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Moon landing conspiracy theory disproved by new graphics card

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So I am sure many of you have heard the numerous moon landing conspiracy theories one of which is that the lighting in the photos and film "proves" it was filmed on a set. I thought this was a really awesome way for NVidia to show off the new capability/feature on their new Maxwell graphics card. Basically they recreated the photo of Buzz Aldrin jumping off the lander in 3D using the new single source global illumination lighting technology.

Was really cool!
 
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The big question is, if it was so easy to get to the moon (not to mention back to Earth) in 1969, why is it so difficult to go back today?

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_landing

Ten years ago: Bush sets ‘new course’ for moon and beyond http://www.nbcnews.com/id/3950099/n...ush-sets-new-course-moon-beyond/#.VDXfR23n_IV and we can't do it??? Why?

In the video, they admit having problems getting the computer model to jive, so they reverse engineered until everything matched.

You should look into the story of why Elon founded SpaceX sometime for why we haven't managed to make it back to the moon or put a person on Mars. (it is complicated and there are quite a few discussions about these things over on the SpaceX sub-forum here on this site)

And this issue that they had with trying to figure out why the lighting was off ended up being because they forgot a very critical element which affected the lighting which was the guy taking the photograph (Neil). As soon as you had his shiny white spacesuit reflecting everything off it basically becoming a lightsource you get a really close computer image to the real photo.

Apollo11Comp_575px.jpg

Here is the side by side of the two images (in case you can't tell, the one on the right is the original, and the one on the left is the computer rendered version). The critical piece of proving whether or not it was a "hoax" shot was if you could see a well lit Astronaut about ready to jump off the lander. If the conspiracy theory was right in its "science" he would have been totally dark. Even without Neil's suit being a lightsource he was still pretty well lit in the render which should still safely disprove it. And besides, the core flaw in the assumption about their "science" about how light works was flawed given that light bounces off of practically everything...

Anyway, I just thought it was an interesting use of technology and a neat way to show off their new real-time lighting capabilities on the graphics cards. Hopefully we will start to see better, more natural looking light in video games.

Edit: Image source: AnandTech | The NVIDIA GeForce GTX 980 Review: Maxwell Mark 2 Which is itself a screen cap from the video.
 
Because there's no real need to return to the Moon.

Yes, and this explanation seemed reasonable until Bush announced a need:

"The idea behind returning to the moon will be to develop the capability to use it as a launch pad for deeper space exploration, as well as tapping resources on the lunar surface that could be used in those missions, Bush said. "Establishing an extended human presence on the moon could vastly reduce the cost of further space exploration, making possible ever more ambitious missions," he said.

Apparently we need to enlist the help of other nations too:

"We'll invite other nations to share the challenges and opportunities of this new era of discovery," he said. "The vision I've outlined today is a journey, not a race, and I call on other nations to join us on this journey, in the spirit of cooperation and friendship."

I'm no conspiracy theorist, however, the moon landing followed by a moon take off within three hours is a bit suspicious. The landing seems plausible, the take off, well, maybe. Just saying.
 
I'm no conspiracy theorist, however, the moon landing followed by a moon take off within three hours is a bit suspicious. The landing seems plausible, the take off, well, maybe. Just saying.

I'm sorry, I don't think I had heard this one before... are you suggesting that it would have taken longer than 3 hours to land on the moon, get out, walk around, collect some samples, hop back in, and take off? You can do A LOT in 3 hours if you are working efficiently and trying not to waste too much time "taking in the sights". They were on a very limited supply of air.
 
I'm sorry, I don't think I had heard this one before... are you suggesting that it would have taken longer than 3 hours to land on the moon, get out, walk around, collect some samples, hop back in, and take off? You can do A LOT in 3 hours if you are working efficiently and trying not to waste too much time "taking in the sights". They were on a very limited supply of air.

Haha, well they were taking pictures! I'm talking about prep time, it seems fast.

