Moon Hoax Debate at IMDB - Capricon One

[ajv]

Having just watched Capricon One again I visited the IMDB to check what they thought of it.

I noticed that Our Man in Utah has been having a recent debate on that message board.

[JayUtah]

Yes, the thread with the religious zealot seems to have burned itself out. However, the thread with "thegame-1" seems to be rewarding. He's scratching his head over some of the conspiracy beliefs. I've invited him here, as he doesn't want to clutter up IMDB with an ongoing debate (a laudable policy). So please treat him as a reasonable enquirer if he drops in.

[AGN Fuel]

Yes, the thread with the religious zealot seems to have burned itself out. However, the thread with "thegame-1" seems to be rewarding. He's scratching his head over some of the conspiracy beliefs. I've invited him here, as he doesn't want to clutter up IMDB with an ongoing debate (a laudable policy). So please treat him as a reasonable enquirer if he drops in.

It is very nice to see someone take on board all of the information that you supply, Jay, and re-examine his ideas in the light of it.

It is to reach folk such as thegame-1 that this board is so important.

[Bob B.]

However, the thread with "thegame-1" seems to be rewarding. He's scratching his head over some of the conspiracy beliefs. I've invited him here, as he doesn't want to clutter up IMDB with an ongoing debate (a laudable policy). So please treat him as a reasonable enquirer if he drops in.

I read through some of the posts and it looks like you were making real good progress with thegame-1. However, the last post I read (by peteandsam) was a real winner: it was a hoax because American hasn't boasted enough about the accomplishment for it to have been real. Sheeesh!! :roll:

[JayUtah]

It takes a lot of courage to change one's mind publicly, especially after having been an advocate.

[Levitate]

Jay, I'm amazed at your patience with these people sometimes. Even though you certainly didn't seem too happy with the religious zealot, you kept things pretty well decent there. I think a lot of people would have degenerated into name calling out of frustration, heh.

But it is kind of refreshing to see a moon hoax believer actually listen to the things you said and actually start to reconsider his position...I've lurked around here and other places for awhile and seen many of these debates and it seems like most of them come down to the HBs purposefully ignoring any evidence contrary to their opinion. It's kind of maddening really...they present something as "evidence", receive a refutation of that, and then sometimes just ignore it completely and continue making the same claim. Not even bothering to debate the issue any more...it's amazing, kind of.

Anyways...I'm thankful for all the work people like you do in regards to this...I remember watching that Fox special back in the day and not believing the claims but not having any knowledge of how to refute them. Then you find stuff like badastronomy or clavius and there you go...good stuff

[ajv]

Welcome to the board.

[Gillianren]

first, Jay, thank you. sure, that weird Krishna guy (definitely ESL) said it, but I'm pretty sure he was being sarcastic. seriously, from me, thank you for making our lives better.

second . . . man, you're my hero. I couldn't have held that discussion (can't call it a debate, really) even if I had far greater technical knowledge than I do, simply because my eyes kept crossing when I tried to read what he had to say. instead, I skipped his entries and read yours, because you, O faithful Jay, quoted anything relevant.

third, do all cultures have the same pattern for Sunday, Monday, and Saturday? no? I didn't think so. anyway, he never offered proof of that. (and he couldn't have--didn't the Mayans have a ten-day week?)

[Levitate]

Welcome to the board.

thanks

third, do all cultures have the same pattern for Sunday, Monday, and Saturday? no? I didn't think so. anyway, he never offered proof of that. (and he couldn't have--didn't the Mayans have a ten-day week?)

maybe i'm missing something here, but let's see...wasn't the general gist of this idea something like the number of days matches the number of planets plus the moon and not including the earth, and pluto, or something...i don't know? :-? and then there was the vague connection between sun and sunday, moon and monday...saturday and saturn? i wasn't quite sure where he was going with that...any clues? i don't see why that's important...names for days are pretty much arbitrary really...they could have named them anything, how does that prove crazy theories about the moon being a planet and "above the sun". maybe something is getting lost on me in the translation...

