that's how I see it.
I couldn't disprove that Iraq had no WOMD. I just had very strong suspicions, along with the million who marched for peace in London. The ambassador for peace (OK OK, it was Blair) didn't listen to them.
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My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think or were difficult for you to disprove?
Hoax Theories, no. Conpsiracy theories, yes
There are plenty of events that started as a conspiracy to hide wrongdoing and that turned out to be fact
Watergate
The Tuskegee Syphilis Experiment
Iran Contra
MK Ultra
Cointelpro
Operation Mockingbird
Operation Northwoods
WOMD
All denied or covered up by those involved, all actually happened.
For many years, a growing number of historians and people interested in the Vietnam War became convinced that the Gulf of Tonkin incident, an event that was key in the up-scaling of US involvement in Vietnam, was in fact staged or never took place. After years of official US government denials, an internal NSA document declassified in 2005 showed that the CT's were right. There were in fact no North Vietnamese ships anywhere near the Gulf of Tonkin at the time the incident was supposed to have taken place.
However, as for the better known ongoing Conspiracy Theories; moon landing Hoax, JFK & RFK assassinations, Boston Bombing, 9/11 etc, all BS of the worst kind... and that is from someone who at one time believed there was a second gunman!!
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However, as for the better known ongoing Conspiracy Theories; moon landing Hoax, JFK & RFK assassinations, Boston Bombing, 9/11 etc, all BS of the worst kind... and that is from someone who at one time believed there was a second gunman!!
I would never guessed that of you. I have never been a fan of the CT of JFK's assignation, just a nobody that wanted to be somebody, with a rifle as his chosen method.
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And a president who was addicted to public adulation, who, despite being well aware of the risks, rode open motorcades past countless buildings in densely populated cities all around the world, and who one day simply rode past one building too many.
But try to explain that to a conspiracist.
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And a president who was addicted to public adulation, who, despite being well aware of the risks, rode open motorcades past countless buildings in densely populated cities all around the world, and who one day simply rode past one building too many.
But try to explain that to a conspiracist.
Excellent points.
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My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think or were difficult for you to disprove?
No, not a single aspect of the hoax theory has convinced me. There are several reasons.
Firstly, the initial ideas of Kaysing et al involved ideas such as no stars, waving flags, parallel shadows and blast craters. These arguments were so easily debunked the hoax fell for me at the first hurdle. The basic physics of its original advocates was so appalling that it was easily dismissed as hogwash. The idea simply lost all credibility the moment it was aired because of the blatant stupidity on show.
Further, I don't think a hoax on such a scale could be kept secret for so long. There is not a single scientist of notable repute to cry foul, especially those that have investigated the geological samples.
People like Jarrah White and David Percy have bolted on so many parts to the original theory it is riddled with contradictions. For example, Jarrah White has produced two videos, in one he claims wet sand must have been used to hoax the famous Aldrin type boot prints, in another he claims that the dust movement was faked using dry sand. Of course, in the latter case he uses motions that are entirely inconsistent with an astronaut donned in a space suit in a low-g environment. Another example of their cumbersome fantasia was highlighted when Phil Webb analysed Jarrah's Exhibit D video, he found no fewer than 32 contradicting statements.
The retro-reflectors are definitive proof for me, quite simply because they provide data about the moon's orbit that is consistent with Einstein's general theory. You can't easily make those numbers up and fool the scientific community. Given the nature of Einstein's field equations, you would be going some to fiddle the parameters. That only leaves real data from real retro-reflectors placed by astronauts on missions that really landed on the moon.
Finally, the CTs have made error after error with branches of maths, physics, chemistry, geology and engineering. Each time they skulk away in a familiar fashion, repackage their ideas; only to introduce more inconsistencies as they try to save face. More often than not they ignore strong counter arguments and simply use ad hominen tactics to detract attention from their initial stupidity. These are not the actions of honest and credible people.
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However, as for the better known ongoing Conspiracy Theories; moon landing Hoax, JFK & RFK assassinations, Boston Bombing, 9/11 etc, all BS of the worst kind... and that is from someone who at one time believed there was a second gunman!!
I would never guessed that of you. I have never been a fan of the CT of JFK's assignation, just a nobody that wanted to be somebody, with a rifle as his chosen method.
It was a different time and I was a lot younger and less wise. Also, it was the pre-internet age, information was really difficult to get and there weren't many books on the JFK assasination. Criminal forensics was also less well understood.
JFK was the only CT I ever believed, and unlike other CTists, as more information became available, much of it on the internet, my belief weakened rather than strengthened. I began to realise that this was simply a lone gunman and there was no conspiracy to kill JFK.
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However, as for the better known ongoing Conspiracy Theories; moon landing Hoax, JFK & RFK assassinations, Boston Bombing, 9/11 etc, all BS of the worst kind... and that is from someone who at one time believed there was a second gunman!!
I would never guessed that of you. I have never been a fan of the CT of JFK's assignation, just a nobody that wanted to be somebody, with a rifle as his chosen method.
