June 11, 2024 • 50 mins
The nation of China recently made international news by successfully completing an unmanned landing on the far side of Earth’s moon, marking a pivotal point in the resurgent space race. So why do some observers believe there’s more to the story?
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Fellow conspiracy realist and space nerds alike. This is a
fantastic classic episode. It's about one of the most extra
things human beings have ever done, which is going to
the moon. Yes, there are problems on Earth, but Matt,
why do we go to the moon?
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Why do we go to the moon?
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Why?
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Besides the helium and it's cool, and because we do
the things because they're hard, not because they're easy.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Not because it is easy, but because it is hod.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Yeah, well, it's crazy to think. We did this episode
in twenty nineteen when there was major news about China
one of China's moon missions that they were completing, and
as we're recording this in June twenty twenty four, another
one of China's moon missions successfully is functioning right there
on the Moon right now. You can read about it
(00:53):
in the New York Times and The Verge everywhere. It's
the lunar race that we've talked about before is.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Ongoing, and this episode provides a bit of context. One
thing we can say for sure is that there is
more news ahead. Civilization has technically become a bunch of lunatics,
from UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
(01:23):
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn this stuff they don't want you to know.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my
name is Noel.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
They call me Ben. We are joined with our super
producer Paul, Mission controlled decand most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know. No Paul, just as an aside here,
your nickname is very appropriate for today's episode. We for
anyone who doesn't check the title of the podcast before listening,
(02:08):
we are as a species returning to the Moon. It's
been a huge stream. About twenty one million Americans are
convinced that never happened, right, correct, So take that with
a grain of salt. We have some recent developments here
in twenty nineteen that were a long time in the making.
(02:30):
Humanities study the Moon dates back way before recorded history,
and it was only as recently as the nineteen sixties. Again,
if you believe the official story that we actually managed
to send bona fide, genuine human beings to the lunar surface,
and then after a few manned moon missions, we just stopped.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
Yeah, we were done. We found everything we needed to find.
You know, the castles and extraterrestrios, moon bases on there
were kept under wraps successfully. So yeah, we didn't need
to do anything else.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
And the mainstream narrative, of course, would be the tremendous
cost involved with every Moon launch across every imaginable industry
you could think of. But still, we can understand how
it seems strange to achieve something so breathtaking and then
just stop, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, so
(03:26):
this situation seemed set to be the new normal that
we would forever be in a near Earth orbit limbo. Right,
We'd have tons of spy satellites, we'd have those things
that can drop what is it a rod, like a
titanium rod. Have you guys heard of these?
Speaker 3 (03:44):
No? Yeah, like a rail gun.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
It would just drop a rod from space onto a
target and would hit with such enormous force that it
would it would be like a nuclear bomb.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Yeah, it's a rail bomb. That's that's scary.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
Yeah, so it would just detonate on him. I don't know,
it doesn't just detonate at all. It would just wreck shop. Yeah,
it would just knock the heck out of something.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
Yeah, dude, And well yea, it is weird to think
that humans have stayed in that near Earth orbit for
all this time. If people go into space, it's right outside.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
And yeah, and it's very bad for you to live
in such low gravity, right, But be that as it may.
Aside from the few experiments that we had ongoing, and
don't get us wrong, folks, these are amazing innovative things.
The International Space Station is one of the most important
(04:36):
structures humanity has ever built. But it looked like that
was going to be it for us, that we were
just going to be caught in this cosmic purgatory, until
the situation began to change, especially in January of twenty nineteen,
when China announced that it had successfully landed a probe
on the far side of the Moon, or you know,
(04:58):
we sometimes call it the dark side. Far side of
the moon is the hemisphere that never faces us. We're
not on speaking terms with it due to the Moon's rotation.
Sometimes we call it the dark side of the moon
because that sounds, let's be honest, incredibly cool. But it
receives just as much sunlight as the side that faces us.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
All that what that just destroys all of my.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Well let down think Floyd lied to us.
Speaker 4 (05:24):
They did, they did, oh me, as my mother would say,
they didn't let the truth stand in the way of
a good story or concept album.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Yeah, I've heard that too. So what are the facts
about this thing? This probably popped up in most people's
news feeds. But what actually happened.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
Well, it's part of something called the Change Program and
it's been going on for quite a while now. But
the Changy four, the fourth, I guess phase of this program,
it achieved the first soft land ending on the dark
side of the moon on January third, twenty nineteen. That's
this year, not that long ago actually, And what was
(06:08):
this thing? Is that what you're asking? What was this? Well,
it was a relay satellite, a lunar lander, and a
rover named YouTube two is.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Utu, yeah exactly, which has the amazing translation.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Of jade rabbit.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Second Jade Rabbit, yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Well, and YouTube of this Jade Rabbit is actually a
pet to Changi, which was a goddess, a moon goddess
or is the moon goddess? Yes?
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Yeah, and Chinese mythology, so we see it's three different components.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Right.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
First, they have to get the relay satellite up there.
That is step one, because direct communication with Earth is
impossible on the far side of the Moon because there's
an entire moon in the way.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
So communications have to hit this relay satellite and it's
placed in a location that has a clear view of
landed area and planet Earth.
Speaker 3 (07:03):
Nice good planning, so you know, we're we're not joking
at all about it, but it just we forget maybe
sometimes how much planning and ridiculous math that it takes
to do any one of these things, and then to
have all of them work in concert like this, It's
an incredible feat.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Boggles the mind. It is not an improv exercise for sure.
On May twentieth, twenty eighteen, the China National Space Administration
or SINSA, launched the Magpie Bridge relay satellite to Halo
orbit around the Earth Moon L two point. This was
the first step, and the relay satellite was based on
(07:44):
another earlier satellites design. We can tell you some of
the stats about it if you would like to hear them.
First off, it's incredibly heavy. It's nine hundred and thirty
seven pounds or for the rest of the world four
hundred and twenty five kilograms. It's heavy, man, it is heavy.
I mean, I guess it's not heavy in space, but
(08:04):
it seems like a lot to get up there, you know.
And it's not that large, right.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Yeah, But it does have a nice big old antenna
that's four point two meters or fourteen feet for us,
and it receives the it receives X band signals from
the lander again, and then it sends them down to Earth.
Pretty cool stuff, and I guess it can also send
information the other way if need be. And the relay
satellite has some help up there with a form of
(08:33):
two micro satellites, which is super cool in my opinion.
It's I don't know how anybody they are, but it's
just a cool idea of a micro satellite working in
conjunction with these. It's called the Dragon River one, Dragon
River two, or long Jang and the first one that
they sent up there, Long Jang one, was unsuccessful, but
the second iteration made it and is still going strong.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Nice cute as a button. Can you imagine the Pixar
stories that will spring from them? Oh?
Speaker 4 (09:01):
Man, an anthropomorphized microsatellite sounds, They're like.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Oh, in the it's like a brother and sister.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
With Wally and that whole universe.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
Yeah, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
And they just want to help out the rover. We
have a little bit of information about the lander and
the rover, but it's it's somewhat limited. As you can understand,
the government wouldn't want to advertise any of the really
cool spooky stuff, right. So the lander has two cameras,
one for just landing and one for terrain. As a spectrometer,
(09:35):
it has something I had not heard of, a neutron dosimeter,
and perhaps most interestingly, it has something called the lunar
micro ecosystem. This is so, this is mind blowing to me.
We've done experiments like this before our species, I mean,
but this is a little bit different. It's a sealed
(09:57):
biosphere that has seeds and insect and it's meant to
measure their growth and development in space space space space.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
And specifically on the Moon and specifically on the Moon.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Can we grow things on the moon? Huge question. They
have seeds of potatoes and a small flowering plant called arabidopsis.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Yep, you got this, Ben, that's actually that's it.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
I don't know you said got a pregnant positive.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
It was the second part of the of the of
the name. I figured it was Arapidosis speculorum.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Yeah right, No, No, I think it's just arabidopsis. And
I'm probably mispronouncing.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
It was that upward inflection that like had me on
the edge of my seat.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
It was that word was like an obstacle course that
I accidentally and blindly ran through it. Right, do you
think so we'll see aribidopsis.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yeah, it's a small flowering plant. It belongs to the
mustard family. And the insect eggs were actually so worm cocoons.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Very nice. Now we mentioned those two cameras, you can
already see images. I guess it's a video that is
just an image sequence of the lander actually landing, and
it's always I mean, that's always fun to watch, and
it will be scoured over by the internet just for
the for the rest what fifty hundred years.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
I go see the pixels.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
Yeah, exactly, exactly, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
You're absolutely right. This mission was originally scheduled for December
twenty fifteen. It is meant to explore and assess this
unexplored region of the Moon, which is near the South Pole,
and the aim here is to learn more about the
age of the area and then to facilitate the construction
of technology needed to create a successful lunar colony. Right,
(11:49):
we've talked about it. We've talked about it. I cannot
wait to go. Oh my gosh, it's going to be dangerous.
