The Apollo Moon Landings and Critical Thinking

The recent article and poll about meteorites being traced to a Martian origin inspired some discussion about the truth of the Apollo Moon Landings — one of the commenters questioned the veracity of the landings and suggested a few conspiracy books for readers. I was a youngster during the 60s, and a huge fan of the space program, watching launches and following every mission until the eventual splashdown. My parents let me stay up late to watch Neil Armstrong take those historic first steps on another world, an event I'll never forget.

People who would have you believe that these landings did not take place "as advertised" have a vested interest in asking questions like those that were asked in the Martian meteorite thread: those questions allow them to sell books and videos, keeping themselves well paid and well fed, for very little effort. Understanding the engineering marvel that was the Apollo program (and Mercury and Gemini) is hard work — but asking questions about it is easy, and profitable. Remember the old adage: a fool and his money are soon parted.

It's a simple exercise in critical thinking to show that there is no possible way that the moon landings could have been faked. At its peak, over 500,000 people worked on the missions, both governemnt employees and the folks in private industry who built the hardware and the software that made the missions possible. A conspiracy on the part of NASA to fake the landings could only be accomplished in one of two ways: either it was a small group of people at the top who were "in the know," or it was a huge conspiracy involving many thousands of people. In the latter example, a conspiracy of that size would surely collapse under its own weight — sooner or later, some bit player would come forward with what they know, and the cover would be blown. In all the years since Apollo, no such whistleblower has come forward, and no deathbed confession has been published — we can safely assume that no such huge conspiracy was undertaken.

This leaves us with the first proposition, that it was only a handful of people at the top who were in on the conspiracy to fake the landings. But what about the  hundreds of thousands of people working on technology to go to the moon? If the technology was not going to work, they would certainly know, and again the conspiracy would fall apart.

So, for those who would question the moon landings and ask "how did they do it?" I have a simple answer: engineering. Talented, smart engineers designed a system to transport men and material to the moon, where they gathered rocks and soil, conducted countless experiments, and tooled around in a sporty little solar powered moon buggy that was folded up into the cargo bay of the lunar lander. The evidence of their visit has recently been photographed by the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter, a satellite launched by NASA in a consortium with the ESA, the European Space Agency. See the images here:

LRO Images of Apollo Landing Sites

Did the Apollo Moon Landings take place "as advertised?" Yes, absolutely, they did. Anyone questioning their veracity is either a fool or a charlatan, or both.