David Bowdley 2003 Phys. Educ. 38 406 doi:10.1088/0031-9120/38/5/304
David Bowdley
Show affiliationsMany people believe that NASA could have faked the evidence showing that man landed on the Moon in 1969. Some opinion polls suggest that as many as 10-25% of the United States population also agree that there is the possibility that this could have happened. Numerous magazines, journals, websites and TV programmes now present the facts as understood by the hoax proponents in startling reality and the National Aeronautics and Space Administration in the US (NASA) has in the past provided little response to the ever increasing number of accusations. Whether NASA did or did not land men on the Moon in the late 1960s is irrelevant to the amount of good science and astronomy that can be got from studying the evidence in favour of or against the hoax theory. Presented here are some ideas for how the arguments for and against this popular conspiracy theory can be used to good effect in teaching some basic principles of physics.
96.20.Dt Features, landmarks, mineralogy, petrology, and atmosphere
Issue 5 ( 1 September 2003)
Received 3 July 2003
David Bowdley 2003 Phys. Educ. 38 406
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