It's going to be not the most luxurious place to live.
But wouldn't you go? Would you go? Would you go
to a moon colony? No? Why not?
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Not?
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Unless?
Speaker 4 (12:06):
I like, not, unless stuff got so bad here that
it was like an absolute thing that was gonna save
min in my family's life.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
I'm a big old whimp, you guys.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
Not just to get in early, it's gonna say, not
just to visit at Like.
Speaker 4 (12:17):
Flying to Los Angeles it takes like five hours and
then my legs get really stiff.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
Going to the Moon. That just sounds like a nightmare.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
How long would it take?
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Do we know this?
Speaker 1 (12:27):
It takes about three days for a spacecraft to reach
the Moon.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
With current technology.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Man, f that noise?
Speaker 1 (12:34):
But are you serious?
Speaker 4 (12:36):
Sorry, I'm such a spoilsports Oh it does sound amazing,
And you know, maybe if I had the opportunity, I
might rethink it.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Right now, just being a curmudgeon.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Would feel like you would have fomo.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
I'm a space cugget, you know, I would have that
about me. You know that about me.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
What if it was a huge spacecraft that's just ostensibly
a conspiracy cruise that you got to take.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
I don't know, man, I would be paranoid that we
would just one would of course correct us and we
ended up going into the sun.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
They still haven't figured out who drilled that hole in
the ISS exactly.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
Oh that's true. Well, you know I would have to
just say in answer to your question, I would do
pretty much anything to be able to follow in Doc
Rendezvous shoes.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
Yes. Oh, we also have new T shirt out really cool.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
I didn't even know what a pocket tea was.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
It's apparently a T where the design is like where.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
The pocket goes. Yes, as advertised. It's really cool.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
So I think our are pals, uh who work with
us in the T shirt department. I think they sensed
our cartoonish excitement over the nickname Doctor buzz Rendezvous, right,
So now we have a shirt about it.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
Yeah, And you can check out our tea public stores
at t public dot com slash std wyt k and
there's an array of cool new design and now that
I'm looking at that I haven't seen before, so check
it out. This is new doc Rindevisure. It's not up yet,
but be looking for it in the near future.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yes, good save And in the future, let's look at
what the Chang Gi four expects to accomplish. Ultimately, they
want to do stuff that sets them up for success
later on in this mission, which is an ongoing Star
Trek esque thing. First, this rover will measure the chemical
(14:22):
compositions of lunar rocks and soils. It'll measure lunar surface temperature.
While it's out in the field. It will carry out
low frequency radio astronomical observation and research using a radio telescope,
which right now is going to be the envy of
every astronomer on this planet because it is one of
the quietest places to use this sort of telescope.
Speaker 3 (14:45):
Yeah, and what a cool idea, just to get as
a little interference as necessary. The next thing, the next
two things actually looking at cosmic rays. That's cool, some
powerful thing cosmic rays. And then to study the solar
corona and investigate the radiation that's coming off of the
(15:06):
Sun and specifically to explore coronal mass ejections.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Which is one of your favorite doomsday scenario.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Yeah, exactly, So thank you, Thank you everyone involved in
this project for studying those, because I do feel like
that's gonna be one thing that causes a massive issue
at some point on this planet in the next one
hundred years.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Now. We did a video on this a while back,
but could you remind everybody what a CME is or
maybe just what it does.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
Oh? Sure.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
It's a massive charged particles that get ejected from the
Sun and they just head outwards, and if they head
towards the Earth and they happen to run into Earth,
they can do a lot of things. One of the
biggest things is that they affect. They have an effect
that's kind of like what you hear as in what
is it emp? Electromagnetic pulse kind of thing where it
(16:00):
will fry circuits essentially and just destroy anything that's electronic.
Speaker 4 (16:05):
And a call back to our pal Josh Clark's End
of the World show, Isn't that a potential existential risk?
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Yes? Yeah, yeah, and it's out there looming. Whenever you
see sun spots like that are aimed at the Earth,
I always think, like, see, I don't even need.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
To get shot into the Sun with a spaceship to
get fried by its mighty rays.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Here in the United States, the sun shoots you exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
That's good.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
That was my Russian nailed. The United States to nailed.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
It's little more Brooklyn than Russia.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
I don't know what it was.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Siberia Brooklyn, Yeah, sure, Siberia by way of Brooklyn, Brooklyn.
So this this is important stuff, right, And I think
did we mention that CMEs have occurred like in Canada,
I think in the nineteen eighties.
Speaker 3 (16:48):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's there's have been some recorded instances
of a CME, and probably over the span of humanity
there have been CMEs that have occurred that we just
didn't understand what they were the time, and they had
some weird effects. Didn't have so many transistors and you
know CPUs back in the day that would be affected fully.
Electrical systems like long wires that carry electricity, they can
(17:13):
be affected as well.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. The thing that makes the far side
of the Moon so attractive is the same thing that
makes it so difficult to get to her to communicate
with It's tough. You have to use that relay satellite.
But the scientific payoff is huge, According to Tong Hi Liu,
(17:38):
deputy director of the Lunar Exploration and Space Programs Center
for the China National Space Administration, against the far side
of the Moon is shielded from electromagnetic interference from Earth,
making it an ideal place to research the space environment
and solar bursts, and the probe can listen to the
deeper reaches of the cosmos. They're bearing the lead a
(18:00):
little bit here because for any fans of extraterrestrials UFO
exploration in the audience, that is a clear indication that
they may may be capable of sensing some signal that
would not ordinarily be within our means to differentiate from
(18:23):
the background noise.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Yeah, dude, Oh that's really cool. And it will be
of course gray aliens from Andromeda most likely, of course,
of course, and or reptilians from a different.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Galaxy also Andromeda.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Okay, okay, right, I'm seriously, I really.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
Hope I feel like the reptilians from some galaxy called like,
you know, some weird name and then a number, you know,
like oh sure Prcus nine.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
Oh my gosh, thought, yes, oh they're from the Draco
oh consolation, right, got it got.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
It obviously, right, Ye. So, as we could assume from
the name, the Changi four represents one of several steps
in China's Lunar Exploration Program or KLEP. It's a series
of robotic by which we mean unmanned missions to the
lunar surface, and the name, as we had mentioned before,
(19:24):
pays homage to a Chinese goddess of the moon. The
program spans multiple years. It's meant to be conducted in
three phases of incremental technological advancement. You know, Changi four
is one in an iteration that doesn't end with four,
and it's kind of like HEINZ fifty seven, except there
(19:46):
really are fifty six other varieties, right. And the first
thing they did was just to reach lunar orbit. They said,
let's just get something to orbit the Moon without completely
screwing it up.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
Yeah, And they did the twelve years ago, almost in
two thousand and seven, with.
Speaker 1 (20:07):
The Chongi one, and its job was pretty simple. It
was a success. It was such a success that it
overstayed it's welcome. It stayed in orbit until March of
two thousand and nine, and then they launched the chong
E two which is a pretty interesting, pretty interesting thing,
because it didn't just do a typical lunar orbit.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Did it. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:30):
So the chong E two was an updated version of
its predecessor with a lot of tech improvements, things like
better onboard cameras, and the satellite is currently in deep
space as we speak and expected to return to Earth
sometime in or around twenty twenty nine, which is a
very futuristic sounding date.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
When you say it out loud, it really is.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, but nineteen ninety nine used to sound equally astonishing.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Well, you know, hindsight is twenty twenty Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Go, it's twenty twenty nine. So this is neat because
it's traveling. The experiment here is to send this thing
on a very far orbit and then have it return
right And if we can, if our species can establish
this proof of concept, then we will also be able
to potentially in the future send people further out. Yeah,
(21:25):
if that fad ever comes back in style. The second
phase is the land and rove around on the Moon,
as Changi three did in twenty thirteen and Changi four
did in January twenty nineteen. The chang E three in
twenty thirteen became the first object to land on the
Moon since the Soviet Union's Luna twenty four in nineteen
(21:46):
seventy six. Officially, this objective of this was to achieve
China's first soft landing and rover exploration on the Moon,
as well as again demonstrate develop technology for future missions.
