Fifty years since the moon landings

[sycamore54321]

It will be 50 years ago later this month since the first moon landing. I wasn’t born. I’ve always imagined though, what it must feel like to look up at the moon and know that there were people there. Do any MNers recall it? Was it scary or awe-inspiring? What did it feel like?

It seems so odd to me that this huge milestone took place half a century ago, and then abruptly stopped almost as suddenly as it had begun a few years later. And since then, loads of other exciting space stuff but nobody else has ever stood on something that wasn’t of our planet.

The scientists and engineers of 50 years ago might be stunned to find out how much computing power is available now, and how much is squandered on propagating anti-science conspiracies.

If there's a rank of sentiment, I'm sure much higher would be a deep sense of sadness that the miracle that was the Apollo programme got pissed away before it had even finished, and that 50 years later we're further away from returning to the moon than we were 30 years ago.

As a species, it's hard to feel too impressed by human intelligence. We're smart enough to go to the moon, dumb enough not to believe it, and then whinge about one of the best hopes for ourselves which is to somehow get off this rock. That or die.

I know regrets are a Bad Thing, but I was offered a job in 1988 with a company that was part of the European Space Agency - regular trips to Darmstadt. In an act of stupid (never repaid) family loyalty I turned it down

Wow paddy you feel pretty strongly about this, calm down!
I like to deny they were real to wind DH up, thankfully he doesn’t react like paddy

As a species, it's hard to feel too impressed by human intelligence

It is sobering to consider that many technological leaps are driven by conflict. The honing of flight from the Wright brothers to functional machines in an incredibly short time. The development of guided rockets sufficient to bomb London not long after. The space race driven by the Cold War.

I suppose we should be glad of the decadence of peace, were it not that we're trashing the climate, squandering medical advances etc the while.

I was 7 and my recollection is they brought a tv into the classroom so we could watch (l was living in US then). This must be a false memory as the landing/walk was at night. But maybe I saw a program about it at school.
However it really was s huge deal! We were totally awed. Space stuff was everywhere - 2001 A Space Odyssey, Star Trek... it felt like the whole world was holding it’s breath for these guys!

Nah, paddy, retain your righteous indignation! Foolishness, whether real or just wind-up merchants, needs robust resistance. A common fault of rationalists is being too damn polite.

I was not much more than a toddler. My dad took me outside and pointed to the moon saying "there are people up there". He was a super scientific bloke not a "ooh, look! fairies" kind of bloke. It blew my little mind and I remember it really clearly.

I like to deny they were real to wind DH up, That's nice!

Then again, I don't like so called practical jokes either, they rely on humiliation to be 'funny'.

Dour, aren't I?

Errol the flip side to war time imagination is extended peace makes human kind look inward, start to eat itself, overturn social mores, destroy/hate its own past, myths and legends . Look around, you'll see lots of it. Then look at North Korea, - nope! Russia - it's growing. CHina - yep, startng their too! Syria? Not one iota!

Since we are talking memories, mine is of my Mum and Dad around the tiny B&W TV on 4 spindly legs with the aerial on top and two huge dials (on/off/volume and tuning). Since the room I remember was in a house we moved from in late 1969, I'm thinking it must have been 11 or 12.

I can remember walking home with my Mum in 1972 (from piano lessons !) and the moon was up in the sky, and my Mum said "there are men on the moon right now", which I am guessing was Apollo 17 ? I distinctly recall asking if we had my Grandads army binoculars, whether we'd see them .

Isn't it funny how all the old folk at the time totally and utterly believed it was real, despite a relatively glacial exposure to technology that subsequent generations have had.

I wonder if part of the apparent scepticism about the moon landings is a sort of reaction to the comment I might make in frustration along the lines of "we can get a man on the moon, but DPD can't quite get a parcel from one town to another ...."

• Isn't it funny how all the old folk at the time totally and utterly believed it was real, despite a relatively glacial exposure to technology that subsequent generations have had.

Perhaps a greater number at that time were exposed to a higher proportion of the current technology, and it was more comprehensible. In that generation there would be men who'd worked out artillery trajectories, women who'd helped build spitfires...

