Moon Hoax Debate - The Radiation Issue

[Arouet]

Ok, so this is an offshoot from this thread: viewtopic.php?f=12&t=1496

The topic of this thread is to just discuss the radiation issue in the moon hoax debate. That is: Do concerns about radiation poisoning, particularly from the area that has been called the Van Allen belt make it implausible that the astronauts went to the moon as alleged by NASA, given that none seem to have suffered from serious radiation effects.

This is to be a no-insult thread and I'll ask Ninja to delete portions of posts from either side of the debate that contain such insults (if you could leave the substantive part that would be great - maybe just add a {portions removed for violating thread rules] in place of the deleted portion). That is: no calling people pseudoskeptics, or paranoid, or delusional, or closed-minded, or not worth talking to. The idea is to try to have an actual, mature discussion, and perhaps even come to a resolution on this one issue (might be wishful thinking! But we can dream, right?). I'll also ask Ninja to move posts dealing with other aspects of the moon hoax debate over to the main thread.

Also: while I'm not going to say don't post videos, I would suggest trying to rely primarily on written sources that we can all access for free on the net. It makes it much easier to discuss. Also, please try and source your material. Don't just make a claim that such and such is possible or not, or true or not, without posting your reasons for believing that. If you're relying on someone else, cite the source and link to the original material.

Ninja has offered to move the relevant posts over on the other thread over to this one, so I'll let her do that then we can continue the discussion.

I'll set out my background on this topic from the get-go: I have not researched this topic in depth in the past. I believe in general that man did go to the moon, but I'm open to looking at the evidence against it. But I want to do so in a structured way, as I've described in the posts that Ninja is about to move over.

This is an experiment to see what we can achieve as a forum. It it works, we can try it out on other subtopics of this debate, or on other topics entirely.

If it fails - oh well! It's worth a try I think!

[The23rdman]

I commend you for having a go. I'll be interested to see where this leads, so good luck.

[NinjaPuppy]

Arouet - On this one, I'll let you decide what goes and stays. To make it simple, just use red font in any standard reply for deletions and I'll take it from there. That way you can keep the conversation flowing. No need to give instructions, just use red font.

Also, you will need to give a clue as to what you want moved 'here' from 'there' (where?).

[ProfWag]

Kudos to arouet for wanting to examine this subject logically.

As for the radiation belts, the following is from the Health Physics Society:

"The radiation levels were too low to be lethal. Astronauts on Apollo missions were exposed to radiation from the Van Allen belts (trapped particles) and the galactic cosmic ray (GCR) background. There were no solar particle events of any significance during these missions; hence, there were no dose accumulations from them. Radiation exposures for the transits through the trapped belts were kept very low by transiting quickly through them. Since the Apollo mission lengths were only a week or two, there were also no significant accumulations of radiation dose from the GCR background. Thus doses were well below thresholds for any measurable radiation effects, including lethality. Average exposures to Apollo crews measured by onboard dosimetry were 4.1 mGy (0.41 rad) absorbed dose and 12 mSv (1.2 rem) dose equivalent for the mission duration."

Larry Townsend, PhD
http://hps.org/publicinformation/ate/q753.html

Now, I guess we could believe what Mr. Jarrah White says (albeit in 3rd person) or we can believe what an organization who specializes in radiation actually says. Personally, I vote for Dr. Townsend.

[NinjaPuppy]

[ProfWag]

[Arouet]

[really?]

[NinjaPuppy]

[Arouet]

[Arouet]

[Arouet]

[Arouet]

[Arouet]

[Arouet]