"LANDING ON THE MOON TRUE OR FALSE", "WAS THE LANDING ON THE MOON A MYSTIFICATION?" - THIS IS THIS TIP FROM GOOGLE WHEN WE ASK HIM ABOUT THE APOLLO 11 MISSION. MYTH EVER LIVING ...
HOW TO FIGHT AGAINST Conspiracy Theories, IF EVERY EXPLANATION OF PROFESSIONALS HAS OBJECTS AND MORE MYTHS? WHAT DID BUZZ ALDRIN HAS BEEN TAKEN BY A MAN WHO DIDN'T BELIEVE IN THE MOON LANDING? CAN THE MYTHS BE EFFECTIVELY BULLED SO THAT PEOPLE WILL READ / WATCH / LISTEN TO US?
TODAY, THE ENTRY IS A LITTLE UNUSUAL, BECAUSE I WOULD LIKE TO TAKE A LOOK AT NOT ALL THE CONTRACTUAL THEORIES ABOUT THE LANDING ON THE MOON, BUT A FEW SPECTACULAR (AND CONTROVERSIAL) ATTEMPTS OF THEIR OVERLOOK. MANDATORY READING FOR ANYONE WHO DREAMS ABOUT A MYTH DRIVER'S CAREER!
FROM THE JOURNAL DEVELOPER
Saturday: I have carefully analyzed all their arguments, and listed all logical errors, it will be over in two hours. After all, it is enough to talk to them - calmly, without unnecessary nerves. I'm surprised no one has done it yet!
Sunday: Hmm ... There isn't any evidence that NASA is in conspiracy, but how to prove that it's 100% NOT?
Monday: I have prepared counter-arguments to their counter-arguments. (Note on the side: I do not know if it is worth taking my file from the Institute of National Remembrance to prove that I was not a secret collaborator. First of all, it has nothing to do with landing on the moon, second - I was 14 when communism collapsed. …)
Wednesday: The bank statement did not convince them that I am not being paid by Soros. I agreed to a house search for cash in carrier bags, but they thought it was a blast.
Friday: You fucking Russian trolls !!!! 1111 Maybe someone is paying you to spread this nonsense! Prove it is not so! Prove it!
Tuesday: Frustration, a sea of frustration, an ocean of frustration ...
Sunday: Maybe they are right?
Monday: Head-wall, head-wall.
Anyone who has tried to convince a supporter of pseudoscientific or conspiracy theories at least once in their life knows this feeling. Powerlessness, anger, frustration. You feel the dark side of the Force claiming the remnants of your rationality and personal culture ...
Is it possible otherwise ??
Structural analysis shows that the most popular conspiracy theories and the most successful attempts to debunk them are surprisingly similar in structure!
LIKE-LIKE
Successful debunking of conspiracy theories should not only take place from the position of the sciences to which they are attacked (climatology, epidemiology, genetics, history, etc.), but also from the position of cultural sciences, which aim to understand the very mechanisms governing conspiracy imagination.
Before we begin to refute ourselves, we should understand both those who invent conspiracy theories and those who set the model for effective fight against them (even if effective means "unscientific" or "gimmicky" in this case). Who do people want to listen to? Who do they believe and why? Who has retained the ability to convince those who do not believe professors and politicians?
Can a phenomenon as anti-scientific as conspiracy theories be even framed by a scientific theory?
DIY BUILD THEORIES ...
plotters are tinkerers. Like MacGyver, they only solve problems by using common sense and whatever is at hand
Let us first try to consider for a moment how conspiracy theories are actually made?
Moon landing conspiracy theories are among the most pervasive myths in modern American and global pop culture - so they provide a good starting point. I will not analyze the individual stories in detail in the entire collection (I already wrote a little about it in the post Star Wars Really Really !, and I will try to publish a separate text on this topic in the near future). I will limit myself to a few examples and try to show the general principle on which these kinds of theories are based. Where did the idea that the moon landing was a hoax come from?
The flag, which can be seen in the famous video, "flutters", and yet - as it is commonly known - there is no atmosphere on the moon, and therefore no wind ...
Astronauts leave footprints, while - due to the lack of moisture - perfectly loose lunar dust should not allow it.
Some photos look as if they were lit by several light sources, and on the moon, the only illumination should be the sun (so, for example, all shadows should be parallel).
And so on and so forth…
The general rule, then, is that conspiracy theorists look at the available material documenting the moon landing and, relying on a common-sense interpretation of the fundamental laws of physics, question their authenticity. The whole is complemented by alternative explanations and motivations ("the landing was shot in the studio", "it happened because the Americans wanted to overtake the USSR", and "Stanley Kubrick is behind everything").
Using the metaphor popularized in cultural studies by Claude Lévi-Strauss, it can therefore be said that conspiracy hunters resemble tinkerers. Like MacGyver, they only solve problems by using common sense and whatever is at hand.
… THE ENGINEERS TRY TO TOP UP THEM
Viewers prefer explanations that are fascinating, attractive, surprising, perverse, and visually appealing. Few people are excited by tables, formulas, and lectures.
How can the proponents of the "canonical version" that Armstrong and his companions actually walk the surface of the Silver Globe fight such allegations?