[The Supreme Canuck]

You're absolutely right. The names of the days of the week have nothing to do with anything. Sunday is named for the Saxon Sun god, Monday is named for the Saxon Moon god, and Saturday is named for the Roman god Saturn. But it means nothing. Tuesday is named for the Nordic god Tyr, Wednesday is named for the god Odin, Thursday is named for the god Thor, and Friday is named for the goddess Frige.

The days of the week have no more to do with astronomical bodies than these gods do. So the guy is clearly wrong.

Welcome to the board.

[JayUtah]

I think the Hare Krishnas believe that the moon is actually farther away than the sun. You have to throw out orbital mechanics altogether to make their cosmology work, but that's not really the point. The gist of invoking the day names was to point out that "Sun"-day comes before "Mo[o]n"-day, and therefore the sun must come before the moon in some global cosmic order.

But as I pointed out and has been pointed out by others here, there is no rhyme or reason to the naming of days, nor would there necessarily be any significance to their order. The notion of a week, the notion of where that week begins and how many days it has, and the naming and/or numbering of those days, and the origins of those names have too many convolutions to be meaningful, and hold only for English.

Only two of the seven days exhibit an order "helpful" to the case. This is the fallacy of limited scope. That is, if you propose an explanation to account for a feature of a set of data, that explanation must hold for all or most of the data, not just a small subset. The smaller the subset, the greater the chance your proposed feature or correlation is merely coincidence.

[PhantomWolf]

I think the Hare Krishnas believe that the moon is actually farther away than the sun.

That must make explaining solar eclipses really fun.

[Van Rijn]

Interesting. I didn't know about Hare Krishnas. I did know that in English and some of the more Germanic related languages, days are mostly named after a mix of Norse and Roman gods. In Spanish and and some other more latin related languages, they are mostly named after Roman gods - starting from Tuesday (Martes/Mars), Wednesday (Miercoles/Mercury), Thursday (Jueves/Jupiter), Friday (Viernes/Venus), and of course Saturn's day.

Monday works in both mythologies, as for Sunday and more details, look here:

http://www.pantheon.org/miscellaneous/origin_days.html

[PhantomWolf]

Tuesday is named for the Nordic god Tyr

starting from Tuesday (Martes/Mars)

Actually according to my Oxford Dictionary, Tuesday was named after the Germanic god, Tīw, their equivalent of Rome's Mars and Greek's Ares.

[Van Rijn]

Actually according to my Oxford Dictionary, Tuesday was named after the Germanic god, Tīw, their equivalent of Rome's Mars and Greek's Ares.

Tiw and Tyr are slight name variations on the same god, his story was revised over time:

http://www.pantheon.org/articles/t/tyr.html?esc

[PhantomWolf]

bah humbug, it's harder keeping track of pagan gods than Days of Our Lives.

[AstroSmurf]

Interestingly, in Japanese the theme seems to be the elements (though not the classical greek ones):

Monday: 月曜日 : Moon-day
Tuesday: 火曜日 : Fire-day
Wednesday: 水曜日 : Water-day
Thursday: 木曜日 : Wood-day
Friday: 金曜日 : Gold/metal-day
Saturday: 土曜日 : Earth-day
Sunday: 日曜日 : Sun-day

This is also interesting since the Japanese picked up the whole idea of a seven-day week from the Europeans, but seem to have found their own take on it.

And in Swedish, Saturday is "Lördag" which I've been taught means laundry day

[TriangleMan]

This website discusses an older Japanese calendar system which didn't use seven days to a week. IIRC pre-14th century the Japanese calendar didn't have weeks, only days and months, so they would use "24th day of X month" rather than an equivalent of "last Wednesday".

[Levitate]

The gist of invoking the day names was to point out that "Sun"-day comes before "Mo[o]n"-day, and therefore the sun must come before the moon in some global cosmic order.

yeah that's what i figured but also couldn't quite figure why he was throwing Saturday (Saturn) into the equation as well...to say Saturn is the next furthest out after the moon? :-? dunno, oh well, no big deal i guess...

[jrkeller]

Weekday name origins found here.

I'm sure there are other sites.

[Van Rijn]

Weekday name origins found here.

I'm sure there are other sites.

Yup, such as the one I mentioned previously:

http://www.pantheon.org/miscellaneous/origin_days.html

AstroSmurf, TriangleMan, thanks for the info on the Japanese systems. Trivia, certainly, but interesting trivia.

