The Moon landing conspiracy theories claim that some or all elements of the Apollo program and the associated Moon landings were hoaxes staged by NASA and members of other organizations. Various groups and individuals have made such conspiracy claims since the mid-1970s. The most notable claim is that the six manned landings (1969–1972) were faked and that the twelve Apollo astronauts did not walk on the Moon. Conspiracy theorists (henceforth conspiracists) base their claims on the notion NASA and others knowingly misled the public into believing the landings happened by manufacturing, destroying, or tampering with evidence; including photos, telemetry tapes, transmissions, rock samples, and even some key witnesses.
Conspiracists have managed to sustain public interest in their theories for more than 40 years despite there being much third-party evidence for the landings and detailed rebuttals to the hoax claims. Polls taken in various locations have shown that between 6% and 20% of Americans surveyed believe that the manned landings were faked, rising to 28% in Russia. Even as late as 2001, the major television network Fox broadcast a documentary named Conspiracy Theory: Did We Land on the Moon? claiming NASA faked the first landing in 1969 to win the Space Race.
Since the late 2000s, high-definition photos taken by the LROC spacecraft of the Apollo landing sites have captured the lander modules and the tracks left by the astronauts. In 2012, images were released showing the Apollo flags still standing on the Moon.
Read more about Moon Landing Conspiracy Theories: Origins, Public Opinion, Conspiracists and Their Main Proposals, The Hoax Claims
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“on the instant clamorous eaves,
A climbing moon upon an empty sky,
And all that lamentation of the leaves,
Could but compose man’s image and his cry.”
—William Butler Yeats (1865–1939)
“I foresee the time when the painter will paint that scene, no longer going to Rome for a subject; the poet will sing it; the historian record it; and, with the Landing of the Pilgrims and the Declaration of Independence, it will be the ornament of some future national gallery, when at least the present form of slavery shall be no more here. We shall then be at liberty to weep for Captain Brown. Then, and not till then, we will take our revenge.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
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—Stanley Kubrick (b. 1928)
“Philosophers of science constantly discuss theories and representation of reality, but say almost nothing about experiment, technology, or the use of knowledge to alter the world. This is odd, because ‘experimental method’ used to be just another name for scientific method.... I hope [to] initiate a Back-to-Bacon movement, in which we attend more seriously to experimental science. Experimentation has a life of its own.”
—Ian Hacking (b. 1936)