(EDIT: Though I believe it's most likely we did in fact land on the moon, there are questions and it's more than a little fun to read. Here's a good one, just for the entertainment value: http://listverse.com/2012/12/28/10-reasons-the-moon-landings-could-be-a-hoax/)
 
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Haha, well they were taking pictures! I'm talking about prep time, it seems fast.

(EDIT: Though I believe it's most likely we did in fact land on the moon, there are questions and it's more than a little fun to read. Here's a good one, just for the entertainment value: http://listverse.com/2012/12/28/10-reasons-the-moon-landings-could-be-a-hoax/)

Moon landing conspiracy theories - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Wikipedia has a better list (IMO) and also certainly gives much better refutations for the common claims.

I don't mind, I have spent countless hours being entertained by these theories, because most of them show how little these people actually know about different scientific things (like light).
 
I'm no conspiracy theorist, however, the moon landing followed by a moon take off within three hours is a bit suspicious. The landing seems plausible, the take off, well, maybe. Just saying.
I believe that they were on the moon for more than 24 hours, the EVA was about 3 hour.
And it was not easy getting to the moon in 1969... It was damn hard. I worked on it a little (very little) bit.
 
Yes, and this explanation seemed reasonable until Bush announced a need:

"The idea behind returning to the moon will be to develop the capability to use it as a launch pad for deeper space exploration, as well as tapping resources on the lunar surface that could be used in those missions, Bush said. "Establishing an extended human presence on the moon could vastly reduce the cost of further space exploration, making possible ever more ambitious missions," he said.

Apparently we need to enlist the help of other nations too:

If you've read this article, The Elon Musk interview on Mars colonisation – Ross Andersen – Aeon, then you know that Elon thinks the moon is too close to the Earth for space exploration and that Mars is much more suited for a "launch pad" place for going into deep space.
 
The big question is, if it was so easy to get to the moon (not to mention back to Earth) in 1969, why is it so difficult to go back today?
It's not hard, it just costs money. But we would rather spend all of our money (err... increase our debt) blowing up the Middle East. With the money we've wasted over there the last few decades we could have easily gone back to the moon, built a base there to test technologies we would use to build a base on Mars (but still be close enough to rescue the team if something went wrong), etc.

I just read an article about Peter Theil in Fortune and he makes some good points. There has been a serious lack of investment in "hard tech" in recent years. In my view it's due to the financialization of the economy and Wall Street not wanting to take any actual risks. There's a great quote from Peter in there, "We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters."
 
It's not hard, it just costs money. But we would rather spend all of our money (err... increase our debt) blowing up the Middle East. With the money we've wasted over there the last few decades we could have easily gone back to the moon, built a base there to test technologies we would use to build a base on Mars (but still be close enough to rescue the team if something went wrong), etc.

I just read an article about Peter Theil in Fortune and he makes some good points. There has been a serious lack of investment in "hard tech" in recent years. In my view it's due to the financialization of the economy and Wall Street not wanting to take any actual risks. There's a great quote from Peter in there, "We wanted flying cars, instead we got 140 characters."

I would put it as instant gratification and convenience beats the need for long term advancement and development. That is why Elon Musk is such a rare individual. He is willing to sacrifice short term gains for the long view, even past his own lifetime.

Back to the topic. Conspiracy theories come down to people with too much time on their hands focusing on minute details. In a way it is similar to political correctness. Sure when looked at under a microscope you can find the faults but in the big picture you need to move ahead in spite of the errors/minor faults...

This is the age of information and there are no secrets anymore. There is always someone willing to pass on information, especially for a buck or two. The President, arguably the most powerful man on the planet, couldn't keep his dalliance a secret in the Oval office. I had one crazy person thinking that SpaceX wasn't actually making resupply trips to the ISS. Utterly ridiculous when you truly reason it out.
 
The most convincing piece of "evidence" (to me anyway) that proves we did indeed land on the moon is actually what is completely absent from the argument. That is, if the moon landing was a hoax, why did the Russians never call us out on it? With their extensive network of spies, I'm sure they would have been absolutely delighted to point out to the rest of the world what a fraud it was.
 