It was a different time and I was a lot younger and less wise. Also, it was the pre-internet age, information was really difficult to get and there weren't many books on the JFK assasination. Criminal forensics was also less well understood.
JFK was the only CT I ever believed, and unlike other CTists, as more information became available, much of it on the internet, my belief weakened rather than strengthened. I began to realise that this was simply a lone gunman and there was no conspiracy to kill JFK.
If you ever need anything on the plausibility of the rifle shot, I'll ble glad to help. Shot a Sauer STR200 6.5x55 competitively for around 10 years. And at that distance, with that rifle, Oswald had an easy shot.
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For stuff like that, there's often a sort of inverse of the Texas Sharpshooter effect. The conspiracy believer looks at the odds of the bullet/airplane/whatever doing what it actually did and claims that is too unlikely for anyone to have seriously contemplated the attack in the first place. What they forget is the large number of perhaps equally unlikely but different paths the bullet/airplane/whatever could have taken that would also have been quite sufficient for the attacker's purposes.
Oswald didn't set out to make THAT shot. He set out to make A shot.
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More apropos, more general; it sort of saddens me that it is so impossible to make a plausible Apollo conspiracy theory even if you have the technical background to properly understand the evidence. If I wanted to write a thriller or science fiction yarn I'd either have to give up on the first page, or be forced to make it a story about the "Argos Project" with a huge number of differences (that make a fictional hoax possible).
(I'm actually wrestling with something similar right now. Got somehow cajoled into writing a Stargate fanfic, and the central Ancient Astronauts conceit of the show is just about impossible to reconcile with anything in real history or archaeology. Which means in the end you can't write more than a few words before you are forced to either abandon canon or lie about history. And neither is a palatable choice.)
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That only leaves real data from real retro-reflectors placed by astronauts on missions that really landed on the moon.
We've got to be careful with the retroreflector argument since most of the smarter CTs (I know that's not saying much) know that the USSR landed two rovers with retroreflectors, thus "proving" that the Apollo reflectors could have been placed robotically too.
I sometimes challenge them to explain why, if it was possible to land robots in the moon in the 1960s and 70s, it was nonetheless impossible to land humans. If they answer at all, it's usually to mumble about radiation.
To sharpen the point I say that one of the most important roles of the Apollo LM commander was to pick a safe landing spot -- and robotic vision is a famously difficult problem that only now is finally making some serious progress. In other words, in some ways it was actually easier to land humans on the moon than robots -- as underscored by the fact that all six attempted Apollo landings succeeded while two of the seven Surveyor missions crashed along with who knows how many Soviet missions. The robotic mission controllers basically had to land blind and hope they didn't hit a boulder or steep crater wall.
Of course it wasn't cheaper to land humans on the moon, but that was just a matter of money -- which the US had to burn on space in those days. They just had to scale everything up, something Americans have always been famous for: a huge rocket and a (relatively) huge lander with the necessary life support equipment and supplies as well as a fully fueled ascent stage and a waiting CSM for the return to earth. The Saturn V was the biggest, the most crucial and probably the most expensive part of the whole Apollo program, and few can doubt its reality -- although surprisingly there are some who do.
Edit to add: I'm actually not sure about how the Apollo program costs broke down. Does anybody have any good estimates of how much went to the three major Apollo flight components: the Saturn V, the CSM and the LM? Each would have two parts: the initial development ("NRE" or non-recurring engineering in industry-speak, or fixed costs in economics-speak) and the second being production and testing of the flight units (variable costs). Of course there would be major additional sums for the construction of ground infrastructure and then for mission operations, again representing fixed and variable costs.
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That only leaves real data from real retro-reflectors placed by astronauts on missions that really landed on the moon.
We've got to be careful with the retroreflector argument since most of the smarter CTs (I know that's not saying much) know that the USSR landed two rovers with retroreflectors, thus "proving" that the Apollo reflectors could have been placed robotically too.
I sometimes challenge them to explain why, if it was possible to land robots in the moon in the 1960s and 70s, it was nonetheless impossible to land humans. If they answer at all, it's usually to mumble about radiation.
To sharpen the point I say that one of the most important roles of the Apollo LM commander was to pick a safe landing spot -- and robotic vision is a famously difficult problem that only now is finally making some serious progress. In other words, in some ways it was actually easier to land humans on the moon than robots -- as underscored by the fact that all six attempted Apollo landings succeeded while two of the seven Surveyor missions crashed along with who knows how many Soviet missions. The robotic mission controllers basically had to land blind and hope they didn't hit a boulder or steep crater wall.
Of course it wasn't cheaper to land humans on the moon, but that was just a matter of money -- which the US had to burn on space in those days. They just had to scale everything up, something Americans have always been famous for: a huge rocket and a (relatively) huge lander with the necessary life support equipment and supplies as well as a fully fueled ascent stage and a waiting CSM for the return to earth. The Saturn V was the biggest, the most crucial and probably the most expensive part of the whole Apollo program, and few can doubt its reality -- although surprisingly there are some who do.
Another point for the HB's, lasers were bounced off the moon before anything was sent there. This is true, but with the retro-reflectors the number of counts received increases when pointed to where they were put by the Apollo crews.