It did a lot of lunar surveying. It measured the
lunar crust to a depth of several hundred meters. It
(22:07):
also discovered a new type of rock. So go you
number three.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
That's sweet, nice word chaining you three.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
I have a quick question for you guys.
Speaker 4 (22:14):
Yeah, you talked about the idea of sending humans to
outer space as being like a fad, and I think
that's funny and also true because we think of that
being the only way to do space or exploration. But
obviously the technology is such that we don't have to
risk the human lives to do the work and get
the data. Is can you think of a reason why
it would become back in style or you know, like
(22:36):
important for the mission to send humans rather than a
rovers and you know, other remote controlled things.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
To construct the lunar colony and then eventually have all
of the colonists there unless we were doing a full
AI colony, which could be interesting.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
So it would be more like construction stuff.
Speaker 4 (22:53):
I mean, like, you know, there's really no reason to
have humans out there digging for samples when you can
have like a robot do it just as effectively, if
not more so, right.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Right, One of the big pieces here would also be
having it would also be the advantage of having a
person on the ground to repair machinery, which alloid machines
can't quite do yet. But ultimately, the whole goal with
sending people up there and exploratory occupations is to build,
as you said, Matt, a lasting non earth presence for
(23:25):
humanity to start to seed the Solar System and then
later maybe eventually the galaxy, unless that already happened before
and we are an unknowing results or consequence of that
earlier action.
Speaker 3 (23:37):
It's been happened in since nineteen forty seven, my brother.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Cool bro. You ever tried dmt oh several times big
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This and the slant rhyme here Spidium segue would be
hot takes, cool vapes, rare steaks deep space. And the
third step in this plan is to collect lunar samples
from the near side of the Moon and send them
back to Earth. It just going in uh. This is
(25:54):
a task for Change five and the Change six missions,
and they get more and more advanced eventually. So the
big game changers are going to be Chang E seven
and eight, because CHANGI eight will hopefully include a three
D printing mechanism to begin fabricating structures that people will
(26:17):
eventually live in on the Moon, and it, like its predecessor,
will carry a small sealed ecosystem with it to see
how things grow over the long term. This is meant
to bring people. Initially it'll be scientists, but eventually it
will just be a breeding population to bring human beings
(26:38):
to the Moon and build a permanent outpost somewhere near
the lunar south Pole. Overall, this seems to be a
well planned out, ambitious yet reasoned push to expand human knowledge.
China came very late to the space race. Their first
satellite was launched in nineteen seventy, well after human beings
officially landed on the Moon, but China has invested billions
(27:01):
of dollars in the space race ever since. And it
shows go humanity, right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Go humanity. Let's all get to the Moon first and
build a base first.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
Right. Some critics believe there's more to the story, and
here's where it gets crazy. Yeah, the KLEP program has
raised alarms in other space programs NASA, Jackson so on,
as well as countries across the planet, and with good reason.
This isn't just paranoid Cold war thinking. It goes back
to what we would call the militarization of space, which
(27:35):
is against the closest thing we have to global law, right.
And the problem is that a lot of the things
you could develop for peaceful exploration are also things you
could use for non peaceful purposes. It's called dual use technology.
So when you guys remember back when, back when there
was that cover story about the existence of weapons of
(27:59):
mass destruction to justify adventurism in the Middle.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
East, what that happened.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Well, one of the big concerns there was the idea
of dual use technology. The same enrichment process you use
to build a relatively safe nuclear power plant is the
same enrichment process you use to build weapons. But the
only thing that really changes is the number of iterations,
(28:26):
right that the number of times you go through that process.
And in a way, space technology is similar. Although laws
prevent the militarization of space, these are pretty tough to enforce, right,
I mean, what are you gonna, what are you gonna
You're gonna send the cops, Yeah, the space cops. We
don't even have Space Force.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yet, not yet. Did you have about the Steve Carrell
show Space Forces?
Speaker 3 (28:48):
It gonna be like the Office, but in space, I
hear tell, And I'm trying not to get too excited about.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
Why isn't that just the Orville?
Speaker 4 (28:55):
I think the Orville is much more of a Star Trek. Yeah,
I've heard it's great, so I haven't seen it.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
I've seen it's good, So this will just be the
Office in space.
Speaker 4 (29:02):
That's what I thought. That was the one line pitch.
That's obviously the lowest hanging fruit type show for Steve
Carell to do.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
But I don't know. I'm intrigued.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
I'll check it out. I'll check it out. Let us
know if you think it's going to be a bomb
or if you think it's it's going to be a
new age in space based comedy, I think TV shows.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
True Detective season three.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Oh yeah, are you caught up?
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Dude?
Speaker 1 (29:27):
It's really good.
Speaker 3 (29:28):
It is.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
It's really really good. Because I did not like the
second season. It lost me and I wanted to like it.
I was really trepidacious about season three. But I think
it's fantastic.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
People would have liked the second season if it was
not built as True Detective season two, if it had
just been like, look at Vince Vaughan again, looking as
though he needs to sleep, which is how Vince Vaughn
often looks. He's a hard working guy. He's a hard
working dude. So one way nations have historically tried to
(29:58):
ease these tensions, you know, try to relax and chill
out a bit, is through scientific collaboration, international assistance, with research,
funding and manufacturing. We see this happen in Antarctica in
the South Pole. Here researchers stay at the compounds of
other nations all the time. Right, That's why we did
that episode, didn't we on what happens if someone commits
(30:19):
a murder into Antarctica? Yeah, it gets complicated. We did that,
ridiculous history, We did that, Okay, so it is worth
checking out. The answer is not simple. The problem here
is that we can't have the scientific collaboration that eases
concerns about dual use technology because there's a US law
(30:41):
from twenty eleven that bans any official contact with Chinese
space officials. This exacerbates the already thick tensions and miasma
of mistrust.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
Wow, And that is why in recent history, Vice President
Michael Pence he went to the Pentagon. This was in
January as well, and he accused China and Russia of
developing technologies and weapons to target US satellites and working
to bring new weapons of war into space itself.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
Yeah, nobody acts aggressively on their own right. We're always
acting in defense of something.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
Why would you guys take weapons of mass destruction into
space while we're doing it too, I'm just kidding. I
have no proof that we're doing that, but it.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Leads to ulterior motives. Well, I mean, what is the
X thirty seven B doing up there right? That is
the unmanned spacecraft that has orbited for more than one
hundred and eighty days before No one officially knows what
it's doing. So what if there are ulterior motives to
the newest the newest fouries into space by China, what
are they to quote Tom Waits building up there. This
(31:55):
builds on the concern about the militarization of space and
the next question becomes more specific, what are they making?
One guess would be a potentially massive resource mining business,
because China could potentially make an enormous windfall by transporting
fusion ready helium three. This is something that was new
(32:15):
to me. Were you guys aware of this?
Speaker 3 (32:17):
We I believe we talked about it on a Moon
episode a while ago, or with the Mars episode, maybe
with Marshall Brain I can't remember, or maybe I've just
learned about this. God, I don't know. I thought I
talked with you about this. Ben Helium three a massive
source for future fuel, like what we're going to probably
be using, and the Moon has a whole heck of
(32:38):
a lot of it. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Helium three is a is a very tasty nuclear fuel
because there are no neutrons generated as a product of
the reaction, and the protons that do get generated have charge,
and they can be safely contained using electromagnetic fields. So yeah,
I think you are right. We did talk a little
bit about this. Maybe the good mister brain people once
(33:02):
imagine that Saturn or Jupiter would be the right place
to get your hands on some helium three. But now
it looks like China has their site set on the Moon,
and we have a quote about how much stuff might
be up there.
