Why do so many people believe the U.S. hasn't went to the Moon or even space?

[DaveBB]

I've been running into people lately who believe we haven't been to the Moon or even space.  In the last two cases, these were college educated people working in an engineering/technology field.  One guy claims that radiation would kill anyone trying to go to the Moon.  And that the U.S. has only achieved low earth orbit (though we have sent robots to the moon). 

The second guy was teaching a seminar on how to use an x-ray fluorescence instrument.  He said we hadn't been to the Moon too.  I would have questioned him more but I needed to know how to use the instrument.  He also claimed to be a "flat earther".  I simply replied with "Oh".

Then there are people who say we haven't been back to the Moon because of aliens.  One nutjob astronaut (Apollo 17) has been claiming that aliens have been stopping nuclear war on Earth, and I believe he is contributing to that conspiracy.

So is it mental illness, ignorance, a combination of the two, or something entirely different?  I read once that people who believe in conspiracy theories are low on the neurotransmitter serotonin. 

Ironically, two of the people who believe aliens have prevented us from going back to the Moon also believe that 9-11 was an inside job.  They are also veterans (one a M1 tank commander in Desert Storm, another a Chief Petty Officer in the Navy). 

[Shuffler]

The number is very few. There are always folks who do not believe facts.

[WaffenVW]

Mental illness. A form of paranoia.

[pipz]

I find that instead of questioning why people think the way they do it is best to accept the fact that as a species we are doomed. Just Enjoy Aces High until then.   

[Tumor]

Extremely smart people can also be eerily stupid.

I know one of these.  An Engineer, worked on NASA projects.  He'll help his grandkids (of all ages) with complex math problems... they take them back to school with attached work, and the teachers/professors can't figure out how he got the correct solution to the problem.  It's hilarious.  Nothing short of a mathematical genius.

Take this guy and watch him in ANY social setting.... he's dumber than a box of rocks.

[WaffenVW]

I.e. he's got Asperger's.

[caldera]

I'm about 95% in believing we went there.   Like most things the government tells me,  I can't take their word it's 100% truth. 

Unlikely, but not impossible that it didn't happen.   



Capricorn One.   Just sayin'   

[WaffenVW]

100% impossible that the USSR wouldn't have ratted NASA out if they faked it.

[caldera]

Maybe they didn't know.   Tracking satellites was likely not as easy as it is now.   

[Meatwad]

Because some people are nutjobs, plain and simple

[WaffenVW]

Maybe they didn't know.   Tracking satellites was likely not as easy as it is now.

There is only one way you can pick up radio and TV signals from the Moon, and it's not aliens. Someone has to go there and transmit them.

[BaldEagl]

They must have been two of the five subscribers to Conspiracy Theory.  Odd how you know so many of them.   

[ghi]

The number is very few. There are always folks who do not believe facts.

 "Opinion polls taken in various locations have shown that between 6% and 20% of Americans and 28% of Russians surveyed believe that the manned landings were faked."
from  Wikipedia   ;Moon landing conspiracy theories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moon_landing_conspiracy_theories

''between 6% and 20%"   from 318 million USA population= between 19.08 and 63.6 million Americans believe that the manned landings were faked    



 interesting videos; http://www.apfn.org/apfn/moon.htm

[Karnak]

[Karnak]

On another note, people who are conspiracy vulnerable usually subscribe to multiple conspiracies so it is not unexpected that the people you talk to who think we didn't go to the moon also believe other nonsense.