Another HB point about the Saturn V was the "lack of power" that it had to do the work. Of course this fails also if yu have the knowledge, such as Bob B. has.
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For stuff like that, there's often a sort of inverse of the Texas Sharpshooter effect.
Yes, exactly, Texas sharpshooter. Hmm, Texas.
The conspiracy believer looks at the odds of the bullet/airplane/whatever doing what it actually did and claims that is too unlikely for anyone to have seriously contemplated the attack in the first place. What they forget is the large number of perhaps equally unlikely but different paths the bullet/airplane/whatever could have taken that would also have been quite sufficient for the attacker's purposes.
I've argued this point myself, usually with a lottery analogy. The chances of any one individual winning the Powerball (a huge multi-state US lottery) are infinitesimal, but there are so many players that eventually somebody will win a huge jackpot. It's a fallacy to harp, after the fact, on how unlikely it was for that specific person to win.
Oswald didn't set out to make THAT shot. He set out to make A shot.
Precisely. And he needed three shots, his first missing entirely.
I really think people are mostly ignorant of the scale of the risk that JFK repeatedly accepted in satisfying his craving for adulation. And this isn't 20-20 hindsight; JFK himself famously made a fatalistic comment about it the morning of his assassination. Maybe, just maybe, if he'd known the depth and duration of the turmoil his assassination would cause, he might have reconsidered. In some ways the country never recovered. Or maybe I'm projecting the fact that the JFK assassination was the earliest event I can remember that happened outside my own family. (I was in second grade at the time. I was really annoyed that all the Saturday morning cartoons were preempted.)
Anyway, everybody knows that JFK rode in a motorcade through downtown Dallas around noon on November 22, 1963. A few might know that he also rode through downtown Fort Worth earlier the same day. But I wonder how many people know just how many previous motorcades in how many cities JFK rode in during (and even before) his presidency, and how it seems (and not just to me) obvious in hindsight that what happened in Dallas was bound to happen somewhere eventually -- especially in a country (and state) already awash with guns. There's a reason no president since has ridden in an open motorcade except occasionally through certain specific parts of Washington DC where the Secret Service is able to secure every building along the route.
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Another point for the HB's, lasers were bounced off the moon before anything was sent there. This is true, but with the retro-reflectors the number of counts received increases when pointed to where they were put by the Apollo crews.
You must be reading Hunchbacked's latest screeds. Yes, he's active again.
The claim that retroreflectors aren't necessarily there because pre-Apollo tests used the natural lunar surface is a classic example of CT innumeracy. Yes, if you use enough energy -- a long, powerful pulse -- you can get a return from the bare lunar surface. But the return pulse is characteristically stretched in time because, due to diffraction, the telescope can't help but illuminate several square km of surface, and the roughness of that surface (plus simple geometry) results in a wide range of round trip delays all jumbled together. It's like yelling into the Grand Canyon; sure, if you have a big enough amplifier/speaker you can hear your echo. But that won't get rid of the reverberation.
An artificial retroreflector is small, so it intercepts only a small fraction of the kilometers-wide beam as it hits the lunar surface. But this is good because that significantly limits the variation in round trip times. (Although the reflectors were aligned to the average position of the earth in the sky at that location, libration is enough to cause the reflectors to be seen a little obliquely for much of the month, resulting in one of the larger remaining error sources in the data.)
So the mere fact that the return pulses from the Apollo (and Lunokhod) reflectors are so sharp in time and far brighter than anything that could possibly be expected of the natural lunar surface is proof of a small, extremely reflective and therefore artificial reflectors on the moon.
Hunchbacked's latest rationalization is as amusing as it is silly. He now thinks NASA scanned the entire lunar surface with a laser, looking for natural spots that behaved exactly as the real reflectors are purported to do, and when they found them they scheduled their "bogus" Apollo missions to "deploy" retroreflectors at those sites.
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Another HB point about the Saturn V was the "lack of power" that it had to do the work. Of course this fails also if yu have the knowledge, such as Bob B. has.
Another classic favorite. I think we've discussed this here before, but to summarize I usually challenge the claimant to find a combination of sub-nominal thrust and less-than-nominal gross liftoff weight that simultaneously satisfies the following properties of the Saturn V as verified by non-NASA parties (news media and especially crowds of the general public):
1. A liftoff acceleration (as verified by tower clear time) of about 1.4 g.
2. Mach-1 at about T+66 seconds, as verified by shock clouds forming momentarily around the launcher.
3. Engine burn times of 135 sec (center engine) and 162 sec (outer engines).
4. Propellant masses constrained by observed dimensions of S-IC stage and known densities of RP-1 and LOX.
I could go further and require adherence to the observed look angles (azimuth and elevation) vs time, but I'll assume that most TV camera operators and members of the public didn't bring protractors or surveying equipment.
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What I love is when the same people that say NASA sent the reflectors via unmanned landers or rovers, ignoring the highly pertinent question of who built these alleged unmanned vehicles and how they were landed on the Moon in secret, then somehow claim that NASA did not have computers powerful enough to send Apollo to the moon.