Speaker 4 (33:19):
This comes from Extreme Tech, and it says although the
Sun dispenses ample amounts of helium three wherever it blows,
the Earth is largely shielded from this windfall by its
own magnetic field, and the little we do have is
mostly generated by various terrestrial processes like cosmic ray bombardment
and even relic sources from leftover nuclear warheads. The Moon,
(33:41):
on the other hand, is a far more concentrated depot,
with up to five million tons conveniently embedded in its
top surface layer.
Speaker 1 (33:50):
So it's not even that difficult to mine it.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
No, no, it's not buried deep.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
In the lunar surface.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
But guys, you're changing the Moon if you take that
stuff off. You know what I'm saying, like an escape.
If you mind enough of this helium three, what are
you going to do to the not only the composition
of the moon, but also, oh, I don't know the
mass of the moon. If we mind it the way
we you know, we take down trees in the Amazon, like,
(34:17):
good lord, we're gonna have a hollow moon.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
You know, I get the feeling that you're thirty percent joking, yes,
but seventy percent raising a legit concern, right, Yeah, it's true.
It's that that's one ulterior motive, and it's potentially it
potentially could be an ecological disaster or an astronomical disaster,
(34:44):
perhaps because you know, I wonder would they ever actually
mind so much of a resource off the moon? Would
humanity ever mind so much of a thing off the
Moon that it does affect its mass and its orbit.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
I can't imagine that it would happen anytime in the
near future, and by that I mean hundreds and hundreds
of years. But still we would be mining it for
a while. Why would we stop mining it unless we
could at least prove that, oh, it's gonna crash into
the Earth now, or you know, we're gonna change the
tide's X amount because of this. And I can't even
(35:22):
imagine helium having enough of an effect on any of
that stuff just with the amount of mass it has
in volume all.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
That, But what if that's a What if that's a
cover story as well? What if the mining is cover story?
What if they're looking for something else. According to one
of the United Kingdom's favorite tabloids, The Sun, last year
twenty eighteen, a guy named Carl Wolf, the technician at
the Air Force Tactical Air Command Headquarters in Langley, Virginia,
(35:50):
claim to have discovered artificial structures on the far side
of the Moon.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
Go on.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
They found strange shapes and images taken by the Lunar
Reconnaissance Orbiter, a probe that circled the Moon since back
in nine and according to Wolf, these were structures that
were definitely not created by natural means such as meteors
or ancient collisions with other heavenly bodies. He believes that
the structures were quote created by intelligent beings. Most noticeable
(36:19):
was what looked like radar antenna is very similar to
what you could see on Earth.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
Hold on, Yeah, what is going on here? This is
a gentleman that appears to have some credentials from the
Air Force Tactical Air Command Headquarters that is saying these
things nol.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Why Noel?
Speaker 3 (36:40):
What does that mean? We've been here before? Someone has
been here before and set up all of like maybe
a base is already there. What what is happening to you? Guys?
Speaker 1 (36:52):
I you know what, I'm gonna let that simmer because
I have an update for that, but I was I
wanted to save it for the end of the day show.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (37:00):
Okay, okay, it's going be a weird update for everybody
to know going in. It's going to be a weird one.
But for now, let's just remember that Carl Wolf, technician
Air Force Tactical Air Command, totally believes there are structures
of some sort that did not occur naturally that exist
on the far side.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
Of the Moon, and they have evidence from pictures.
Speaker 1 (37:21):
Yes, and has, in his opinion, visual evidence.
Speaker 4 (37:25):
Oh guys, let's take a quick pause and then have
a word from our sponsor, and we're back with more
for you about returning to the Moon.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
There are other people who argue that maybe we're opening
a door we shouldn't open. There are some conspiracy theorists
who say that the probe could put us all in
mortal danger, arguing that alien races living on the Moon
to go with us here for a second, could see
the landing as an act of war against their space,
(38:00):
potentially with devastating consequences. Other people believe that the dark
side of the Moon is peppered by craters left by
secret NASA military bombings.
Speaker 3 (38:10):
Okay, bombing.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Wait, you mean like from when we tried to blow
up the moon, Yeah, or.
Speaker 3 (38:17):
When we tried to blow up the alien races that
are living.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (38:21):
Oh no, no, no.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
But there's that whole story where we were trying to
intimidate other countries by shooting missiles of the Moon that
would make a big cloud that they could see to
demonstrate our superiority.
Speaker 2 (38:29):
Didn't Is this that I make this opposite?
Speaker 1 (38:31):
No, that's true. That's the thing that really happened. It
never got past the planning stages. But that's what it's rights.
That's what mister Show was referencing and their famous blow
up the Moon sketch.
Speaker 4 (38:40):
So you're saying, there are craters that possibly were left
by some version of what we're talking about that did happen.
Speaker 1 (38:47):
People, there are people who believe it. Yes, that's interesting.
I myself, it's I am of the opinion that it
seems like a lot of trouble to go to, right,
especially given the propaganda you would want to detonate something
like that on the Earth facing side.
Speaker 3 (39:05):
Yeah, but if you were an alien community or in
an extraterrestrial community living, existing on that dark side of
the Moon would be pretty advantageous.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Oh yeah, it'd be dope.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
You're not going to be found, You're not getting you know,
you can actually make your own radio programs and not
get interrupted by all the noise.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
This this theory first arose in two thousand and nine
after NASA deliberately fired a rocket and satellite into the
lunar surface. They said it was an attempt to kick
up moon dust so they could analyze this debris from
Earth and determine if the Moon held any water. So
that's that's their that's their story, all right, Matt, Matt, Yeah,
(39:51):
are you over the lies of Big NASA?
Speaker 3 (39:53):
No, it's just not as much fun, that's all it is.
We're gonna look at a cloud, study its content.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
But it's important if you want to build a colony
on the Moon. This is the more long term question,
and it reminds us, It reminds me, at least of
that Martial Brain episode where he walked us through his
thought experiment on how to set up a Martian society.
He had some pretty articulated social theories, right, And one
(40:22):
thing that's almost inescapable, whether you're talking the Moon or Mars,
is that after some amount of time, any actual self
sustaining non Earth colony will eventually inevitably become an independent entity,
kind of like the colonies in North and South America
when it used to be called the New World. The
(40:42):
cost of transportation and governance eventually became too high for
the European powers, and the terrestrial overlords of the future
will also have a tough time maintaining control unless they
bake in some specific, unchangeable dependencies. They probably want rule
the Moon for long. Maybe they would have to do
(41:03):
something like be the gatekeepers of food supply, right, or
be able to turn off the air or something.
Speaker 3 (41:10):
Yeah, but then that all changes as soon as the
colony is self sustaining and you're growing plants and some
kind of biosphere thing, you know, I mean, quickly the
colony becomes in control of itself.
Speaker 1 (41:23):
Yeah, if the colony doesn't collapse under its own the
weight of its own social functioning, right, I mean, look,
we've all seen Biodome. It is a harrowing exploration of
the human psyche.
Speaker 3 (41:36):
It really is almost the documentary.
Speaker 1 (41:39):
Almost its documentary. I believe the future will prove it
to be so, right, I.
Speaker 3 (41:44):
Squeeze the juice, wheeze the juice or whatever.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
He's still out there.
Speaker 2 (41:49):
He's wheezing the juice to this day. So there was
from Encino Man too, But I know I don't through.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
Both of those. Yeah, didn't just have the set catchphrases
that he said in every film.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
No, I don't think so.
Speaker 4 (42:03):
I think Wee's in the Juice was pretty specifically, and
in the Sino Man when they go to the convenience
store and they terrorized that poor clerk by whueezing the jews,
which is basically theft because they're just stealing slurpy juice
and it's very unsanitary. He's just putting his mouth right
on the slurpy nepple.
Speaker 3 (42:19):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (42:20):
But they probably faked a lot of that, right. The
cashier was a paid actor. They didn't actually break into
a thing.
