I was reading the back page of the October Smithsonian, and I was inspired to do some further reading about the Moon Landing Hoax.
One can guess my position, as a son of an astrophysicist who worked summers for NASA.
Here are a bunch of simple and clear rebuttals to a couple of dozen Hoax points, written and illustrated for non-scientists: http://www.redzero.demon.co.uk/moonhoax/index.html
But the Smithsonian gave me the best answer:
We were in the midst of the Cold War. The Soviets would have given anything to somehow embarrass the U.S. as they were racing us to the moon.
Once we got there, the Soviets never once cried, “Hoax!” Their scientists knew the state of the art as well as ours, and how to test the supposed evidence we returned.
So, why didn’t the Russians ever attempt to expose this hoax in the decades between the moon landing and the end of the cold war?
Relevance? Apparently, some 10% of Americans believe that NASA faked the 6 moon landings, and (presumably) the failure of Apollo 13. I wonder how many of them think that Saddam planned 9/11 in cahoots with Clinton?
I remember the first time someone said this to me, that it had been a hoax. It stunned me. But I said "It can't be." "Why not?" "The pictures are too bad. If this were on a soundstage, you could see everything."
That actually backed this guy up a bit. He almost reconsidered.
Ah, the power of media!
Pixelpete
How did the lunar module take off from the moon and find the exact orbit to re unite with the mothership? There was no computer navigation, the astronauts had no vision (no windows) . They only had manual joysticks. That would have been an impossibility in 1969.
Let's see the disinfo crew answer that one???????
Pete
Pixelpete: Do you think that airplanes are a hoax too? How about computers? Do you think that people are just pretending that they're working at computers, and that they are just big empty plastic boxes? Did you think that numerous astronauts and thousands of aeronautics engineers are lying?
I suspect that your comment is a hoax. But do me this favor: How much technical information have you read about the moon landings? How much do you actually know about the Apollo navigation computer? Have you read this? Have you gone to any air and space museums? Are you curious and yet you don't believe, or do you simply refuse to believe? In short, convince me that you really care about the facts.
Pixelpete: Both the Command Module and the Lunar Module had windows. And radar. And stellar navigation scopes.
The orbits were well established, precalculated, and all the astronauts knew how to astrogate.
What alternative do you propose to a "manual joystick"? Manual as opposed to the automated trajectory control system that was decades more advanced than the ones used to land V-2's in London?
Erich is right; no one is as ignorant as Pixelpete claims to be. I know an actual moon landing denier. He doesn't believe these recent pictures, either: LRO Sees Apollo Landing Sites