Why not use the Hubble to view the Moon Mars??

Well, this thought occurred to me today completely out of the blue. As the title says.."Why not use Hubble to view the Moon/Mars?"

~With this high powered scope why can't they beam us pics of the EXACT landing site on the moon complete with the US flag that should still be there.

~Wouldn't they be able to get pretty clear pics of Mars being that they can look deep into space?

~would they be able to get as clear pics from Mars as they would from the rover? If it's because of the atmosphere, as far as I know, which isn't much, WHAT ATMOSPHERE?! Mars doesn't have any; And since it doesn't have any, then why not use it?

Just some thoughts on the mind... I don't have the time or energy to create a whole topic on the power of the Hubble and why NASA can't... but it would be intresting to know ALL the facts..

if this was already posted.. plz post url

Thanks guys!

Hubble has taken photos of the moon and mars, just do a little googling and you will find lots of info on it. Here's a start for you.

Hubble pics of mars

If you are looking for the kind of resolution to find landing sites on the moon, etc, you won't get them from hubble. The way hubble works is great for taking photos of very distant objects, but not so good for close up work.

Remember that-

"Its NOT SO GOOD for close-up work."



That is so pathetic its funny. Point a Keyhole at it then.

Never A Straight Answer

[edit on 22-5-2008 by Chakotay]

Obviously, the Hubble Telescope can take photographs of the Moon and Mars.

As to why it can't show photographs of the lunar rovers or American flags on the moon, that explanation would require a lot of physics to explain in detail...and since I have to be at work in 45 minutes, time is short. The 'quick and dirty' explanation is that there's a huge difference between light gathering power (which is what astronomical telescopes excel at) and magnification (which is NOT their strong point). Magnify a stellar image, and you get a bigger dot. Period. (No pun intended, there). Gather more light from a star, though, and you can start to get useful information (spectrograph data, color), and data that you'd ordinarily not see at all (faint objects).

The simple fact is that optical wavelengths don't give good enough resolution to allow us to see those American flags from down here, whether we're using the naked eye or the Keck 10-meter scope...or the Hubble. It's not a conspiracy, it's physics.

Originally posted by Brother Stormhammer
Obviously, the Hubble Telescope can take photographs of the Moon and Mars.

As to why it can't show photographs of the lunar rovers or American flags on the moon, that explanation would require a lot of physics to explain in detail...and since I have to be at work in 45 minutes, time is short. The 'quick and dirty' explanation is that there's a huge difference between light gathering power (which is what astronomical telescopes excel at) and magnification (which is NOT their strong point). Magnify a stellar image, and you get a bigger dot. Period. (No pun intended, there). Gather more light from a star, though, and you can start to get useful information (spectrograph data, color), and data that you'd ordinarily not see at all (faint objects).

The simple fact is that optical wavelengths don't give good enough resolution to allow us to see those American flags from down here, whether we're using the naked eye or the Keck 10-meter scope...or the Hubble. It's not a conspiracy, it's physics.

So what's going on when you see those pictures of distant galaxies that are very detailed, that famous one which looks like a cloud, that's very detailed, how come that doesn't look like dots?

Its easy to remember, Guys and Girls:

From the Moon, you can't photograph stars-

And from the stars, you can't photograph the Moon.

Simple, really.

(Until you Deny Ignorance).

Originally posted by Chakotay
Its easy to remember, Guys and Girls:

From the Moon, you can't photograph stars-

And from the stars, you can't photograph the Moon.

Simple, really.

(Until you Deny Ignorance).

But I can see the stars VERY clearly without ANY clouds underneath the earths Atmosphere????? But, i can't from the moon............which has no atmosphere?? please.. feel free to explain this reasoning with detail with NON-Wikipedia info..

Originally posted by Alethia

Originally posted by Brother Stormhammer
Obviously, the Hubble Telescope can take photographs of the Moon and Mars.

As to why it can't show photographs of the lunar rovers or American flags on the moon, that explanation would require a lot of physics to explain in detail...and since I have to be at work in 45 minutes, time is short. The 'quick and dirty' explanation is that there's a huge difference between light gathering power (which is what astronomical telescopes excel at) and magnification (which is NOT their strong point). Magnify a stellar image, and you get a bigger dot. Period. (No pun intended, there). Gather more light from a star, though, and you can start to get useful information (spectrograph data, color), and data that you'd ordinarily not see at all (faint objects).

The simple fact is that optical wavelengths don't give good enough resolution to allow us to see those American flags from down here, whether we're using the naked eye or the Keck 10-meter scope...or the Hubble. It's not a conspiracy, it's physics.

So what's going on when you see those pictures of distant galaxies that are very detailed, that famous one which looks like a cloud, that's very detailed, how come that doesn't look like dots?