Speaker 2 (42:27):
What you're saying, Sina Man wasn't a documentary.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
Then it's not. No, it's a speculative nonfiction. I see
if that feels better. This leads us to one of
the last questions about the lunar landing in the Chinese
Lunar Landing project, which is, of course we all saw
this coming, did they fake it? The rumors about a
hoax were started by a guy named Scott C. Warring
of UFO Sightings Daily, and he said, I guess China
(42:53):
may have decided since NASA faked the first Apollo moon
landing and got away with it, then China won it
in on it too. And he supports his evidence by
doing the same thing that Carl Wolf did, which is saying,
look at the original photo. You'll see there are no
other lines in the entire giant panoramic photo. OMG, this
(43:13):
is so very disappointing. Note the lack of moon rocks
on the entire surface of the Moon, which is exactly
what the first Apollo moon landing also showed a sign
of being faked on a stage. What I know. For him,
this is like a smoking smoking gun. And as we
mentioned before, a lot of people, a surprising amount of
(43:35):
people got behind this, because you know, twenty one million
people in the US alone still believe the moon landings
were faked for one reason or another. And if you
were one of those twenty one million people, we'd love
to hear your story. You can write to us directly.
You can find us on the Instagrams, the twitters and
the facebooks. But where does this leave us? All? Now?
Speaker 2 (43:58):
Here?
Speaker 1 (43:58):
We are now, it's the twenty nineteen is we record this?
Things are about to go. Nuts and bananas on our
nearest rocky relative out there.
Speaker 3 (44:08):
In orbit, Nuts and bananas on the moon.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Nuts and bananas on the moon.
Speaker 3 (44:13):
Yeah, We've never thought about pairing those with the cheese
unless it was like a fine breeze. Maybe moon cheese. Yeah,
isn't the Moon made out of cheese?
Speaker 4 (44:22):
Well, moon cheese is a very specific snack available at
your local Starbucks and health food stores.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
I think yeah, And the moon is probably made out
of cheese with very high helium three content. So I
don't know what side of the argument that puts you
on map that. I just want you to be aware
of that.
Speaker 3 (44:42):
Okay, thank you, absolutely no, but you're right, Yes, it's
going it's gonna get very busy up on the moon.
And it's cool to think that in the next twenty years,
Like the timelines that are mapped out for the Chengi
I guess the program and then as well as the
United State, it's trying to get up there. It's around
twenty thirty something, I think when all this stuff will
(45:03):
be completed. If you look at the US and China,
that's not that far away, and we could possibly see
lunar colonies. That is still mind blowing to me. But
all kidding aside, Beijing is careful distress that everything it's
doing on the Moon at this point and everything that's planning,
(45:24):
it's all peaceful motives. They're doing with peaceful motives in
exploring space. However, I mean, we have to just we
have to remember that the United States used China and
Russia as a potential threat to national security, and that's
why our current president, Donald Trump, he called for the
(45:47):
establishment of a space force by twenty twenty, a Space
Force NOL. That sounds familiar.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
I'm excited about it.
Speaker 1 (45:58):
Yeah. The problem is that most of this stuff, again,
you can say that you're developing it for peaceful means
all the livelong day. It doesn't take away the fact
that one really could turn it into turn some of
these technologies into weapons of war. The US and other
would be space vary nations obviously don't want to be
(46:19):
left out or caught defenseless. That is why on December eleventh,
the forty fifth anniversary the Apollo seventeenth lunar landing aka
the last time people walked on the Moon, President Trump
signed the Space Policy direct of one. It directs NASTAG
to take astronauts to the Moon with the help of
the US commercial space industry. So SpaceX l on Musk,
(46:41):
I'm sure is up in there. Yet there is very
little detail on exactly how and when this might happen
and how much the White House will spend, and in
the meantime, the clock is ticking. Would you like to
hear that last somewhat unpleasant.
Speaker 3 (46:59):
Update, Yes, I do, But I do want to add
this one bit of information that I got from NASA Dokov.
They've got a graphic that has the exploration campaign written
out up until twenty thirty, and it kind of gives
you a timeline. But none of this stuff is solid,
and it's all basically what we hope to achieve, and
(47:19):
you can find it on there.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
When you have to aim for the stars quite literally
in this instance, here's the weird update. That guy Carl
wolf who said that he had seen pictures of a
secret alien base on the Dark side of the Moon
during his time as a sergeant at Langley in nineteen
sixty five. Okay, in I want to say October of
(47:48):
twenty eighteen or somewhere thereabouts. He was killed and was
struck by a tractor trailer riding his bicycle on October tenth, actually,
and police were investigating the incident, but there were no
charges filed. The sheriff refrain from releasing the driver's name.
(48:08):
This is someone who had contacted doctor Stephen Greer as well.
Speaker 2 (48:13):
Our buddy Steve Greer.
Speaker 1 (48:16):
Carl Wolfe was in and of this world, but at
this time authorities do not suspect foul play. Buddy. He did,
unfortunately pass away. So for some people that's going to
indicate that he was a whistleblower. From other people, it's
just going to indicate how dangerous traffic is. The choices
up to you.
Speaker 3 (48:35):
Wow, Well, now I'm going to go and find myself
researching that for the next at least nine hours.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
Yes, sorry, Matt, it's okay. I should have opened with that,
but we want to hear from you do you think
the space race is a noble thing? Do you think
the countries involved are being transparent in their motives? Is
the government of China setting up a massive operation or
something more sinister? Or's this snocuous and everybody's just being alarmist.
(49:05):
We want to hear from you. Find us on Instagram, Facebook,
and Twitter. You can see our community page. Here's where
it gets crazy, where you will meet our favorite part
of the show, your fellow listeners.
Speaker 4 (49:16):
If you want to get up in me and Ben's
personal business, you can check me out at Embryonic Insider
on Instagram.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
And I am at Ben Bolan on Instagram in a
burst of creativity.
Speaker 3 (49:26):
And you will never find me on Instagram.
Speaker 2 (49:29):
I can't even find you.
Speaker 3 (49:30):
I have an account, but you'll never find it.
Speaker 2 (49:33):
That's very on brand for Matt Frederick, though I appreciate
that about you.
Speaker 3 (49:36):
I'm only kidding. It's like my name hsw or something.
You can find it, but you know, don't follow me
or whatever you do on Instagram.
Speaker 4 (49:43):
Follow yourself, Follow you, okay, follow your rs and your
nose to the delicious taste of fruit loops.
Speaker 3 (49:49):
You can also and that's the end of this classic episode.
If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode,
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We are conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 3 (50:14):
Stuff they Don't want you to Know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Fellow conspiracy realist and space nerds alike. This is a
fantastic classic episode. It's about one of the most extra
things human beings have ever done, which is going to
the moon. Yes, there are problems on Earth, but Matt,
why do we go to the moon?
Speaker 2 (00:17):
Why do we go to the moon?
Speaker 1 (00:20):
Why?
Speaker 3 (00:21):
Besides the helium and it's cool, and because we do
the things because they're hard, not because they're easy.
Speaker 1 (00:28):
Not because it is easy, but because it is hod.
Speaker 3 (00:31):
Yeah, well, it's crazy to think. We did this episode
in twenty nineteen when there was major news about China
one of China's moon missions that they were completing, and
as we're recording this in June twenty twenty four, another
one of China's moon missions successfully is functioning right there
on the Moon right now. You can read about it
(00:53):
in the New York Times and The Verge everywhere. It's
the lunar race that we've talked about before is.
Speaker 1 (01:01):
Ongoing, and this episode provides a bit of context. One
thing we can say for sure is that there is
more news ahead. Civilization has technically become a bunch of lunatics,
from UFOs to psychic powers and government conspiracies. History is
(01:23):
riddled with unexplained events. You can turn back now or
learn this stuff they don't want you to know.
Speaker 3 (01:42):
Welcome back to the show. My name is Matt, my
name is Noel.
Speaker 1 (01:45):
They call me Ben. We are joined with our super
producer Paul, Mission controlled decand most importantly, you are you.
You are here, and that makes this stuff they don't
want you to know. No Paul, just as an aside here,
your nickname is very appropriate for today's episode. We for
anyone who doesn't check the title of the podcast before listening,
(02:08):
we are as a species returning to the Moon. It's
been a huge stream. About twenty one million Americans are
convinced that never happened, right, correct, So take that with
a grain of salt. We have some recent developments here
in twenty nineteen that were a long time in the making.
(02:30):
Humanities study the Moon dates back way before recorded history,
and it was only as recently as the nineteen sixties. Again,
if you believe the official story that we actually managed
to send bona fide, genuine human beings to the lunar surface,
and then after a few manned moon missions, we just stopped.
