Alas, photographs – any photographs – can be faked, and there are plenty of articles which show this about the "fly-by pictures," as well.

Believe me, I wish that the 1969 stories were true!

Unfortunately, it's not just about the Van Allen belts: it's about everything out there that is beyond them, when there is no magnetosphere to deflect the so-called "solar wind." This is a stream of particles and radiation so hellishly intense that it not only powers the auroras on our planet, but on Jupiter and Saturn, as well. (An unknown-billion number of watts of electrical power.) The Van Allen belts are merely a small accumulation of what is out there. We do not yet(!) have the technical capability to enable an astronaut, or a human-carrying spacecraft, to survive this torrent. We can do "low Earth orbit," and that's it so far. All of our space exploration, space stations and so-forth have been kept well within the boundaries of the magnetosphere. Today, we have no other choice.

And my very simple concern is that we nonetheless pretend that going to the Moon, or beyond, is "no big deal," as though we had already done it – and done it routinely – back in the 70's. It is a "big deal," and I don't want to see brave astronauts dying because of our national hubris and because we also lied to them. If we send them out there beyond the magnetosphere using the technology that we have today, that is what's going to happen to them, and it happen very quickly but also very gruesomely and very, very publicly. This is not acceptable. It's one thing to tell a great big lie. It's an altogether different thing to kill astronauts because of it.

Start by admitting that we haven't actually solved these problems. Confess the truth, in order to finally get the Big Lie out of the way of actual progress. We need many solutions and technologies that we do not have ... and, to get them, we must first admit that we never did. We must present all of the information that we have or can get about the conditions, even though these data clearly reveal that humans cannot (and therefore, never could have) survived there. We're doing nothing for no one by dancing-around and trying to perpetrate the Big Lie. All of this nonsense is standing squarely in the way of: achieving it.

After all, it's a great big three-letter word: "Yet!!"

I want to see us begin with man-sized robotic probes that can walk. We already explore the depths of the ocean using unmanned probes (except when millionaires want to take a dare), and this should be the first step of "landing on the Moon." Construct a spacecraft filled, not with human beings, but with robots and radiation detectors. Using this equipment, attempt a genuine, verifiable, "there and back again" round-trip mission including re-entry. In other words, "every single thing except for the humans." And, instead of arrogantly making it "a United States project," make it an international effort. Stream the data in real time on the Internet, no matter what the data might be. Repeat the entire mission not just once but several times, including at times when the "blast jet" of solar wind directly coincides with the flight path. I'm willing to see our government – and, others – invest billions of dollars in that, so long as human astronauts are not involved ...

... "Yet!!"

(P.S.: The robotics would have to be partially self-sufficient due to the fact that radio signals take about 2.5 seconds to make the round-trip to the Moon and back ... a point conveniently forgotten by NASA in the Apollo recordings.) (also here) And please, let's not talk about supposed hours of audio editing. I heard it, coming right out of my parent's black-and-white TV. Knowing about the speed of light and able to do the math, I actually asked my Dad that same question at the time. "How come they're answering each other so quickly?" He looked thoughtful, but didn't answer. NASA was unbelievably careless. It was as if they simply assumed that no one would ever question what they "saw and heard."

Face it, Gentlemen, the "Big Lie" has been exposed. We need to move beyond it, if we're actually going to stand on the Moon – much less any other planet.

Intelligent design is not a conspiracy..it is just a debate.
Otherwise watch this https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mXAM-KGN7XU

It isn't even a real debate. It's just a mix of pseudo science and bad theology. http://www.hrussman.entadsl.com/ramb...nt_design.html

@ sundialsvcs - Since you seem fond of what used to be termed "The Natural Science" or "Philosophy" let me try to appeal to that side of you with a quote from David Hume

and another from good 'ol Ben

I have posted both of these as it seems a balance between the two is prudent. That said, when "book learnin'" conflicts with the reality of actual observation, of experience, the odds are heavily in favor of the empirical. Only misinterpretation of that observed data mitigates it's position as "trump card". Even when theory is utterly solid, it can be misinterpreted or mis-applied by people.

Consider Phlogiston whose theory was based on observation (and lasted over 100 years) combined with speculation. One of the fundamental supporting observations was that almost all materials lose weight when burned, signifying some invisible substance was "lost". Once it was proved that many metals gain weight when burned the obit writing was on the wall but it took more than 50 years before Phlogiston was demoted from Fact, through Principal, to utterly mistaken and False.