[Eta C]

I think the Hare Krishnas believe that the moon is actually farther away than the sun. You have to throw out orbital mechanics altogether to make their cosmology work, but that's not really the point. The gist of invoking the day names was to point out that "Sun"-day comes before "Mo[o]n"-day, and therefore the sun must come before the moon in some global cosmic order.

(snip) the origins of those names have too many convolutions to be meaningful, and hold only for English.

Indeed. In many other European languages "Sunday" becomes "Lord's Day" (Domingo in Spanish, Kyriaki in Greek, and so on). In Greek, most of the other days are simply numbered, so Monday is Devteri (Second) Tuesday is Triti (Third) and so on. Hard to get very cosmic about that.

[earendur]

The names of the days of the week have nothing to do with anything. Sunday is named for the Saxon Sun god, Monday is named for the Saxon Moon god, and Saturday is named for the Roman god Saturn. But it means nothing. Tuesday is named for the Nordic god Tyr, Wednesday is named for the god Odin, Thursday is named for the god Thor, and Friday is named for the goddess Frige.

The days of the week have no more to do with astronomical bodies than these gods do.

Well, no, the names of the days of the week have a lot to do with both the gods and the astronomical bodies.

Working backwards through time, the Anglo-Saxons adopted the seven day week and the names of the days from the Romans (somewhat indirectly). The Roman week was Saturn Day, Sun Day, Moon Day, Mars Day, Mercury Day, Jupiter Day, and Venus Day; all named for Roman gods. The A-S's understood the Sun and the Moon and kept those names. They didn't know Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, and Venus, but they had gods of their own that were pretty similar: Tiw, Woden, Thor, and Freya (all A-S gods, not Norse). They didn't have a god similar to Saturn, so they retained that name as well.

Why did the Romans use those names? Because those gods were their equivalents of the gods the Greeks associated with the days. And where did the Greeks get the names? From the "planets".

Remember, to the ancient Greeks, a "planet" was just any body visible in the sky that moved relative to the "fixed" stars. Thus, to the ancient Greeks, the moon and the sun were planets.

If you list the seven "planets" known to the ancients in the order of decreasing speed with which they move relative to the stars, they are: Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon.

There are twenty-four hours in a day (this was true even in ancient times). Start with the first planet on the list and associate it with the first hour of the first day. Then associate the second planet with the second hour, and so on. Keep going until you have associated the twenty-fourth hour of the seventh day with a planet. You get:

Hour Planet
1 Saturn
2 Jupiter
3 Mars
4 Sun
5 Venus
6 Mercury
7 Moon
8 Saturn
9 Jupiter
etc.

If you now look at which planet is associated with the first hour of each day, you find they are Saturn, Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus. This is exactly the order in which the days are named.

--earendur

[publiusr]

That movie (Capricorn One) is what started on the moonshot hoax-hoax crud to start with.

I really hated that movie.

[The Supreme Canuck]

earendur:

I think you may have misunderstood my point. You are correct that the days are named after gods (and related planets), but I was saying that, while this is true, it obviously does not prove what the person on the IMDB board was claiming. There is just no relation to what the guy is saying.

[JayUtah]

That movie (Capricorn One) is what started on the moonshot hoax-hoax crud to start with.

Gave it impetus, surely, but did not originate it. The astronauts have said hoax claims were going around even in 1969. And Bill Kaysing's book appeared in 1974. The movie isn't the origin of the hoax theory. Some people have argued that a scene from the 1971 Diamonds Are Forever alludes to a hoax theory -- the scene where 007 runs through a simulated lunar environment complete with space-suitded astronauts. But it is not clear whether this was intended to be a fake moon set or merely a training facility.

I really hated that movie.

Aside from the subject matter, I thought Sam Watterson was great in it.

[SpitfireIX]

I really hated that movie.

Aside from the subject matter, I thought Sam Watterson was great in it.

I thought the helicopters were cool; I also liked a lot of the characters (including Sam Waterston). I was 13 when my mom took my brothers and me to see it; I remember even at that age, though, I knew that the idea of using Apollo hardware for a Mars mission was ridiculous.