The most common way is for experts to speak. Professionals in everyday life in physics, optics, etc., often directly related to NASA, patiently explain that what common sense tells us to interpret in a certain way, from the point of view of science, means something else.
Yes, the flag looks like it is waving, but it is an illusion resulting from the lack of air resistance (it moves when mounting, it vibrates for a long time) and less gravity (bends do not straighten out quickly and in the photos, they give the impression of a "flap"). Added to all this is the poor quality of the photography and - voilà - our imagination plays a trick on us.
Such attempts turn out to be surprisingly ineffective. Why? In essence, experts try to use "professional reasoning" to balance the evidence of the senses and common sense.
But people choose what they understand rather than what their experts convince them. To mitigate the resulting cognitive dissonance (why do my mind and senses tell me something other than the experts?), Conspiracy hunters find that experts are not at all neutral. They have an interest that fits in with the whole conspiracy theory. In other words: for some reason they want us to believe a (completely unintuitive) lie. Technical reasoning (accessible only to professionals) becomes equated with hidden interest.
What's more - experts' explanations are usually too long, incomprehensible, and… unattractive. So the area where "official versions" lose the most to conspiracy theories is spectacular ... Viewers prefer explanations that are fascinating, attractive, surprising, perverse, and visually appealing. Few people are excited by tables, formulas, and lectures.
So the "engineers" usually make a strategic mistake in trying to debunk the myths created by the "DIYers"! They refer to language that amateurs find incomprehensible ("this is due to the microstructure of lunar dust particles") or a set of evidence not available to them ("we looked at the recordings in a higher resolution"). Thus, rather than dragging them to their side, they only increase the sense of alienation that is the primary source of conspiracy theories.
Paradoxically, such attempts to debunk myths can easily become embedded in the conspiracy theory itself and - rather than undermine alternative versions - reinforce them. ("I wonder why NASA is so anxious to hide the truth?", "See how wide circles the conspiracy has already made!", "Now we know that landing on the moon = hoax")
Is it a vicious circle? Is it possible to fight conspiracy theories effectively?
It turns out that yes!
Here are three examples of truly masterful strokes. Truth vs. false - rounds 1-3!
MYTH DEALERS
In Episode 10 of Series 6, the lunar landing conspiracy theories were tackled by unmatched masters in the industry - the MythBusters.
Maybe you ask what competencies the hosts of the program, Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman, have to debunk such myths? Are they astronautics specialists? Physicists? Optics or photography experts? None of these things! Both gentlemen are experienced specialists in the field of… special effects. People who believe that the Apollo 11 mission was one big special effect can successfully convince the guests who spent their entire lives creating it. This is called irony ...
How does their "debunking the myths" work? " It is based on a simple principle: "They don’t just tell the myths. They put them to the test. " In short: Savage and Hyneman try to recreate as faithfully as possible situations described in conspiracy theories, city legends, and various strange stories, in order to prove their truth or falsify them. In individual episodes, they check, for example, whether the hot water boiler can start like a rocket or whether it can be released from the coffin, as the heroine of Kill Bill did in the memorable scene.
Usually, they just blow up whatever they can. The more "testing" of a myth means explosions, stunts, building mockups (and blowing them up) - the better the episode is. The guiding principle of Mythbusters is therefore showy.
This sounds like an objection, but in the context of the engineering failures described above, it is not! In a strange way, Savage and Hyneman manage to find the elements of consciousness that are responsible for the formation of urban legends and conspiracy theories: sensual imagination and common sense. Moreover, they also defeat conspiracy theories because they are more spectacular than them. Mythbusters' strength is therefore based on three principles:
- seeing is believing
- to understand is to believe
- in a situation of information overload, we choose more attractive content.
So the recipe for the perfect conspiracy theory and the perfect punch to debunk the myths turns out to be identical!
How does it look in practice? Unfortunately, in the episode about Moon Landing Hoax, there was not much to blow up, but the Slayers made sure that their evidence was not only effective but also effective.
In order to refute the story of multiple light sources causing the effect of non-parallel shadows in photographs, Savage and Hyneman construct an elegant mock-up and use a single reflector to simulate a situation in which they manage to achieve an effect identical to that questioned by conspiracy trackers. They could achieve the same effect using a cardboard plane and cubic blocks (they also cast a shadow ...), but the gentlemen create a plane that imitates the surface of the moon, they use a faithful model of the lander, etc. The point is that their photograph should ultimately be almost identical to the one made on the Moon.
The Slayers test the waving flag in a vacuum chamber, even recreating the structure of the moon dust to see if there are any traces on it.
All this is full of gags, based on dynamic editing, funny and suggestive.
NVIDIA
A slightly different strategy was used by NVIDIA - a leading manufacturer of graphics cards. In a post published a few months ago under the suggestive title "How to use the world's most advanced GPU to debunk conspiracy theories about Apollo 11," NVIDIA's Brian Caulfield shows how state-of-the-art 3D rendering technique can recreate accurate lighting conditions and generate an image - again, as in the case of Pogromców - Strikingly similar to a photograph whose authenticity is questioned by conspiracy hunters.
Our software provides proof that iconic photography is real. In a demonstration powered by Epic's Unreal 3 and Maxwell, we showed how light from the moon's surface and [reflected off] Neil Armstrong's suit illuminated Aldrin.
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