It may seem circumstantial that, as 273 and I have pointed out, the Russians at the time of Apollo had a heavily invested interest in the US failing to gain back the lead in space exploration, yet they had no viable choice when faced with the evidence they gathered themselves that the Apollo Landing was indeed an accomplished fact. When your opponent begrudgingly admits he is beaten that is a powerful indication that he considered it more difficult and costly to spin the evidence and deny! deny! deny! than to concede defeat. You may remember Nikita Khruschev's famous shoe pounding and declaration that Russia would "wave bye-bye" to the US and "bury you" to recall just how invested they were in their early successes. They had to come to terms with the provably true or look foolish. There is likely a lesson to be learned there.

However that was circa 1970. We are now nearly 50 years, a half century, in the future from that point and technology is at the fore of what has changed most. That technology has not only culminated in such items as the Solar Dynamics Laboratory (launched seven years ago) but also in Lunar Orbiters from more than one nation that have taken photos of the Apollo Landing Site, one of which I linked in my previous post.

At this rate in less than 20 years any coverup or fakery from 1969 will be completely exposed for even the Man in the Street to take completely for granted as it will be such a given. Given your conclusion of "Fake!" how long do you suppose NASA expected to be able to get away with such a fraud? Do you suppose it would never come to light? If you don't take that hardline position what do you imagine their plan was/is to deal with the distrust when it does or did come to light? Please do not imagine this reaction would be greeted with apathy and quickly disappear to back pages. Questionable behaviour is one thing but KNOWING a respected government agency lied, and not some little fib, but a massive global deception, would be the end of NASA altogether. Anything taking it's place, if that were even possible, would be vastly different. Do you truly imagine NASA was prepared to risk it's very survival over even a beloved president's dream?

It just makes no good sense and once again, objective even negative data sources have confirmed that despite any theoretical obstacles, real or imagined, it DID happen. It is an accomplished fact.

BTW while big numbers like "untold billions of watts of electrical power" sounds impressive and daunting it is a diffuse field without a travel path and not only is that value vastly diminished in localized sizes of Apollo, but even in cases where such impressive amounts of power are actually available such as a man working on power lines carrying in excess of 50,000 volts, he is in no danger without a path for current to flow.

You once mentioned your problem with Carl Sagan's all too famous (and apparently, infamous) use of "billions and billions" so let me again point out the problem all humans have with very large numbers we can spout off so glibly. The problem is one of Frame of Reference. Try to recall every waking moment of even the past week and you realize that it would take another week in which to actually do that unless we compress hours into mere moments.

It is theorized that an asteroid roughly 6 miles in diameter wiped out the dinosaurs 65 Million years ago and the evidence keeps growing to support this BUT did that occur 64,535,473 years ago or 65,379,863 years ago and on what day in what week of what month? Our frame of reference is so limited it is impossible to imagine a 6 mile diameter object greater than the mass of Mt Everest coming in at vastly supersonic speeds knowing that at one moment the leading edge was just touching the ocean while the trailing age is still brushing the lower limits of the Stratosphere.

Now realize that light can travel around the Earth nearly eight times in a single second, yet it takes over 8 of those seconds to get here from our Sun. By comparison, it is difficult for anyone to really grasp the ~3000 mile distance from NYC to LA. How good is that grasp of the Earth's circumference? of 6 times that circumference? and then 8 times that?

If you set out right now in 2017 to drive to Pluto driving non-stop (no sleeping, no gasoline, coffee, pee breaks, tire changes or engine overhauls) 24/7 averaging 100 mph you can expect to arrive there sometime in the year 6017. Space is a VERY big place and 93,000,000 miles away from our Sun the amount of energy at the Earth is greatly diffused and at the infintessimally small locality of the size of Apollo it is rare that amount of energy is a "deal breaker" even for technology circa 1969.

The evidence is actually overwhelming and you continuing to be "that kind of sceptic" only makes you appear foolish, and rightfully so, and tends to poison all your better instances of critical thinking, substantially reducing your credibility.

I did not mean to imply that a spacecraft would be electrocuted by the Aurora: space shuttles passed through it all the time.

Rather – the streams of ionized particles and radiation that stream away from El Sol are so powerful that they induce these massive currents when they encounter Earth's magnetic field. Deep space is full of radiation. The surface of the Moon has been on the receiving end of this stream and is also therefore highly radioactive.

The "moon rocks" that were returned by Apollo – had they not turned out to be petrified wood – would also have been intensely radioactive.