I would put it as instant gratification and convenience beats the need for long term advancement and development. That is why Elon Musk is such a rare individual. He is willing to sacrifice short term gains for the long view, even past his own lifetime.
I think you're selling short the bulk of the human population. I don't this is rare. Perhaps that makes me an optimist.

What makes Musk rare is the combination of a lot of great qualities with few distasteful ones. I'm not a groupie (yet?), but I definitely respect him.
 
Ah, but what if the graphics card people are in on the conspiracy... :wink:

Seriously, the thing that pisses me off about these conspiracy theories is that they denigrate the enormous efforts and hard work of the thousands of brilliantly smart and resourceful people that got those few astronauts to the moon and back. With the technology of the '60s, this was an enormous undertaking, executed in a difficult time. Hats of to all those that worked on the program.
 
Ah, but what if the graphics card people are in on the conspiracy... :wink:

Seriously, the thing that pisses me off about these conspiracy theories is that they denigrate the enormous efforts and hard work of the thousands of brilliantly smart and resourceful people that got those few astronauts to the moon and back. With the technology of the '60s, this was an enormous undertaking, executed in a difficult time. Hats of to all those that worked on the program.
Ok, devil's advocate time.

Another way to look at it as this:
brianman alternative viewpoint said:
Seriously, the thing that brightens my day about these conspiracy theories is that they show extreme respect for the enormous efforts and hard work of the thousands of brilliantly smart and resourceful people that got those few astronauts to the moon and back. With the technology of the '60s, this was an enormous undertaking, executed in a difficult time. Hats of to all those that worked on the program. In their own way these conspiracy theorists are saying, "The results are so impressive that I honestly just can't believe it."
 
The most convincing piece of "evidence" (to me anyway) that proves we did indeed land on the moon is actually what is completely absent from the argument. That is, if the moon landing was a hoax, why did the Russians never call us out on it? With their extensive network of spies, I'm sure they would have been absolutely delighted to point out to the rest of the world what a fraud it was.

What about the thousands of people that watched a huge rocket blast out of the atmosphere? Or the tens of thousands of people that built the rockets? Or the couple dozen astronauts that would need to lie for their entire lives just to maintain the lie? Absolutely absurd. No better than the 9/11 conspiracy BS. Or aliens watching us and kidnapping us. The KISS principle says that all of it is a waste of time. It makes for fun plots to movies but is pure fantasy.
 
What about the thousands of people that watched a huge rocket blast out of the atmosphere? Or the tens of thousands of people that built the rockets? Or the couple dozen astronauts that would need to lie for their entire lives just to maintain the lie? Absolutely absurd. No better than the 9/11 conspiracy BS. Or aliens watching us and kidnapping us. The KISS principle says that all of it is a waste of time. It makes for fun plots to movies but is pure fantasy.

So the originations (whether the current guys want to admit this or not) is that there was a lingering group of Flat-Earthers that was under the belief that not only was the world flat but that every launch was staged but the pictures taken of a curved earth was all fakes. We didn't launch anything outside our upper atmosphere. There is a book that is pretty much the source of all this released like a year or two after we started shooting stuff into the sky.

It took on a life of its own but that is the basis for it. So their belief is that the government is so coordinated and able to keep secrets that it was all a huge plot to deceive the people.

Most modern theorists would not subscribe to their own roots of course and so you get varying degrees of disbelief but the most current prevailing belief is that we didn't make it to the moon with humans (we successfully made it with unmanned things but not manned) and it was all a cold war ploy to make the Russians believe we were better than them which is why the Russians never came out and called it a hoax because they too were successfully deceived by our amazing government that has the well oiled master plan of deception going on...

This is of course the same people that also are against the government because they can figure out how to spend money properly and are upset because the government is so disorganized... Ironic, I know...

- - - Updated - - -

So yeah, Saturn V never actually sent people into space, it was all a coverup... They launched empty unmanned rockets and faked all the photos and videos... And that is why there were a bunch of mysterious deaths of people working on the program because they were about to come out and tell the world the truth... So they were silenced.

(Not my belief... Of course)