That's either some Orwell grade doublethink, or they're just copy and pasting claims without really putting any kind of thought into them.
Mind you, the two are not mutually exclusive.
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More apropos, more general; it sort of saddens me that it is so impossible to make a plausible Apollo conspiracy theory even if you have the technical background to properly understand the evidence. If I wanted to write a thriller or science fiction yarn I'd either have to give up on the first page, or be forced to make it a story about the "Argos Project" with a huge number of differences (that make a fictional hoax possible).
I amuse myself sometimes by attempting to make conspiracy theories fit the known historical record, and I just can't with Apollo; it's one of the few that I haven't found a way around. Kennedy and 9/11 are easy with a few minor changes and additions. Apollo and the Holocaust, conversely are great rocks of evidence that will not be worn down no matter how much sand you blow at them. The Birther thing? Shaped wrong for the evidence to stick, because it doesn't fit into history.
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However, as for the better known ongoing Conspiracy Theories; moon landing Hoax, JFK & RFK assassinations, Boston Bombing, 9/11 etc, all BS of the worst kind... and that is from someone who at one time believed there was a second gunman!!
I would never guessed that of you. I have never been a fan of the CT of JFK's assignation, just a nobody that wanted to be somebody, with a rifle as his chosen method.
It was a different time and I was a lot younger and less wise. Also, it was the pre-internet age, information was really difficult to get and there weren't many books on the JFK assasination. Criminal forensics was also less well understood.
JFK was the only CT I ever believed, and unlike other CTists, as more information became available, much of it on the internet, my belief weakened rather than strengthened. I began to realise that this was simply a lone gunman and there was no conspiracy to kill JFK.
If you ever need anything on the plausibility of the rifle shot, I'll ble glad to help. Shot a Sauer STR200 6.5x55 competitively for around 10 years. And at that distance, with that rifle, Oswald had an easy shot.
If I ever had any doubts about my switch from believer to non-believer, the clincher was the debunking of the "magic bullet theory". I think we all know the story about that, but here is a brief recap for those who don't.
It was necessary to prove that a single bullet was responsible for two wounds as it passed through JFK's body, and a further five wounds as it passed through Governor Connolly's right shoulder and right wrist and embedded in his left knee. Without the single bullet proof, a fourth shot would have to be accepted as fact and that automatically means a second gunman, since LHO could not possibly have fired two shots close enough together to account for all seven wounds. So Arlen Specter came up with a cockamamie piece of bullshit pseudo-ballistics (endorsed by the Warren Commission) to explain how a single bullet followed an unlikely sequence of twists, turns and deflections to make all the wounds
The obvious unlikeliness of this scenario raised a lot of suspicions. It looked like a made up story to cover the existence of a second shooter. Well, it was made up alright, but it was because they didn't understand what really happened. Spector (and presumably everyone else on the Warren Commission ) failed to notice two really important aspects of how Governor Connelly was positioned in the Presidential limo...
1. He was not sitting directly in front of JFK, he was seated slightly inboard and lower.
2. At the time of the shot, he had turned partially around (presumably as a reaction to the first shot ringing out)
When you take those things into account, the single bullet does not need to be magic any more... its a straight line through JFK, then through Connelly's right shoulder and right wrist and into his left knee...
(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/98915197/ApolloHoax/SBT.gif)
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And the "pristine bullet" wasn't so pristine when viewed from other angles.
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There were in fact no North Vietnamese ships anywhere near the Gulf of Tonkin at the time the incident was supposed to have taken place.
The Gulf of Tonkin incident was really two incidents two days apart. In the first incident the US ship was attacked. The next day's incident did not happen.
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'''
However, as for the better known ongoing Conspiracy Theories; moon landing Hoax, JFK & RFK assassinations, Boston Bombing, 9/11 etc, all BS of the worst kind... and that is from someone who at one time believed there was a second gunman!!
I would never guessed that of you. I have never been a fan of the CT of JFK's assignation, just a nobody that wanted to be somebody, with a rifle as his chosen method.
It was a different time and I was a lot younger and less wise. Also, it was the pre-internet age, information was really difficult to get and there weren't many books on the JFK assasination. Criminal forensics was also less well understood.
JFK was the only CT I ever believed, and unlike other CTists, as more information became available, much of it on the internet, my belief weakened rather than strengthened. I began to realise that this was simply a lone gunman and there was no conspiracy to kill JFK.
If you ever need anything on the plausibility of the rifle shot, I'll ble glad to help. Shot a Sauer STR200 6.5x55 competitively for around 10 years. And at that distance, with that rifle, Oswald had an easy shot.
If I ever had any doubts about my switch from believer to non-believer, the clincher was the debunking of the "magic bullet theory". I think we all know the story about that, but here is a brief recap for those who don't.