The list goes on. And if you want to "believe everything that Your Government tells you," without questioning anything they say in support of what they told you ... then you are entitled to do that!

Or, why not take the "Apollo challenge?" We still have Saturn V rockets. The assembly building and the launch pad are there. We can grab an Apollo capsule and lander from any museum. Likewise actual space suits. We can even find a box of Tang someplace. The mission-control center in Houston is still there. Since "lunar landings" had become so routine by the late 1970s that they no longer made the news, why don't we "do it again?" We should be ready in no time at all. Why, we could probably be ready to blast-off on the 4th of July, 2017 if we hurry, and the sooner the better. Using exactly the same technology as we did then, but with everyone watching this time ... "just go there, again." Bring your slide rules and your golf clubs. Bring a large magnesium flare and set it off on the lunar surface, creating a blast of light that can be seen plainly from Earth. Then blast off again and sail home, having forever proved your detractors wrong. If NASA spent $40 billion in 1960's Dollars doing it "routinely," then this "one last huzzah" should be positively no big deal and it should require very little preparation. After all, all of the 1960's technology was developed and paid-for in the 1960's and we are going to use exactly that technology, leaving four weeks from today. Why, you could even volunteer to be one of the astronauts.

As I said earlier, denial of the risks, done only to perpetrate the myth that Apollo was real, is the worst thing that could happen to future manned missions. We are trying to understand the radiation environment and to find ways of making astronauts safe in that turns-out-to-be hellish place called The Moon ... but there's a problem: any "official data" must not "contradict Apollo." And that could kill a lot of innocent astronauts.

If you haven't watched all the clips on aulis.com, and many of them are quite short, you should do so. One of my very-favorites is this one which busts Mythbusters. (The 30-second video at the bottom of the page reveals the obvious-when-you-see it trick that MB used to add light into their picture. It happens four to six seconds in ...)

Again, why did the then CCCP and, now, Japan (amongst others) conspire in this?

There are various suggestions on that, but remember, this was the United States' little show, and no other nation with actual space capability saw any reason to play a part in it. They knew what was and wasn't possible – why pretend otherwise, even if the US has chosen to do so?

If they did spill the beans, the US government would ensure that no newspaper or television station in the country ever carried it. And in any case, why bother? You would not be believed. The most-jingoistic Government on Earth has just claimed that it routinely did the impossible, and that's precisely what its citizens wanted to believe. What good would it do you to try to mess-up their show? Especially, as has been suggested, you could use "the promise to keep your mouth shut" as a bargaining chip.

The Russians made no attempt to enter a "space race." They focused on a few more low-orbital missions and they also sent unmanned probes, including some meant to recover lunar material. They never picked-up the "moon landing" gauntlet that had been dropped at their feet by the Americans. No one did.

I asked why they would conspire in this.
There are many nations with the capability to disprove the claims yet they continue not to do so. Why?

I'm not a scientist or photographer, but in those side-to-side comparison pictures, something is wrong. The focus is completely different between the attempt at recreation and the original taken from the moon.

Why bother?

The concern is the lighting. If you presume that the only source of light in the picture is "the sun, thousands of miles away, in the total vacuum of space on the lunar surface," there is too much light in all the wrong places. (Quite literally, "it is too good to be true.") The Mythbusters™ who claimed to "bust the myth" resorted to a very simple trick that they made no attempt to conceal, even as they also shrewdly did not call attention to it: one of them was wearing a white jacket, and the other one was not. As the Russian photographers proceeded to demonstrate, this was enough to provide the necessary "fill light."

- - -
Unfortunately, as I see NASA (and maybe, other government agencies) going to greater and greater lengths to "prove Apollo, at all costs," I become more and more alarmed. The purpose of the agency is to let us "boldly go where no man has gone before," even though this statement does not yet involve starships. And, necessarily, everything about that mission must be based, above all else, upon absolute truth and scrupulous integrity, for the protection of our bold astronauts.

Quite frankly, as I see them going to ever-more extraordinary measures to preserve a thing that I personally witnessed, and that I now earnestly believe to be false, their integrity disappears with it. And this, to me, "is completely unacceptable" also. I hold my space-exploration agency to a higher standard than, apparently, they themselves do.

As I said: "Step one ... a probe filled with human-sized walking robots." You have already sent a probe "beyond Poor Pluto." You have sampled Venus and Mars. The Moon will be comparatively easy. Don't(!) put human lives at risk "for your damned-fool pride!" Instead, stay focused on the prize: "safely identifying the actual obstacles, as they actually are, and seeking a safe way to solve them while the brave astronauts who might one day face them, until then, remain safe."