Speaker 3 (02:52):
Yeah, we were done. We found everything we needed to find.
You know, the castles and extraterrestrios, moon bases on there
were kept under wraps successfully. So yeah, we didn't need
to do anything else.
Speaker 1 (03:05):
And the mainstream narrative, of course, would be the tremendous
cost involved with every Moon launch across every imaginable industry
you could think of. But still, we can understand how
it seems strange to achieve something so breathtaking and then
just stop, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah, so
(03:26):
this situation seemed set to be the new normal that
we would forever be in a near Earth orbit limbo. Right,
We'd have tons of spy satellites, we'd have those things
that can drop what is it a rod, like a
titanium rod. Have you guys heard of these?
Speaker 3 (03:44):
No? Yeah, like a rail gun.
Speaker 1 (03:47):
It would just drop a rod from space onto a
target and would hit with such enormous force that it
would it would be like a nuclear bomb.
Speaker 3 (03:56):
Yeah, it's a rail bomb. That's that's scary.
Speaker 4 (03:58):
Yeah, so it would just detonate on him. I don't know,
it doesn't just detonate at all. It would just wreck shop. Yeah,
it would just knock the heck out of something.
Speaker 3 (04:07):
Yeah, dude, And well yea, it is weird to think
that humans have stayed in that near Earth orbit for
all this time. If people go into space, it's right outside.
Speaker 1 (04:16):
And yeah, and it's very bad for you to live
in such low gravity, right, But be that as it may.
Aside from the few experiments that we had ongoing, and
don't get us wrong, folks, these are amazing innovative things.
The International Space Station is one of the most important
(04:36):
structures humanity has ever built. But it looked like that
was going to be it for us, that we were
just going to be caught in this cosmic purgatory, until
the situation began to change, especially in January of twenty nineteen,
when China announced that it had successfully landed a probe
on the far side of the Moon, or you know,
(04:58):
we sometimes call it the dark side. Far side of
the moon is the hemisphere that never faces us. We're
not on speaking terms with it due to the Moon's rotation.
Sometimes we call it the dark side of the moon
because that sounds, let's be honest, incredibly cool. But it
receives just as much sunlight as the side that faces us.
Speaker 3 (05:17):
All that what that just destroys all of my.
Speaker 2 (05:21):
Well let down think Floyd lied to us.
Speaker 4 (05:24):
They did, they did, oh me, as my mother would say,
they didn't let the truth stand in the way of
a good story or concept album.
Speaker 1 (05:33):
Yeah, I've heard that too. So what are the facts
about this thing? This probably popped up in most people's
news feeds. But what actually happened.
Speaker 3 (05:44):
Well, it's part of something called the Change Program and
it's been going on for quite a while now. But
the Changy four, the fourth, I guess phase of this program,
it achieved the first soft land ending on the dark
side of the moon on January third, twenty nineteen. That's
this year, not that long ago actually, And what was
(06:08):
this thing? Is that what you're asking? What was this? Well,
it was a relay satellite, a lunar lander, and a
rover named YouTube two is.
Speaker 4 (06:17):
Utu, yeah exactly, which has the amazing translation.
Speaker 3 (06:20):
Of jade rabbit.
Speaker 2 (06:22):
Second Jade Rabbit, yeah.
Speaker 3 (06:24):
Well, and YouTube of this Jade Rabbit is actually a
pet to Changi, which was a goddess, a moon goddess
or is the moon goddess? Yes?
Speaker 1 (06:34):
Yeah, and Chinese mythology, so we see it's three different components.
Speaker 2 (06:39):
Right.
Speaker 1 (06:40):
First, they have to get the relay satellite up there.
That is step one, because direct communication with Earth is
impossible on the far side of the Moon because there's
an entire moon in the way.
Speaker 3 (06:51):
Yeah, you know what I mean.
Speaker 1 (06:53):
So communications have to hit this relay satellite and it's
placed in a location that has a clear view of
landed area and planet Earth.
Speaker 3 (07:03):
Nice good planning, so you know, we're we're not joking
at all about it, but it just we forget maybe
sometimes how much planning and ridiculous math that it takes
to do any one of these things, and then to
have all of them work in concert like this, It's
an incredible feat.
Speaker 1 (07:22):
Boggles the mind. It is not an improv exercise for sure.
On May twentieth, twenty eighteen, the China National Space Administration
or SINSA, launched the Magpie Bridge relay satellite to Halo
orbit around the Earth Moon L two point. This was
the first step, and the relay satellite was based on
(07:44):
another earlier satellites design. We can tell you some of
the stats about it if you would like to hear them.
First off, it's incredibly heavy. It's nine hundred and thirty
seven pounds or for the rest of the world four
hundred and twenty five kilograms. It's heavy, man, it is heavy.
I mean, I guess it's not heavy in space, but
(08:04):
it seems like a lot to get up there, you know.
And it's not that large, right.
Speaker 3 (08:10):
Yeah, But it does have a nice big old antenna
that's four point two meters or fourteen feet for us,
and it receives the it receives X band signals from
the lander again, and then it sends them down to Earth.
Pretty cool stuff, and I guess it can also send
information the other way if need be. And the relay
satellite has some help up there with a form of
(08:33):
two micro satellites, which is super cool in my opinion.
It's I don't know how anybody they are, but it's
just a cool idea of a micro satellite working in
conjunction with these. It's called the Dragon River one, Dragon
River two, or long Jang and the first one that
they sent up there, Long Jang one, was unsuccessful, but
the second iteration made it and is still going strong.
Speaker 1 (08:55):
Nice cute as a button. Can you imagine the Pixar
stories that will spring from them? Oh?
Speaker 4 (09:01):
Man, an anthropomorphized microsatellite sounds, They're like.
Speaker 3 (09:05):
Oh, in the it's like a brother and sister.
Speaker 2 (09:09):
With Wally and that whole universe.
Speaker 3 (09:11):
Yeah, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1 (09:13):
And they just want to help out the rover. We
have a little bit of information about the lander and
the rover, but it's it's somewhat limited. As you can understand,
the government wouldn't want to advertise any of the really
cool spooky stuff, right. So the lander has two cameras,
one for just landing and one for terrain. As a spectrometer,
(09:35):
it has something I had not heard of, a neutron dosimeter,
and perhaps most interestingly, it has something called the lunar
micro ecosystem. This is so, this is mind blowing to me.
We've done experiments like this before our species, I mean,
but this is a little bit different. It's a sealed
(09:57):
biosphere that has seeds and insect and it's meant to
measure their growth and development in space space space space.
Speaker 3 (10:05):
And specifically on the Moon and specifically on the Moon.
Speaker 1 (10:09):
Can we grow things on the moon? Huge question. They
have seeds of potatoes and a small flowering plant called arabidopsis.
Speaker 2 (10:20):
Yep, you got this, Ben, that's actually that's it.
Speaker 1 (10:25):
I don't know you said got a pregnant positive.
Speaker 2 (10:27):
It was the second part of the of the of
the name. I figured it was Arapidosis speculorum.
Speaker 1 (10:32):
Yeah right, No, No, I think it's just arabidopsis. And
I'm probably mispronouncing.
Speaker 2 (10:38):
It was that upward inflection that like had me on
the edge of my seat.
Speaker 1 (10:41):
It was that word was like an obstacle course that
I accidentally and blindly ran through it. Right, do you
think so we'll see aribidopsis.
Speaker 3 (10:53):
Uh.
Speaker 1 (10:53):
Yeah, it's a small flowering plant. It belongs to the
mustard family. And the insect eggs were actually so worm cocoons.
Speaker 3 (11:01):
Very nice. Now we mentioned those two cameras, you can
already see images. I guess it's a video that is
just an image sequence of the lander actually landing, and
it's always I mean, that's always fun to watch, and
it will be scoured over by the internet just for
the for the rest what fifty hundred years.
Speaker 1 (11:21):
I go see the pixels.
Speaker 3 (11:23):
Yeah, exactly, exactly, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:25):
You're absolutely right. This mission was originally scheduled for December
twenty fifteen. It is meant to explore and assess this
unexplored region of the Moon, which is near the South Pole,
and the aim here is to learn more about the
age of the area and then to facilitate the construction
of technology needed to create a successful lunar colony. Right,
(11:49):
we've talked about it. We've talked about it. I cannot
wait to go. Oh my gosh, it's going to be dangerous.