Something like this?

Andromeda, photographed by Hubble

or this?

Another Andromeda photo


Those "very detailed" images don't really show much detail...you'll note that most of the 'detail' is on the scale of individual stars. Even getting that much detail requires exposures of several minutes to several hours...that's why the center portions of the galaxies are whited out...that's over-exposure. If you try to get detail in the arm structures, you wash out the hub. If you settle for detail in the hub, your arms are almost too faint to see.

That's relevant to the Moon question...if you expose an image of the Moon long enough to get extraordinary detail, you wind up over-exposing the image.

ok .. so lets forget about the Rubble.. errrr.. Hubble for a minute. What about the HUGE observatories that are in use today. You know, the ones that sit in remote locations that look that the stars and what not?? Tell me they're the same..

Originally posted by Komodo
ok .. so lets forget about the Rubble.. errrr.. Hubble for a minute. What about the HUGE observatories that are in use today. You know, the ones that sit in remote locations that look that the stars and what not?? Tell me they're the same..

They're the same.

Hey...you TOLD me to tell you that, and I aim to please.
All joking aside, the differences between terrestrial observatories like Palomar, Kitt Peak, Keck, or Mount Wilson, and the Hubble Space Telescope are really minimal.

An optical telescope is going to work as either a reflector (using mirrors to gather and focus light), or a refractor (using lenses for the same purpose). Reflectors can be built with larger diameters (since the mirrors don't have to be transparent, they can be built thicker and stronger than lenses), but the general principle is the same...light enters the telescope, is focused (either on an observer's eye, or a photographic plate), and an image is captured.

The thing that makes the Hubble unique is what it *doesn't* have...several miles of air between it and the incoming light. Being in orbit, it's above atmospheric distortion, absorption, and perhaps most importantly, weather effects. (You haven't known frustration until you've seen your available 'scope time, booked several months or even years in advance, rendered useless by a solid cloud deck).

Details may vary, and light-gathering power certainly does...but when you get down to basic principles, an optical telescope is an optical telescope. If we want pictures of the Moon landing sites that will let us see the flags and the rovers, we're just going to have to go back there with a good set of camera equipment....now, where do I sign up?

Didnt they just use the hubble to prove that we did in fact land on the moon by showing the landing site?

Originally posted by alienstar
Didnt they just use the hubble to prove that we did in fact land on the moon by showing the landing site?

No, you are mistaken. Neither Hubble, or any other telescope in existence has the magnifying power to see any equipment left at the landing sites.

Here's a good site that explains why we can't see the equipment with earth based telescopes or hubble.

calgary.rasc.ca...

I remember hearing something they were going to do to prove it was real.They can always use the lunar reconnaissance orbiter.

I heard on A&E or maybe national Geographic (One of the two never know which) but on one of these channels, they stated that their was a telescope powerful enough to see a "candle flicker on the moon's surface" I'm wondering couldn't they just use that to view the moon landing site? That is of course given that they point it at the correct side of the moon that the landing occurred on.

Here is a link, The Hubble was pointed at the moon, in 1999 and 2005. Just google "hubble moon".


space.newscientist.com...

Interestingly I recall the same subject pre 1999 and NASA blankly stated that parallax issues prevented the hubble being used on an object as close as the moon. Meaning it was incapable of focusing.

A year later NASA Disappeared that statement. Then I think it was about 2002, they announced that the earth observation package broke.

Hey, which is closer Earth or the Moon?

You need to face the facts. There is no nation with a space program, which is releasing their imagery unfiltered and high quality. They simply are not going to let you see the good stuff.

are you all really that nieve of course they can get high res pics but they reason they wont is because theres stuff on the moon and on mars that they dont wont us to see do the research its called youtube

reply to post by Leviatano


If the moon landing were faked (which I beleive they were) even if some kind of telescope was able to see the landing sites, don't you think the same people that faked the landings would fake the pictures? I'm sure if there were some way to see the moon landing sites either from earth or from space, THEY would control them too.

Were all living in a dream world... welcome to the Matrix!

I had read someplace that NASAs LRO which i believe will be 250m resolution, will still be insufficient resolution to see the the rover or lander. NASA said that at the resolution (although it is very good), the rover will appear as a 1 pixel object, which perhaps a slight shadow. You hear alot of stories about these spy satellites being about to obtain a resolution so fine, they can read a license plate number from a satellite, but why is the resolution demonstrated to the public so lame? Of course I have never seen an proof of these claims, but it sure a person wonder. I guess with the LRO, the idea is to get a good survey at a reasonable resolution, but you would think that with they money they spend on these projects, they would put a camera capable of 10m resolution to observe specific points of interest.