It was necessary to prove that a single bullet was responsible for two wounds as it passed through JFK's body, and a further five wounds as it passed through Governor Connolly's right shoulder and right wrist and embedded in his left knee. Without the single bullet proof, a fourth shot would have to be accepted as fact and that automatically means a second gunman, since LHO could not possibly have fired two shots close enough together to account for all seven wounds. So Arlen Specter came up with a cockamamie piece of bullshit pseudo-ballistics (endorsed by the Warren Commission) to explain how a single bullet followed an unlikely sequence of twists, turns and deflections to make all the wounds
The obvious unlikeliness of this scenario raised a lot of suspicions. It looked like a made up story to cover the existence of a second shooter. Well, it was made up alright, but it was because they didn't understand what really happened. Spector (and presumably everyone else on the Warren Commission ) failed to notice two really important aspects of how Governor Connelly was positioned in the Presidential limo...
1. He was not sitting directly in front of JFK, he was seated slightly inboard and lower.
2. At the time of the shot, he had turned partially around (presumably as a reaction to the first shot ringing out)
When you take those things into account, the single bullet does not need to be magic any more... its a straight line through JFK, then through Connelly's right shoulder and right wrist and into his left knee...
(https://dl.dropboxusercontent.com/u/98915197/ApolloHoax/SBT.gif)
Yes I think the computer forensics have proved the point that with the correct seating, it was not only possible but convincingly the only real option. And as Allan F. has posted the bullet was not as pristine as the famous image.
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...
Hunchbacked's latest rationalization is as amusing as it is silly. He now thinks NASA scanned the entire lunar surface with a laser, looking for natural spots that behaved exactly as the real reflectors are purported to do, and when they found them they scheduled their "bogus" Apollo missions to "deploy" retroreflectors at those sites.
Yes, I agree that most of what he indicates in his videos is amusing. His latest videos, for those that don't visit YT, Lunar regolith movement from LRV tires "proves" the videos "can't" be filmed on the Moon. Those movements prove to me they were taken in a very low to non-existent atmosphere.
Another is the Apollo mission spent the mission time either in LEO and/or a sub-orbital flight with the capsule dropped by a large aircraft for TV audiences. This video includes an out of context comment by Pete Conrad about the landings "didn't happen", when in fact Pete is responding to a question about the program being cancelled.
He really seems to be dropping to the blunder level on his videos.
Didn't you believe that he really believes Apollo, but post videos to see how many HB's respond to his videos? Personally I don't think he believes and attempts to use the videos in an attempt to show "anomalies".
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I think I'm with the majority here, no claim has ever made me doubt Apollo, but some have made me wonder about what exactly was going on and driven me to do a little research. On that basis, the hoax claims have helped my education if not that of the claimant.
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That only leaves real data from real retro-reflectors placed by astronauts on missions that really landed on the moon.
We've got to be careful with the retroreflector argument since most of the smarter CTs (I know that's not saying much) know that the USSR landed two rovers with retroreflectors, thus "proving" that the Apollo reflectors could have been placed robotically too.
A fair point, but in balance all other evidence points to the authenticity of Apollo, so I'd say that the LRRRs lend themselves well to the consistency of the overall account. Why should we accept one part of the evidence being more authentic than another part when all other parts meet the consistency of the record. Surely the argument is about the sum of the parts, rather than the individual merits of each component. That was the point I was making in my OP. The hoax theory is so internally inconsistent that it falters against the internal consistency of the Apollo record.
Further, if I recall correctly, the Soviet retro-reflectors are more prone to thermal fluctuations due to them being placed by probes and not humans. They were not placed accurately. Hence my point about the LRRRs confirming GR to the degree of accuracy needed. Such accuracy is unlikely to be achieved from an object that undergoes thermal fluctuations, and would certainly not be achieved by reflecting a laser of the lunar surface.
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The only Apollo hoax theory that made me really stop and think was the lack of a blast crater under the descent stage of the LM.
In the Army, when making decisions, we used what was called the Military Decision Making Process or MDMP. One of the first steps in this MDMP was to gather your facts and assumptions. So I tried to apply this to the lack of blast crater theory.
So I only came up with one known fact. The LM did land on the moon. I could not come up with any real assumptions because of my lack of expertise in the Lunar Geology and Rocket Science.
This is where every single Apollo Hoax theory fails for me. The assumptions made to support these theories are untenable. I cannot tell how deep the lunar dust is or if there is any dust at all. I also do not know if they would land on a rock bed or not. I would not expect a rocket engine to dig a large hole in cement (or rock) if it was landing. I have seen videos of rockets attempting to land on earth on landing pads and they do not dig blast craters. So because of my lack of knowledge, I again have to defer to those with more knowledge.
I have read websites and seen videos on the landings. These provided information and evidence that I was not aware of and they seem to me to be accurate and factual. It is also very easy to look up the weight of the LM and the weight of the consumables. It is easy to extrapolate approximate weights as the LM nears the surface and therefor understand that the thrust needs are not that high at landing. I admit that I was a little lost on the math of the amount of thrust and the area inside the engine bell, but I would assume that any real mathematician could and would have disputed them if they were inaccurate.
But almost every Apollo hoax theory makes assumptions that I do not believe that they can make. It seems that the theories are even more unbelievable than an actual landing. The assumptions made by the Apollo hoax theorists are often contradictory as well.
