Where Are The Hoaxers?

[gillianren]

you clearly haven't debated with the people I have. Pascal Xavier (as many people on here will tell you) believes because he wants to.

Look, I have been involved in these discussions for more than ten years.  I am also mentally ill.  What I am telling you is that "they have a psychological problem" is a vast oversimplification of people's reasons.  Bart Sibrel, for one, was in my opinion clearly doing it for the money, much good it did him.  One or two, I have believed to have been schizophrenic.  I believe the DSM-5 has declared extreme conspiracism to be a mental illness, but it has to impact more of your life than just discussions on YouTube and Facebook; it has to have a severe detriment to your life in general.  Most of the conspiracists I've encountered over the years just want to feel important.  If that's a psychological problem, it's an awfully common one.

[benparry]

I think I have explained myself badly here. what I meant was people who believe because they want to and being trolls purposely have something wrong with them. why on earth would they do it. to feel important. well to me that is an issue with their mind. of course people are snake oil salesman and again that isn't psychological. I just meant that there are people who are daft and try to feel important.

[LunarOrbit]

Most of the conspiracists I've encountered over the years just want to feel important.  If that's a psychological problem, it's an awfully common one.

It can even get you elected President of the United States.

[benparry]

lol

[smartcooky]

The record we have today of Apollo is vast, far larger than any of the hoax theorists contemplate.  So I agree that it would be prohibitively expensive and difficult to fake that record.  But let's say we wanted to fake a manned mission to Mars within the next 15 years.  Would we be able to do it convincingly?

Well, we already have some relatively recent examples, at least, of how the Mars video side might be faked.

1. Mission to Mars. A terrible Mars sci-fi movie with turgid dialog and a far-fetched but nonetheless interesting take on the Cydonia "Face on Mars" rubbish. However, it had some good effects, and IMO, its sole redeeming feature was the Zero G dancing scene, the main reason being that they danced to Van Halen's "Dance the Night Away".... Awesome!

2. National Geographic's MARS A better effort, badly let down by having the astronaut actors interact with each other in exactly the way that astronauts don't, and having the astronauts doing really dangerous, stupid and risky things that no astronaut would ever, ever  do. Too much licence taken with the science for dramatic effect.

3. The Martian The best of the three, most of the science was realistic with the one glaring exception (the dust storm) on which the whole premise was based. The CGI was excellent, and astronauts acted like real astronauts.

All three however, fail on a single important aspect.... gravity. Even today, 50 years after Apollo, it still seems impossible to film live action actors walking and operating in low gravity. Mars' gravity is just over 1/3 that of Earth. Although people working on Mars would be doing so in a little more than twice the gravity of the Moon, as they walked, worked and carried out tasks on Mars, they would still look more like what astronauts on the moon looked like, than what they would when filmed in the 1G of Earth's gravity.

Gravity is going to be the dead-giveaway of a fake

[HyperOreo]

Can somebody tell me how to reply to a specific person's post? I'm too stupid to figure it out.

[bknight]

Can somebody tell me how to reply to a specific person's post? I'm too stupid to figure it out.

Look at the top right of the post you are referring and select quote.  If you want to go to that person then send a Private Memo

[Count Zero]

All three however, fail on a single important aspect.... gravity. Even today, 50 years after Apollo, it still seems impossible to film live action actors walking and operating in low gravity. Mars' gravity is just over 1/3 that of Earth. Although people working on Mars would be doing so in a little more than twice the gravity of the Moon, as they walked, worked and carried out tasks on Mars, they would still look more like what astronauts on the moon looked like, than what they would when filmed in the 1G of Earth's gravity.

A point that is always overlooked (for example, in 2001: A Space Odyssey) is that people will use the same gravitationally-altered walking gait indoors as well as out on EVA.  Hollywood isn't the only one to make this mistake.  A long time ago I saw a prototype moonbase module at Marshall Space Center.  The ceiling was too low and had lots of unpadded protrusions.  o.O

[Glom]

Wasn't DakDak a young earth creationist? One stage of his meltdown was a rant about how ungodly this all was.

The record we have today of Apollo is vast, far larger than any of the hoax theorists contemplate.  So I agree that it would be prohibitively expensive and difficult to fake that record.  But let's say we wanted to fake a manned mission to Mars within the next 15 years.  Would we be able to do it convincingly?

Well, we already have some relatively recent examples, at least, of how the Mars video side might be faked.

1. Mission to Mars. A terrible Mars sci-fi movie with turgid dialog and a far-fetched but nonetheless interesting take on the Cydonia "Face on Mars" rubbish. However, it had some good effects, and IMO, its sole redeeming feature was the Zero G dancing scene, the main reason being that they danced to Van Halen's "Dance the Night Away".... Awesome!

2. National Geographic's MARS A better effort, badly let down by having the astronaut actors interact with each other in exactly the way that astronauts don't, and having the astronauts doing really dangerous, stupid and risky things that no astronaut would ever, ever  do. Too much licence taken with the science for dramatic effect.

3. The Martian The best of the three, most of the science was realistic with the one glaring exception (the dust storm) on which the whole premise was based. The CGI was excellent, and astronauts acted like real astronauts.

All three however, fail on a single important aspect.... gravity. Even today, 50 years after Apollo, it still seems impossible to film live action actors walking and operating in low gravity. Mars' gravity is just over 1/3 that of Earth. Although people working on Mars would be doing so in a little more than twice the gravity of the Moon, as they walked, worked and carried out tasks on Mars, they would still look more like what astronauts on the moon looked like, than what they would when filmed in the 1G of Earth's gravity.

Gravity is going to be the dead-giveaway of a fake

The most realistic fictional depiction of the Moon's surface is in Super Mario Odyssey. The gravity is light, there are no stars in the daylight sky and the dog wears a space helmet. I'm not sure about the chapel though.

[raven]

I saw 'The Martian' recently, and I liked it, I cried at the end, just like on Apollo 13, though I didn't like some of the changes they made. That said, there was occasional moments of lesser gravity . . . which made all the moments there wasn't stand out all the more.

[sts60]

They generally just ignored the Mars gravity issue, which was for the best.  The only thing that annoyed me about the movie was Hollywoodizing the rescue, in which they carefully develop the plan, only to have the commander throw it out and do her own thing.  That’s way harder for me to suspend disbelief on than the gravity.

As for the sandstorm, Weir admitted it was, well, stretching the physics.  But he needed a device to start the story.

I admit I laughed at the part where Watney is monologging about the hazards should the RTG release its fuel.  Anything that would spill the PuO₂ would leave him in no condition to worry about anything.

[raven]

They generally just ignored the Mars gravity issue, which was for the best.  The only thing that annoyed me about the movie was Hollywoodizing the rescue, in which they carefully develop the plan, only to have the commander throw it out and do her own thing.  That’s way harder for me to suspend disbelief on than the gravity.

As for the sandstorm, Weir admitted it was, well, stretching the physics.  But he needed a device to start the story.

I admit I laughed at the part where Watney is monologging about the hazards should the RTG release its fuel.  Anything that would spill the PuO₂ would leave him in no condition to worry about anything.

Yeah, those things tend to be built tough, for exactly these reasons.  Apollo 13 had a small RTG that was meant to power a long term lunar experiment. Naturally, it never was placed, and ended up re-entering the atmosphere with Aquarius. From what I understand, it would mostly likely survive re-entry and its landing into the ocean in a deep trench after in, if not in working order, at least in a contained state. The dangers of short term exposure to overpressure oxygen was also exaggerated.

[nomuse]

Which means the giant squid now have a way to plug in their television?