Is the Moon a Hoax? Teach the controversy!

I am sure that I'm the last person to notice this, but since it has only now come to my attention, in this solipsistic world of blogging, it is a good time to point it out.

Inspired by the nonsensical conspiracy theorizing of a holocaust denial group wishing to be seen as scholarly, 'The Mad Revisionist' has created a website full of "essays dedicated to the manufacturing of truth through the discarding of evidence." After all "why restrict this methodology [of revisionism] to the discipline of history when there are so many other areas of knowledge that cling to dogmas derived from the worn-out, ivory-tower standards of academic responsibility?"

Anyone familiar with the all-caps style of wild-eyed internet scholarship will be impressed with the work they have collected. "THE PARTHENON: A post-Hellenistic Fabrication," "The IRISH POTATO HOAX of the 1840's," "THE TITANIC: Hollywood Propaganda Fraud Exposed!." But in my humble view, the real gem of the series has to be "THE MOON: A Propaganda Hoax." If there was a crackpot index for, well, denying the existence of things that weigh 7.35 x 10²² kg and can be seen once a day by anyone on Earth, it could be calibrated with this piece. Well, except for the lack of multicolor font or inexplicable spelling/punctuation errors.

Led to moon-existence research by a statement by an historian that

for a group of historians to say that there had been a Holocaust was tantamount to "an organization of astronomers saying there is a moon."

While, on the surface, this appears as nothing more than a shameless attempt to trivialize and thereby discredit the work of revisionists, it nonetheless got me to thinking: why did this historian single out the moon? Why would a scholar, so familiar with academic standards of evidence, use such language to imply that the existence of the moon, unlike any other issue, was a given and not subject to proof? What, in other words, was he trying to hide?
...

Until recently, I, too, believed in the traditional, establishment view of the moon. But any thinking person, untainted by the biases imposed on us by the controlled media, will have no choice but to reach the conclusion I did once faced with the facts described in this account.

"Establishment view of the moon," "controlled media," outstanding. A Q & A section then addresses the objections raised by the Astronomically Correct community, such as "The tides of the oceans are created by the gravatational pull of the moon," "Hasn’t the moon been mentioned in texts and literature throughout history?" and of course "You can see it."

But think about it – without the help of so-called "experts", how do you really know what you’re looking at? It could be a hologram, projected from various government installations throughout the world. It could be a large, crudely painted balloon, held in place by helium and propelled by tiny sails and rudders (which is why it moves across the sky so slowly). Or, most likely, it could have been different things at different times and different places, depending on the technology available to the conspirators and the culture and beliefs of the population being deceived.

A quality section from an aerospace engineer uses the argument that the amount of "fuel" required to "keep" the moon in orbit would be much larger than the earth itself.

In order to keep [satellites] in a stable and useful orbit, I have to plan maneuvers, that have a cost in fuel. In fact, this fuel expenditure is what makes the Moon a totally impossibility!

For, in order to control them, I have to spend, each year, an ammount of fuel bigger than 0.1% of the satellite's mass [I could give the exact number, but it's a professional secret, and they would have to kill me].

So, let's apply this number to the alleged Moon. If it existed since the alleged value of 6,000 years ago, and if it has now the alleged mass of 1/81 times the mass of the Earth, then it would have to be *at least* 402 times *more* massive than it is today. This is *much* more than Earth's mass, a clear impossibility.

6000 years, more good work. I only feel bad that the author must have read a great deal of crank-y writing to learn to reproduce it so well. The interpretation of Newton's gravitational force law is very special as well, including, as it does, not only an ad hominem attack on Sir Isaac but also the repetition of a criticism raised in Newton's time about the instability of orbits (in the manner of creationists echoing once-legitimate but now answered questions about evolution), ignoring Laplace's landmark work demonstrating orbital stability.

However, even the most fanatical Lunarists no longer cling to the absurd notion that objects in the solar system travel in concentric circles. These so-called 'scientists' have changed their story so many times, who knows what to believe anymore?...Our orbiting satellite is forever oscillating towards us, drawing near then distant, in a continuous cycle...

In other words, the moon does indeed alter its distance from the earth. So why is it not widespread knowledge that the end – mathematically predicated BY NEWTON’S OWN FORMULA - has been anticipated and is drawing near? Due to some irrational explanation the moon has managed to defy those very laws of physics that were originally developed to justify its existence.

And if you are still unconvinced,

Okay, but I still find this all hard to believe. What evidence do you have that there is no moon?
You should be asking what evidence we have that there IS one...

And, of course, no exposition of this type would be complete without the unclaimed $100,000 reward for emailable proof of the moon's physical existence.

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