Poll: Do you believe we landed on the moon?

[MailOrderClone]

I'm a bit concerned that we haven't been making regular trips up there. Really, by now, we should have a space station up on the moon. But NASA got cold feet after Challenger and have been relegated to a glorified taxi service ever since.

If we're ever going to actually start a manned exploration of space, then putting a space station on the moon has to be a goal. And at this stage, I don't think that it's a logistical impossibility.

The question is of motivation. Why bother spending all that money on a moon base for no benefit?

There would be a benefit though. A base on the moon could be used to field test and perfect methods of surviving and thriving on another planet. Setting up base models inside of an artificial vacuum and testing them on an actual lunar surface are two entirely different things, with numerous factors that can not be simulated cohabitantly.

That said, at this stage cost is likely the most damning factor for such missions.

 

[Arachon]

Wow, I am kinda surprised that no one posted these links yet. Before MythBusters, there was Phil from Bad Astronomy. He had a TON of info about the Moon Landings and debunks every argument I have ever heard about the Moon landings:

Main Page:
http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/apollohoax.html

Page with most info regarding the Fox TV special made by CT's.:
http://www.badastronomy.com/bad/tv/foxapollo.html

Thank you, I was waiting for someone to post that :3

 

[matrix3509]

I'm a bit concerned that we haven't been making regular trips up there. Really, by now, we should have a space station up on the moon. But NASA got cold feet after Challenger and have been relegated to a glorified taxi service ever since.

If we're ever going to actually start a manned exploration of space, then putting a space station on the moon has to be a goal. And at this stage, I don't think that it's a logistical impossibility.

I know I'm a bit late to this thread but this caught my attention. The reasons we haven't been regularly going to the moon are many-fold.

1.) Practicality: If a robot can do it for cheaper than a human and with less risk to human life, there really is no reason to send a human.

2.) Boredom: After about the third trip to the moon, public interest in it plummeted. Yes humans can get bored of anything, even going to the moon.

3.) Competition: The only reason we even went to the moon was to beat "those pinko commie bastards" to it. With the lack of a world power to compete with, nobody wants to go to the moon "just to do it". There has to be a viable reason other than "for science". It is incredibly hard to justify that much expense given the current state of the economy and indeed the entire world.

What really pisses me off is the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty which bans all use of nuclear devices in outer space. The nuclear powered Orion Drive is theoretically able to achieve a top speed of 10% of the speed of light in a vacuum, rendering interstellar travel at least partially technologically feasible given the average human life span. Plus, it would give us a use for all of those nuclear weapons we have sitting around gathering dust.

 

[AgentNein]

I'm a bit concerned that we haven't been making regular trips up there. Really, by now, we should have a space station up on the moon. But NASA got cold feet after Challenger and have been relegated to a glorified taxi service ever since.

If we're ever going to actually start a manned exploration of space, then putting a space station on the moon has to be a goal. And at this stage, I don't think that it's a logistical impossibility.

The question is of motivation. Why bother spending all that money on a moon base for no benefit?

I might be wrong on this, but I always perceived the benefit to be the ability to launch missions from a moon base rather than earth. If this is indeed possible, we'd save a lot of money, as it would be a lot more expensive to launch something into space with the gravity of our planet than it would from the moon. Please someone correct me if I'm wrong though, I definitely don't pretend to be all that knowledgeable of the factors at work here.

 

[ECAaxel]

I'm a bit concerned that we haven't been making regular trips up there. Really, by now, we should have a space station up on the moon. But NASA got cold feet after Challenger and have been relegated to a glorified taxi service ever since.

If we're ever going to actually start a manned exploration of space, then putting a space station on the moon has to be a goal. And at this stage, I don't think that it's a logistical impossibility.

The question is of motivation. Why bother spending all that money on a moon base for no benefit?

I might be wrong on this, but I always perceived the benefit to be the ability to launch missions from a moon base rather than earth. If this is indeed possible, we'd save a lot of money, as it would be a lot more expensive to launch something into space with the gravity of our planet than it would from the moon. Please someone correct me if I'm wrong though, I definitely don't pretend to be all that knowledgeable of the factors at work here.

I would imagine it could be cheaper, but don't forget everything has to be moved to the moon first.

 

[ProfessorLayton]

Yes because I believe anything the government tells me.

Why wouldn't I believe? If I didn't believe it, then I would just be wasting my time to try and disprove something that doesn't even matter. I would spend time making charts and graphs telling exactly every reason why I think we didn't land on the moon and no one would care. It would be a waste of my time, as are almost all conspiracy theories.

 

[The DSM]

Pics or it didnt happen HI-RES pics.

This is the same reason I dont belive in religion.

 

[ECAaxel]

Considering these were taken from orbit i think they are pretty good.

LRO captures landing sites [http://www.nasa.gov/mission_pages/LRO/multimedia/lroimages/apollosites.html]