Conspiracy theorists rejoice: Prized 'moon rock' in Dutch national museum is a fake

Full story

The Dutch national museum said Thursday that one of its prized possessions, a rock supposedly brought back from the moon by U.S. astronauts, is just a piece of petrified wood.

Rijksmuseum spokeswoman Xandra van Gelder, who oversaw the investigation that proved the piece was a fake, said the museum will keep it anyway as a curiosity.

"It's a good story, with some questions that are still unanswered," she said. "We can laugh about it."

The museum acquired the rock after the death of former Prime Minister Willem Drees in 1988. Drees received it as a private gift on Oct. 9, 1969 from then-U.S. ambassador J. William Middendorf during a visit by the three Apollo 11 astronauts, part of their "Giant Leap" goodwill tour after the first moon landing.

Please note: headline is theirs, not mine.

[edit on 28-8-2009 by Clickfoot]

well what does this mean?

That the rock given to them was BS or does it have greater significance for the moon landing ?

So what are you saying theres petrified trees on the moon. That is a great big cover up by NASA to hide the fact that there used to be trees on the moon.

[edit on 28-8-2009 by JBA2848]

Fake - or perhaps they are just not unable to account for the presence of petrified wood on the moon.





[edit on 28-8-2009 by Exuberant1]

reply to post by JBA2848


na... I think the US just didn't want to give them a real legit present.

I do it all the time a xmas~

Like giving a fake diamond to the Queen...save some money.

There is already a thread about this:
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Researchers from Amsterdam's Free University said they could see at a glance the rock was probably not from the moon. They followed the initial appraisal up with extensive testing.

I don't understand why this would be any reason for conspiracy theorists to rejoice. The discovery was not made by conspiracy theorists, but by University researchers who had a working knowledge of the subject matter. Further, this adds confirmation to the moon landing event - because we have and have tested moon rocks to deduce their properties and composition.

Originally posted by Lasheic
Further, this adds confirmation to the moon landing event - because we have and have tested moon rocks to deduce their properties and composition.

*Carefully selected rock samples from various locations around the earth could be combined to imitate lunar regolith (even the micrometeorite impacts could be simulated at JPL);

By propagating the notion that the Moon was formed as the result of a collision of an object with the earth, NASA is able to set the conditions under which such manufactured samples would be accepted as being actual moon-rock.

This results in the sort of circular logic commonly found in academia: The moon rocks are considered real because they have the properties predicted by the collision hypothesis. The collision hypothesis is then considered validated because the moon rocks appear to have originated from the earth.... so goes the logic loop.





[edit on 28-8-2009 by Exuberant1]

Originally posted by Lasheic
Further, this adds confirmation to the moon landing event - because we have and have tested moon rocks to deduce their properties and composition.

How on earth does a lump of petrified wood, supposedly taken from the Moon and given to the Dutch PM as a present from the USA, add confirmation to the moon landing event?

I am interested as to how you managed to arrive at this conclusion.

[edit on 28/8/09 by stumason]

reply to post by Exuberant1


True, were those the only factors involved. There's every evidence to indicate that we know the moon rocks we have came from the moon because we actually went there and picked them up. Some of the people who did so are still alive.



And this is why this news article is no coup for conspiracy theorists. Because it doesn't do anything to provide counter evidence to challenge the overwhelming evidence suggesting that we did go.

Therefore, what you consider "circular logic" is not a closed circuit of logic, but is rather mere confirmation.

reply to post by stumason


It's quite simple; if a university geologist can quickly uncover a fake moon rock given by a diplomat who isn't even sure where he got it from, then it proves that if the other rocks are fake that experts could quickly uncover the forgery when examining the rocks. It directly proves that fake rocks can't slip by experts. You can't fake several hundred kilograms of ~3.9 billion year old moon rocks. At best you could try to pass off a lunar meteorite, but you won't find as much available and the fusion crust will be a dead giveaway.

[edit on 28-8-2009 by ngchunter]

reply to post by ngchunter


The only reason this was "easily detected" was because it's a lump of wood. I'd hazard a guess and say anyone with a geological degree or training could tell.

Anyhoo, you seem to have taken a different tack to what I was alluding too. Namely, that Lasheic said that this was confirmation of the moon landing events. My question was, how can a lump of pretrified wood be seen as confirmation?

The fact that someone owns a fake moon rock is meaningless.

If, for example, someone finds out they own a fake Rembrandt, that doesn't mean that Rembrandt did not exist.

Originally posted by ngchunter
...if a university geologist can quickly uncover a fake moon rock given by a diplomat who isn't even sure where he got it from, then it proves that if the other rocks are fake that experts could quickly uncover the forgery when examining the rocks. It directly proves that fake rocks can't slip by experts...