"Screw(!) your agency's so-called 'pride!'"

Because, at the time of the landings, the propaganda value of proving the US Government to be liars on that scale would have been immense. I won't go as far as to suggest that the US would loose allies because of it but it certainly wouldn't have helped them in the Cold War.
As to contemporary governments and scientists: Have you any idea how the US government is seen outside of the US? Have you any idea what scientists do and how they work?

Holy Canoli Batman! Look. Whatever evidence you bring to bear on the lighting in photographs (especially short of going there and actually doing it for comparison) , what don't you get about the fact that you are second guessing and interpreting mere possibilities? There is no room for interpretation of lasers bouncing off of reflectors placed precisely on the moon's surface. The reflectors are there as a sweeping burst reveals the diffuse pattern (albedo) anyone and everyone gets off the regolith and a sudden and precise spike when dead center of the reflectors is hit. Given the geometry of retroreflectors it is essential they be placed in a precise fashion with little room for error. Machines could not have done that in 1969. It would be highly risky even today. It took a human to place them so. Furthermore their location was made public. In fact here they are

--- Wikipedia - List of RetroReflectors Placed on the Moon ---

Whatever anyone imagines might be the cause of what some perceive as lighting anomalies possibly leading to a conclusion of fakery is completely trumped by the verifiable existence of the retroreflectors. End of story since that cannot be faked. If you disagree then please FINALLY address this issue and tell us how you imagine that could be faked.

For argument sake let me declare that presently I have high confidence that no aliens have ever visited Planet Earth. UFOs, IMHO, are exactly that - Unidentified and almost certainly natural and not alien spacecraft. I'd bet my life savings on that. You could show me photos by the score and that might intrigue me but it would prove nothing and I'd rightfully keep my savings. However if you took me aboard one, introduced me to the pilot and we flew to the Moon and back, waving at the boys on the Space Station along the way, I'd have little choice but to believe alien spacecraft are likely real and happily hand over my bank account. That is the hierarchy of evidence we are discussing here. Kindly stop theorizing about the less objective stuff and move on to the hardcore, please.

At the time ... and, I was there ... I'm not so sure. Remember, at that time, "the world was a big place, and each government controlled its citizen's perspectives of everyone else, everywhere else." There was no way for <<The Russians>> even to communicate with the American people, let alone "directly." And, the American people were very happily believing that John Kennedy's dream had come true. Even if you could do so, what good would it do you to "piss in Mr. Jingo's swimming pool?" Absolutely none.

... especially if it might be turned into a bargaining chip.

Our present perspective of "a very small, interconnected planet" i-s an artifact of: "High-Speed Internet!" Trying to compare it to a time when no such of a thing existed – or even could be contemplated, except by enlightened science-fiction writers – is complete folly.

At the time, the message could not have been presented, and even if presented it would never have been believed. "Russians" were still the faceless things about which we all must Duck and Cover 2, because "Uncle Walter" told us that "that's the way it is," ... and we all believed him ... and, that was that.

This is the political environment in which NASA planned all that they did. They never looked fifty years into the future. Nor could they ever have predicted the actual future, if they had.

"International(!) discussion forums?" Inconceivable!

Actually the political environment had become blase if not hostile. Nixon's obvious self-serving plug ("This has to be the most historic phone call ever made..." ) was viewed askance by the public since they felt he was trying to piggyback if not steal the limelight altogether. He gained zero political leverage from that and since Agnew was appointed as overseer on the newly formed Space Task Group it was little wonder that not only was Von Braun's plan to send men to Mars by 1982 scrapped, his Apollo was also abandoned (too German) and he was consigned to a no account desk job which he left within two years, exactly as politcos and some military hoped. You may recall some of Agnew's many nasty remarks about "the intelligencia" as "effete intellectual snobs" and "nattering nabobs of negativism". That he was appointed to such a position speaks volumes about how much the Fed, especially Republicans, wished to yank the reins on NASA in particular and Science in general.

NASA may not have been looking 50 years into the future but for a time they were looking 20-30 years into the future, a future that included moving forward to the degree that Mars was but a decade+ away. They fully expected their publicity to be scrutinized up close and personal. Incidentally Von Braun's Mars Project borrowed heavily from Boeing's proposal for Mars from 1969. It was not only government agencies that were heavily invested in the truth about Manned Spaceflight.