I have come to really enjoy finding Apollo hoax theories that I have not heard of and then research for myself to try to find the holes in the theory. For most on this forum this is probably old hat, but it still is new to me and I enjoy the search.
How hard would it be to have pulled off a hoax on the scale of Apollo? Because of the shear scope of the program plus simple human nature and the inability of most people to keep secrets, I don't think NASA could have faked it even if they had tried.
So I thank everyone who has responded to my original question.
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For most on this forum this is probably old hat, but it still is new to me and I enjoy the search.
Not always. I think Fattydash's lost Eagle was a new one for me. I had to take a rear seat there, but learned so much once the real Apollo gurus at this forum got stuck into him. Then there was the PLSS debacle with Romulus. That was a variation on a theme I guess, a new twist on Ralph Rene's spurious thermodynamics of metabolic heat management and sublimation. That debate was more about standards of proof than actual theory, it's a tact that some CTs take - shifting the burden of proof.
I'll echo previous posters, and my own thoughts: The joy of this forum is the education we receive when a CT turns up with a different angle. However, as others have remarked before, the standard of CT really goes to show where the hoax theory sits. Now they are quite rabid, spitting venom as they go over long debunked ground. I understand that in the distant past, long before I got involved in this forum, some of the CTs were quite polite. Jay might be able to confirm a few characters that actually tried to debate their point. Most of the CTs I have met quickly resort to ad hominen
Once in a while there is something new. It happens rarely nowadays. They mostly come at night... when it's dark. Someone remind me, was it also Romulus that aired the missing Saturn V blueprint argument. I learned so much from that episode. This statement alone shows the strength of the forum, the knowledge I gained is more memorable that the person’s name. That speaks volumes.
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http://www.braeunig.us/apollo/LMcrater.htm
Here's everything you need to know about the blast crater, calculated and explained by a member of this board.
Bottom line - the energy in the exhaust was at most able to move dust to a depth of less than 40 mm - which matches nicely with the pictures of the ground beneath the descent stages.
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http://www.braeunig.us/apollo/LMcrater.htm
Here's everything you need to know about the blast crater, calculated and explained by a member of this board.
Bottom line - the energy in the exhaust was at most able to move dust to a depth of less than 40 mm - which matches nicely with the pictures of the ground beneath the descent stages.
This reminds me of the Fox Mocumentary, where Rene used a leaf blower to "model" the rocket engine. I wish that I'd have been there to ask a few pointed t destroy the experiment, and I'm only a novice at this debunking.
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The only Apollo hoax theory that made me really stop and think was the lack of a blast crater under the descent stage of the LM.
The lack of a blast crater is one of the easiest things to debunk, by comparison
The descent motor of the LM has a thrust of about 10,000 lbf (pounds-force), the engine of a Hawker Harrier GR3/9 (in USA - AV8B) VTOL jet has a thrust of between 21,000 and 24,000 lbf depending in the model, more that twice as much. I have seen Harriers land on all sorts of surfaces, including grass paddocks... I have never seen a blast crater under a Harrier
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The only Apollo hoax theory that made me really stop and think was the lack of a blast crater under the descent stage of the LM.
The lack of a blast crater is one of the easiest things to debunk, by comparison
The descent motor of the LM has a thrust of about 10,000 lbf (pounds-force), the engine of a Hawker Harrier GR3/9 (in USA - AV8B) VTOL jet has a thrust of between 21,000 and 24,000 lbf depending in the model, more that twice as much. I have seen Harriers land on all sorts of surfaces, including grass paddocks... I have never seen a blast crater under a Harrier
According to my information, the actual descent engines used, had a max thrust of just below 6.000 pounds of force - because the throttle system restricted the fuel/oxidizer flow. And of course it was throttled way down at landing, otherwise, the LM would have taken off like a . . . . .
(ahem)
....... rocket.
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The only Apollo hoax theory that made me really stop and think was the lack of a blast crater under the descent stage of the LM.
The lack of a blast crater is one of the easiest things to debunk, by comparison
The descent motor of the LM has a thrust of about 10,000 lbf (pounds-force), the engine of a Hawker Harrier GR3/9 (in USA - AV8B) VTOL jet has a thrust of between 21,000 and 24,000 lbf depending in the model, more that twice as much. I have seen Harriers land on all sorts of surfaces, including grass paddocks... I have never seen a blast crater under a Harrier
According to my information, the actual descent engines used, had a max thrust of just below 6.000 pounds of force - because the throttle system restricted the fuel/oxidizer flow. And of course it was throttled way down at landing, otherwise, the LM would have taken off like a . . . . .
(ahem)
....... rocket.
Well I got the 10,000 lb figure from Wikipedia
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Descent_Propulsion_System
If I had bothered looking past the "10,125 pounds-force (45.04 kN)" figure, I would have seen "maximum, throttle between 10% and 60% of full thrust" So, you're right, 60% of 10125 is about 6000, and even less at touchdown.
So that makes the LM descent motor. a quarter to a fifth of the thrust of a Harrier Jump Jet....
Its not looking good for LM blast craters is it?