Very good point, ngchunter....
...Moon Hoax believers say that the Moon Rocks could easily have been faked. Well, obviously this proves that it mustn't be that easy to fake.

Originally posted by stumason
reply to post by ngchunter

 

The only reason this was "easily detected" was because it's a lump of wood.

It's easily detected because like every rock on earth, it has properties foreign to rocks that come straight from the moon.

I'd hazard a guess and say anyone with a geological degree or training could tell.

...which is why it's evidence for the moon landing; it shows that proper knowledge and the application of that knowledge can reveal whether or not a rock really came from the moon.

Anyhoo, you seem to have taken a different tack to what I was alluding too. Namely, that Lasheic said that this was confirmation of the moon landing events. My question was, how can a lump of pretrified wood be seen as confirmation?

See above, my whole point has been to explain how this lump of petrified wood can be seen as evidence supporting the moon landing. The bottom line is that experts won't tow the line that a rock really came from the moon just because a plaque from a government official says so.

All of you guys above are going off track. This cannot be related to moon landings.

Only things you can say for sure, is that you can't trust USA politicians and diplomats about anything. If the top people in US can call a piece of wood as moon rock and present it to other leaders they are capable of bigger lies.

But don't we know that already?


Anyway this will have big consequences, all those scientists and governments who were given lunar samples will try to find if those are real, and this can uncover a lot of dirty things about US leaders.

reply to post by ngchunter


I see what you're saying, don't get me wrong. I don't even buy into the whole "fake moon landing thing" anyway.

I was just curious how someone could claim a petrified piece of wood given to a PM from NASA (who told him it was moon rock) could be seen as "evidence" against a conspiracy.

It has taken over 40 years for this to be discovered, after all.

If anything, a piece of petrified wood given to anybody by NASA and told it was moon rock should set alarm bells ringing, not reinforce the case for a moon landing.

It's like somone giving you a rare flower that they said they got from some
isolated place, only to find out 40 years later it is in fact a plastic flower, then saying "Oh, well, they must still have gone to this rare place, this plastic flower, that was made in China, is proof"..

See what I'm saying?

reply to post by stumason

The stone was not given to Drees by NASA. It was given to him by Middendorf who got it from the State Department. There is no confirmation that NASA was involved at all.

It should also be noted that the note to Drees from Middendorf (displayed with the rock) says nothing about it being a moon rock.
www.google.com...

[edit on 8/28/2009 by Phage]

reply to post by Phage


The plaque also say's it was to commemorate the visit by the Apollo 11 astronauts (who worked for NASA), who had just visited the Moon and the Dutch were told it was a moon rock.

The "rock" had originally been been vetted through a phone call to Nasa, she added.

The US agency gave moon rocks to more than 100 countries following lunar missions in the 1970s.

BBC

Originally posted by stumason
If anything, a piece of petrified wood given to anybody by NASA and told it was moon rock should set alarm bells ringing, not reinforce the case for a moon landing.

As pointed out by Phage, NASA was not involved in the transfer of this rock from a diplomat to a dignitary. The only Apollo moon rock in the Netherlands officially given to them by NASA is at the National Museum of the History of Science and Medicine, in Leiden, not the National Museum in Amsterdam.

It's like somone giving you a rare flower that they said they got from some
isolated place, only to find out 40 years later it is in fact a plastic flower, then saying "Oh, well, they must still have gone to this rare place, this plastic flower, that was made in China, is proof"..

Actually a more accurate analogy would be to say that you heard a story about an explorer who went to an isolated place, brought back tons of flowers, and had those flowers closely analyzed by the world's top botonists. 40 years later someone turns up with a plastic flower they were given by someone who works at the same company as the explorer and claims to have obtained one of the real flowers, though they can't remember who gave it to them or how that person got a hold of such a rare, valuable item. The presence of a plastic flower of dubious origin that can't even be traced back to the explorer does nothing to disprove his trip 40 years ago, but it does prove that fakes can spotted even when they have a compelling story behind them.

[edit on 28-8-2009 by ngchunter]

Originally posted by Phage
It should also be noted that the note to Drees from Middendorf (displayed with the rock) says nothing about it being a moon rock.

Probably nothing was mentioned because it was understood. You are trying to defend politicians like a politician

And why would he send an earthly rock as a gift to a PM and that too as a "part of their "Giant Leap" goodwill tour after the first moon landing." ?

Thats like, ok we landed on Mars, here's a rock for you I found in my backyard, Mr Prime Minister ...

[edit on 28/8/2009 by rocksolidbrain]