It's going to be not the most luxurious place to live.
But wouldn't you go? Would you go? Would you go
to a moon colony? No? Why not?
Speaker 3 (12:05):
Not?
Speaker 2 (12:05):
Unless?
Speaker 4 (12:06):
I like, not, unless stuff got so bad here that
it was like an absolute thing that was gonna save
min in my family's life.
Speaker 2 (12:12):
I'm a big old whimp, you guys.
Speaker 3 (12:14):
Not just to get in early, it's gonna say, not
just to visit at Like.
Speaker 4 (12:17):
Flying to Los Angeles it takes like five hours and
then my legs get really stiff.
Speaker 2 (12:22):
Going to the Moon. That just sounds like a nightmare.
Speaker 1 (12:25):
How long would it take?
Speaker 2 (12:26):
Do we know this?
Speaker 1 (12:27):
It takes about three days for a spacecraft to reach
the Moon.
Speaker 3 (12:31):
With current technology.
Speaker 2 (12:32):
Man, f that noise?
Speaker 1 (12:34):
But are you serious?
Speaker 4 (12:36):
Sorry, I'm such a spoilsports Oh it does sound amazing,
And you know, maybe if I had the opportunity, I
might rethink it.
Speaker 2 (12:41):
Right now, just being a curmudgeon.
Speaker 1 (12:43):
Would feel like you would have fomo.
Speaker 2 (12:44):
I'm a space cugget, you know, I would have that
about me. You know that about me.
Speaker 3 (12:49):
What if it was a huge spacecraft that's just ostensibly
a conspiracy cruise that you got to take.
Speaker 4 (12:57):
I don't know, man, I would be paranoid that we
would just one would of course correct us and we
ended up going into the sun.
Speaker 1 (13:03):
They still haven't figured out who drilled that hole in
the ISS exactly.
Speaker 3 (13:06):
Oh that's true. Well, you know I would have to
just say in answer to your question, I would do
pretty much anything to be able to follow in Doc
Rendezvous shoes.
Speaker 1 (13:17):
Yes. Oh, we also have new T shirt out really cool.
Speaker 2 (13:20):
I didn't even know what a pocket tea was.
Speaker 1 (13:22):
It's apparently a T where the design is like where.
Speaker 2 (13:24):
The pocket goes. Yes, as advertised. It's really cool.
Speaker 1 (13:28):
So I think our are pals, uh who work with
us in the T shirt department. I think they sensed
our cartoonish excitement over the nickname Doctor buzz Rendezvous, right,
So now we have a shirt about it.
Speaker 4 (13:43):
Yeah, And you can check out our tea public stores
at t public dot com slash std wyt k and
there's an array of cool new design and now that
I'm looking at that I haven't seen before, so check
it out. This is new doc Rindevisure. It's not up yet,
but be looking for it in the near future.
Speaker 1 (13:56):
Yes, good save And in the future, let's look at
what the Chang Gi four expects to accomplish. Ultimately, they
want to do stuff that sets them up for success
later on in this mission, which is an ongoing Star
Trek esque thing. First, this rover will measure the chemical
(14:22):
compositions of lunar rocks and soils. It'll measure lunar surface temperature.
While it's out in the field. It will carry out
low frequency radio astronomical observation and research using a radio telescope,
which right now is going to be the envy of
every astronomer on this planet because it is one of
the quietest places to use this sort of telescope.
Speaker 3 (14:45):
Yeah, and what a cool idea, just to get as
a little interference as necessary. The next thing, the next
two things actually looking at cosmic rays. That's cool, some
powerful thing cosmic rays. And then to study the solar
corona and investigate the radiation that's coming off of the
(15:06):
Sun and specifically to explore coronal mass ejections.
Speaker 1 (15:11):
Which is one of your favorite doomsday scenario.
Speaker 3 (15:14):
Yeah, exactly, So thank you, Thank you everyone involved in
this project for studying those, because I do feel like
that's gonna be one thing that causes a massive issue
at some point on this planet in the next one
hundred years.
Speaker 1 (15:27):
Now. We did a video on this a while back,
but could you remind everybody what a CME is or
maybe just what it does.
Speaker 2 (15:35):
Oh? Sure.
Speaker 3 (15:36):
It's a massive charged particles that get ejected from the
Sun and they just head outwards, and if they head
towards the Earth and they happen to run into Earth,
they can do a lot of things. One of the
biggest things is that they affect. They have an effect
that's kind of like what you hear as in what
is it emp? Electromagnetic pulse kind of thing where it
(16:00):
will fry circuits essentially and just destroy anything that's electronic.
Speaker 4 (16:05):
And a call back to our pal Josh Clark's End
of the World show, Isn't that a potential existential risk?
Speaker 3 (16:10):
Yes? Yeah, yeah, and it's out there looming. Whenever you
see sun spots like that are aimed at the Earth,
I always think, like, see, I don't even need.
Speaker 4 (16:18):
To get shot into the Sun with a spaceship to
get fried by its mighty rays.
Speaker 3 (16:22):
Here in the United States, the sun shoots you exactly.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
That's good.
Speaker 3 (16:26):
That was my Russian nailed. The United States to nailed.
Speaker 2 (16:29):
It's little more Brooklyn than Russia.
Speaker 3 (16:31):
I don't know what it was.
Speaker 1 (16:33):
Siberia Brooklyn, Yeah, sure, Siberia by way of Brooklyn, Brooklyn.
So this this is important stuff, right, And I think
did we mention that CMEs have occurred like in Canada,
I think in the nineteen eighties.
Speaker 3 (16:48):
Yeah, yeah, yeah, there's there's have been some recorded instances
of a CME, and probably over the span of humanity
there have been CMEs that have occurred that we just
didn't understand what they were the time, and they had
some weird effects. Didn't have so many transistors and you
know CPUs back in the day that would be affected fully.
Electrical systems like long wires that carry electricity, they can
(17:13):
be affected as well.
Speaker 1 (17:15):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely. The thing that makes the far side
of the Moon so attractive is the same thing that
makes it so difficult to get to her to communicate
with It's tough. You have to use that relay satellite.
But the scientific payoff is huge, According to Tong Hi Liu,
(17:38):
deputy director of the Lunar Exploration and Space Programs Center
for the China National Space Administration, against the far side
of the Moon is shielded from electromagnetic interference from Earth,
making it an ideal place to research the space environment
and solar bursts, and the probe can listen to the
deeper reaches of the cosmos. They're bearing the lead a
(18:00):
little bit here because for any fans of extraterrestrials UFO
exploration in the audience, that is a clear indication that
they may may be capable of sensing some signal that
would not ordinarily be within our means to differentiate from
(18:23):
the background noise.
Speaker 3 (18:24):
Yeah, dude, Oh that's really cool. And it will be
of course gray aliens from Andromeda most likely, of course,
of course, and or reptilians from a different.
Speaker 2 (18:38):
Galaxy also Andromeda.
Speaker 3 (18:40):
Okay, okay, right, I'm seriously, I really.
Speaker 4 (18:45):
Hope I feel like the reptilians from some galaxy called like,
you know, some weird name and then a number, you know,
like oh sure Prcus nine.
Speaker 3 (18:55):
Oh my gosh, thought, yes, oh they're from the Draco
oh consolation, right, got it got.
Speaker 1 (19:02):
It obviously, right, Ye. So, as we could assume from
the name, the Changi four represents one of several steps
in China's Lunar Exploration Program or KLEP. It's a series
of robotic by which we mean unmanned missions to the
lunar surface, and the name, as we had mentioned before,
(19:24):
pays homage to a Chinese goddess of the moon. The
program spans multiple years. It's meant to be conducted in
three phases of incremental technological advancement. You know, Changi four
is one in an iteration that doesn't end with four,
and it's kind of like HEINZ fifty seven, except there
(19:46):
really are fifty six other varieties, right. And the first
thing they did was just to reach lunar orbit. They said,
let's just get something to orbit the Moon without completely
screwing it up.
Speaker 3 (20:02):
Yeah, And they did the twelve years ago, almost in
two thousand and seven, with.