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And, as I've said, even if you take the mathematics out, if it was a hoax, why didn't NASA's set dressers simply sculpt one? If they were too lazy or incompetent to do that. why take a photograph under the LM and publish it, why have the astronauts mention looking for it, mentioning how faint it is (https://www.hq.NASA.gov/alsj/a11/a11transcript_tec.html)? (Ctrl/Command+F '
04 18 37 42' and '04 13 25 45', without apostrophes, of course.)
The handwave of 'whistleblowers' fails under even under the mildest scrutiny. Surely, NASA had scientific experts going over the proposed scripts and photographs? If the conspiracy theorists could figure out there 'should' be blast craters, so could NASA.
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And, as I've said, even if you take the mathematics out, if it was a hoax, why didn't NASA's set dressers simply sculpt one? If they were too lazy or incompetent to do that. why take a photograph under the LM and publish it, why have the astronauts mention looking for it, mentioning how faint it is (https://www.hq.NASA.gov/alsj/a11/a11transcript_tec.html)? (Ctrl/Command+F '
04 18 37 42' and '04 13 25 45', without apostrophes, of course.)
The handwave of 'whistleblowers' fails under even under the mildest scrutiny. Surely, NASA had scientific experts going over the proposed scripts and photographs? If the conspiracy theorists could figure out there 'should' be blaster blast craters, so could NASA.
Its a common story and it applies to quite a bit of the so-called evidence for a hoax
If NASA did fake the moon landings and
1. they dug a significant fake blast crater under the LM, then rocket scientists would have said "hey, that's not right, there should not be a blast crater", and the game would be up
2. If the lunar surface photographs had shown stars in the lunar sky, then any amateur astronomer (or first year photography student) would immediately have their suspicions raised.
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And, as I've said, even if you take the mathematics out, if it was a hoax, why didn't NASA's set dressers simply sculpt one? If they were too lazy or incompetent to do that. why take a photograph under the LM and publish it, why have the astronauts mention looking for it, mentioning how faint it is (https://www.hq.NASA.gov/alsj/a11/a11transcript_tec.html)? (Ctrl/Command+F '
04 18 37 42' and '04 13 25 45', without apostrophes, of course.)
The handwave of 'whistleblowers' fails under even under the mildest scrutiny. Surely, NASA had scientific experts going over the proposed scripts and photographs? If the conspiracy theorists could figure out there 'should' be blaster blast craters, so could NASA.
Its a common story and it applies to quite a bit of the so-called evidence for a hoax
If NASA did fake the moon landings and
1. they dug a significant fake blast crater under the LM, then rocket scientists would have said "hey, that's not right, there should not be a blast crater", and the game would be up
2. If the lunar surface photographs had shown stars in the lunar sky, then any amateur astronomer (or first year photography student) would immediately have their suspicions raised.
Oh, I know, but my point is, even if you take the assumptions of hoax mongers and conspiracy theorists that there should be stars in fast exposure photos, that there should be a blast crater, the whole thing still fails.
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And, as I've said, even if you take the mathematics out, if it was a hoax, why didn't NASA's set dressers simply sculpt one? If they were too lazy or incompetent to do that. why take a photograph under the LM and publish it, why have the astronauts mention looking for it, mentioning how faint it is (https://www.hq.NASA.gov/alsj/a11/a11transcript_tec.html)? (Ctrl/Command+F '
04 18 37 42' and '04 13 25 45', without apostrophes, of course.)
The handwave of 'whistleblowers' fails under even under the mildest scrutiny. Surely, NASA had scientific experts going over the proposed scripts and photographs? If the conspiracy theorists could figure out there 'should' be blaster blast craters, so could NASA.
Its a common story and it applies to quite a bit of the so-called evidence for a hoax
If NASA did fake the moon landings and
1. they dug a significant fake blast crater under the LM, then rocket scientists would have said "hey, that's not right, there should not be a blast crater"[/i], and the game would be up
2. If the lunar surface photographs had shown stars in the lunar sky, then any amateur astronomer (or first year photography student) would immediately have their suspicions raised.
That's more to the point, scientists don't doubt the landings, just average Joe/Jane without any formal education doubting the landings because he/she saw something that looks odd.
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Hrm. I'm tempted to propose "Scotsman Question" for this (but then, I haven't had my morning coffee yet). In the world of the Hoax Believer, the vast public never thinks about the evidence at all. If they can characteristically have foolish expectations, it is that whatever NASA shows them must be appropriate.
The discoveries of the Hoax Believers are different. Those come from looking hard at the evidence. And, yes, some of the claimed evidence is foolish and wrong. But you see; since the observations made by and and associated expectations of the Hoax Believers are by definition evidence for their claims, anything that is foolish and wrong was a mistake, wasn't ever actually said, or is a faked claim made by NASA disinfo agents in order to discredit legitimate researchers.
No Hoax Believer claim is ever wrong. If a claim is wrong, it isn't from a real Hoax Believer.
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So poor Neil Baker is having a hissy fit over on youtube about all the off-topic discussion that's going on in this thread and compares it to the reason he was placed on moderation with the thread he started. Just never ends with that guy and how he thinks the world revolves around him.