I remember it, it was so exciting and I was absolutely glued to the coverage. I also remember clearly the heart in mouth tension of the Apollo 13 mission, waiting to see if they would make it back. It does seem incredible now, what was achieved.

To be honest I feel sorry for people whose imaginations are so staid and limited they can only get as far as imagining it to be a hoax. To accept it as the reality it is requires way more imagination and intelligence totally agree with this!

I guess some people prefer the comfort of conspiracy theories shared with a few other ...ahem .... like minded individuals , to the challenge of physics.

I guess some people prefer the comfort of conspiracy theories shared with a few other ...ahem .... like minded individuals , to the challenge of physics

That would be the same physics that gets them safely to the Costa del Sol, and the same physics which safely chills their beer ....

@DGRossetti -yep.

I was just coming up to 6 years of age in July 1969. I can just about remember it because my two brothers (5.5 and 8 years older than me) were obsessed with watching it on the (black and white) TV. Obviously,being only 6 at the time,I didn't really attach any importance or significance to it. It's only now,50 years on,that I realise I was watching history being made. A couple of years ago,I read an article about it,and what left me totally gob smacked was it saying that the amount of computer power that they had available was about equivalent to one of today's iPhones.

@Hoppinggreen

I guess I don’t tolerate fools. Which is why I didn’t marry one

Obviously,being only 6 at the time,I didn't really attach any importance or significance to it

If you're anything like me, it was just accepted as something that was obviously going to happen. Whyever not ?

Yep, amazing that we had the technology in those days. There's one born every minute.

Thanks to all who replied and particular thanks to those with personal memories. It really doesn’t have any kind of comparison, I think. The more “modern day” Kennedy assassination moment was 9/11, where everyone remembers where they were. There isn’t a similar moment to the moon landing, I think. Perhaps the fall of the Berlin Wall, or the release of Mandela or maybe the election of Obama, as major good news stories, but I don’t think any of them had the single immediacy and transformative power of the landings. I love oral history and to hear people’s recollections of such huge moments.

Thanks also for the podcast and programme recommendations; I will check these out.

What would be the future equivalent? A Mars landing? Contact with extraterrestrial life? Some major scientific discovery to produce a solution to climate change?

One other question, for those who remember it, was the moon clearly visible wherever you were when the landings were underway? Or was it like one of those disappointing solar eclipses when it’s cloudy?

A Mars landing. Definitely.

I’m optimistic we’ll see a human on mars soon. I don’t know what “soon” means though. But it’ll be a private business like Space X that does it.

I remember it very well. I was 11 years old, at the end of my final year of junior school.

The school had one 'big television' (must have been about a 26" screen, which was enormous at the time) on a tall, wheeled stand that was wheeled into a classroom when the class needed to watch one of the many BBC Schools programmes.

One afternoon in July 1969, the whole school was summoned to the school hall, where we sat cross-legged in anticipation. The curtains were drawn, the television was wheeled in and switched on. We saw some barely visible, grainy black and white film of Neil Armstrong and Buzz Aldrin on the moon. The audio was even poorer quality than the video and I couldn't really make out what they were saying. But all of us were fascinated nonetheless - and watching the telly was better than afternoon lessons!

The headmaster told us that we were watching history being made and that we would always remember it. I'm not sure if we were watching 'live' footage though. I think probably not.

Some major scientific discovery to produce a solution to climate change?

There may be technological ways to mitigate against some of the effects of climate change but I very much doubt there will be one specific game changer. Certainly nothing where there's a specific moment in time like with the first step on the moon.

Most scientific breakthroughs happen quite quietly and iteratively.

It's a fact that the moon landings were filmed by Stanley Kubrick. What some dont realise is that he was such a perfectionist we would only film on location

I'm with paddy on the deniers...

paddy many scientists also don’t beleive they landed on the moon

They believe we took off, that we failed a few times (catastrophically as is documented) and then finally faked it.

Lots of sciency reasons too

I was to young when it happened so dont remember watching it
I always think it's strange that no one has been on the moon since then

I always think it's strange that no one has been on the moon since then

Umm... they have...