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So poor Neil Baker is having a hissy fit over on youtube about all the off-topic discussion that's going on in this thread and compares it to the reason he was placed on moderation with the thread he started. Just never ends with that guy and how he thinks the world revolves around him.
Why waste time reviewing what you obviously knows that he will say, just a troll
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Because I'm bored, what's Neil's handle on YouTube?
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Because I'm bored, what's Neil's handle on YouTube?
Do you have your foil hat handy? :)
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Sure, why not?
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Because I'm bored, what's Neil's handle on YouTube?
He uses his real name Neil Baker. He seems to just post on this video that I know of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drSqtw0Qywk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drSqtw0Qywk)
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Because I'm bored, what's Neil's handle on YouTube?
He uses his real name Neil Baker. He seems to just post on this video that I know of:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drSqtw0Qywk (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=drSqtw0Qywk)
Good luck report back when you are out of harms way.
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Aggggh. The stupid was too much to endure...
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Aggggh. The stupid was too much to endure...
I found Michio Kaku's response especially annoying. He really should know better except here he is making up a lot of 'answers' which are wrong.
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Aggggh. The stupid was too much to endure...
LOL, and you expected differently? :)
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Aggggh. The stupid was too much to endure...
I found Michio Kaku's response especially annoying. He really should know better except here he is making up a lot of 'answers' which are wrong.
I watched that video a couple of times, once before our friend neil showed up and then after he started his idiotic thread. A lot of the viewers picked up on some of Dr. Kaku's errors, but the of the other posters stupidity was off scale like Sus_pilot's observed.
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Another HB point about the Saturn V was the "lack of power" that it had to do the work. Of course this fails also if yu have the knowledge, such as Bob B. has.
Another classic favorite. I think we've discussed this here before, but to summarize I usually challenge the claimant to find a combination of sub-nominal thrust and less-than-nominal gross liftoff weight that simultaneously satisfies the following properties of the Saturn V as verified by non-NASA parties (news media and especially crowds of the general public):
1. A liftoff acceleration (as verified by tower clear time) of about 1.4 g.
2. Mach-1 at about T+66 seconds, as verified by shock clouds forming momentarily around the launcher.
3. Engine burn times of 135 sec (center engine) and 162 sec (outer engines).
4. Propellant masses constrained by observed dimensions of S-IC stage and known densities of RP-1 and LOX.
I could go further and require adherence to the observed look angles (azimuth and elevation) vs time, but I'll assume that most TV camera operators and members of the public didn't bring protractors or surveying equipment.
I've used a similar line of argument to debunk the "Pokrovsky paper". For those unfamiliar, there is a paper written by (Russian PhD?) Stanislav Pokrovsky alleging that the Saturn V was not traveling as high and as fast as claimed by NASA near the end of its first stage burn. With just a basic understanding of rocketry, it can be shown that the Saturn V could not have lifted off the launch pad at the observed acceleration, burned propellant at the rate needed to produce the observed acceleration, burned its engines for the observed amount of time, and could end up traveling as slowly as Pokrovsky estimates. The numbers just don't add up, Pokrovsky's claim is a physical impossibility.
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Another HB point about the Saturn V was the "lack of power" that it had to do the work. Of course this fails also if yu have the knowledge, such as Bob B. has.
Another classic favorite. I think we've discussed this here before, but to summarize I usually challenge the claimant to find a combination of sub-nominal thrust and less-than-nominal gross liftoff weight that simultaneously satisfies the following properties of the Saturn V as verified by non-NASA parties (news media and especially crowds of the general public):
1. A liftoff acceleration (as verified by tower clear time) of about 1.4 g.
2. Mach-1 at about T+66 seconds, as verified by shock clouds forming momentarily around the launcher.
3. Engine burn times of 135 sec (center engine) and 162 sec (outer engines).
4. Propellant masses constrained by observed dimensions of S-IC stage and known densities of RP-1 and LOX.
I could go further and require adherence to the observed look angles (azimuth and elevation) vs time, but I'll assume that most TV camera operators and members of the public didn't bring protractors or surveying equipment.
I've used a similar line of argument to debunk the "Pokrovsky paper". For those unfamiliar, there is a paper written by (Russian PhD?) Stanislav Pokrovsky alleging that the Saturn V was not traveling as high and as fast as claimed by NASA near the end of its first stage burn. With just a basic understanding of rocketry, it can be shown that the Saturn V could not have lifted off the launch pad at the observed acceleration, burned propellant at the rate needed to produce the observed acceleration, burned its engines for the observed amount of time, and could end up traveling as slowly as Pokrovsky estimates. The numbers just don't add up, Pokrovsky's claim is a physical impossibility.
As your simulation showed.
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My question to this forum is: Are there any hoax theories that any of you more educated people have seen that made you stop and think or were difficult for you to disprove?
Nothing that made me doubt the landings, but there are some claims that are less obviously stupid as most of them, and may require some actual knowledge about math and "rocket science", so they could be called "more difficult".