Speaker 1 (20:07):
The Chongi one, and its job was pretty simple. It
was a success. It was such a success that it
overstayed it's welcome. It stayed in orbit until March of
two thousand and nine, and then they launched the chong
E two which is a pretty interesting, pretty interesting thing,
because it didn't just do a typical lunar orbit.
Speaker 2 (20:29):
Did it. Yeah.
Speaker 4 (20:30):
So the chong E two was an updated version of
its predecessor with a lot of tech improvements, things like
better onboard cameras, and the satellite is currently in deep
space as we speak and expected to return to Earth
sometime in or around twenty twenty nine, which is a
very futuristic sounding date.
Speaker 2 (20:50):
When you say it out loud, it really is.
Speaker 1 (20:53):
Yeah, but nineteen ninety nine used to sound equally astonishing.
Speaker 2 (20:57):
Well, you know, hindsight is twenty twenty Yeah.
Speaker 1 (21:00):
Go, it's twenty twenty nine. So this is neat because
it's traveling. The experiment here is to send this thing
on a very far orbit and then have it return
right And if we can, if our species can establish
this proof of concept, then we will also be able
to potentially in the future send people further out. Yeah,
(21:25):
if that fad ever comes back in style. The second
phase is the land and rove around on the Moon,
as Changi three did in twenty thirteen and Changi four
did in January twenty nineteen. The chang E three in
twenty thirteen became the first object to land on the
Moon since the Soviet Union's Luna twenty four in nineteen
(21:46):
seventy six. Officially, this objective of this was to achieve
China's first soft landing and rover exploration on the Moon,
as well as again demonstrate develop technology for future missions.
It did a lot of lunar surveying. It measured the
lunar crust to a depth of several hundred meters. It
(22:07):
also discovered a new type of rock. So go you
number three.
Speaker 3 (22:11):
That's sweet, nice word chaining you three.
Speaker 2 (22:13):
I have a quick question for you guys.
Speaker 4 (22:14):
Yeah, you talked about the idea of sending humans to
outer space as being like a fad, and I think
that's funny and also true because we think of that
being the only way to do space or exploration. But
obviously the technology is such that we don't have to
risk the human lives to do the work and get
the data. Is can you think of a reason why
it would become back in style or you know, like
(22:36):
important for the mission to send humans rather than a
rovers and you know, other remote controlled things.
Speaker 3 (22:41):
To construct the lunar colony and then eventually have all
of the colonists there unless we were doing a full
AI colony, which could be interesting.
Speaker 2 (22:51):
So it would be more like construction stuff.
Speaker 4 (22:53):
I mean, like, you know, there's really no reason to
have humans out there digging for samples when you can
have like a robot do it just as effectively, if
not more so, right.
Speaker 1 (23:02):
Right, One of the big pieces here would also be
having it would also be the advantage of having a
person on the ground to repair machinery, which alloid machines
can't quite do yet. But ultimately, the whole goal with
sending people up there and exploratory occupations is to build,
as you said, Matt, a lasting non earth presence for
(23:25):
humanity to start to seed the Solar System and then
later maybe eventually the galaxy, unless that already happened before
and we are an unknowing results or consequence of that
earlier action.
Speaker 3 (23:37):
It's been happened in since nineteen forty seven, my brother.
Speaker 1 (23:41):
Cool bro. You ever tried dmt oh several times big
fans of the Joe Rogan show. So that leads us
to the Changi four. That's where we're at now. But
where are we going? We'll tell you after a word
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Speaker 3 (24:41):
It's also a song that's kind of a stalker, right
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Speaker 1 (24:44):
Hot Takes with Matt Frederick? But we're still on the
show with you.
Speaker 3 (24:48):
Yeah.
Speaker 2 (24:48):
I think that's cool.
Speaker 3 (24:49):
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Ye, Hot Takes Cool Shakes.
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Where we eat a different milkshake every day.
Speaker 1 (24:58):
And then just say catty things about current events.
Speaker 3 (25:01):
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Speaker 4 (25:01):
How about this Hot Takes, Cool Shakes, rare steaks, all
of those together, that's a man's man's podcast.
Speaker 3 (25:14):
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Speaker 1 (25:17):
Our super producer Paul deck And just suggested, uh, what
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Speaker 2 (25:21):
Paul? Paul said, Hot Takes and Cool Vapes.
Speaker 3 (25:25):
Yeah, yeahs like that will blow clouds while we.
Speaker 2 (25:31):
Eye quake with anticipation to see what's next to.
Speaker 1 (25:34):
This and the slant rhyme here Spidium segue would be
hot takes, cool vapes, rare steaks deep space. And the
third step in this plan is to collect lunar samples
from the near side of the Moon and send them
back to Earth. It just going in uh. This is
(25:54):
a task for Change five and the Change six missions,
and they get more and more advanced eventually. So the
big game changers are going to be Chang E seven
and eight, because CHANGI eight will hopefully include a three
D printing mechanism to begin fabricating structures that people will
(26:17):
eventually live in on the Moon, and it, like its predecessor,
will carry a small sealed ecosystem with it to see
how things grow over the long term. This is meant
to bring people. Initially it'll be scientists, but eventually it
will just be a breeding population to bring human beings
(26:38):
to the Moon and build a permanent outpost somewhere near
the lunar south Pole. Overall, this seems to be a
well planned out, ambitious yet reasoned push to expand human knowledge.
China came very late to the space race. Their first
satellite was launched in nineteen seventy, well after human beings
officially landed on the Moon, but China has invested billions
(27:01):
of dollars in the space race ever since. And it
shows go humanity, right, yeah.
Speaker 3 (27:08):
Go humanity. Let's all get to the Moon first and
build a base first.
Speaker 1 (27:13):
Right. Some critics believe there's more to the story, and
here's where it gets crazy. Yeah, the KLEP program has
raised alarms in other space programs NASA, Jackson so on,
as well as countries across the planet, and with good reason.
This isn't just paranoid Cold war thinking. It goes back
to what we would call the militarization of space, which
(27:35):
is against the closest thing we have to global law, right.
And the problem is that a lot of the things
you could develop for peaceful exploration are also things you
could use for non peaceful purposes. It's called dual use technology.
So when you guys remember back when, back when there
was that cover story about the existence of weapons of
(27:59):
mass destruction to justify adventurism in the Middle.
Speaker 3 (28:03):
East, what that happened.
Speaker 1 (28:05):
Well, one of the big concerns there was the idea
of dual use technology. The same enrichment process you use
to build a relatively safe nuclear power plant is the
same enrichment process you use to build weapons. But the
only thing that really changes is the number of iterations,
(28:26):
right that the number of times you go through that process.
And in a way, space technology is similar. Although laws
prevent the militarization of space, these are pretty tough to enforce, right,
I mean, what are you gonna, what are you gonna
You're gonna send the cops, Yeah, the space cops. We
don't even have Space Force.
Speaker 2 (28:44):
Yet, not yet. Did you have about the Steve Carrell
show Space Forces?
Speaker 3 (28:48):
It gonna be like the Office, but in space, I
hear tell, And I'm trying not to get too excited about.
Speaker 1 (28:53):
Why isn't that just the Orville?
Speaker 4 (28:55):
I think the Orville is much more of a Star Trek. Yeah,
I've heard it's great, so I haven't seen it.
Speaker 1 (29:00):
I've seen it's good, So this will just be the
Office in space.
Speaker 4 (29:02):
That's what I thought. That was the one line pitch.
That's obviously the lowest hanging fruit type show for Steve
Carell to do.
Speaker 2 (29:08):
But I don't know. I'm intrigued.
Speaker 1 (29:10):
I'll check it out. I'll check it out. Let us
know if you think it's going to be a bomb
or if you think it's it's going to be a
new age in space based comedy, I think TV shows.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
Yes.
Speaker 3 (29:23):
True Detective season three.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Oh yeah, are you caught up?
Speaker 2 (29:27):
Dude?
Speaker 1 (29:27):
It's really good.
Speaker 3 (29:28):
It is.
Speaker 4 (29:29):
It's really really good. Because I did not like the
second season. It lost me and I wanted to like it.
I was really trepidacious about season three. But I think
it's fantastic.
Speaker 1 (29:37):
People would have liked the second season if it was
not built as True Detective season two, if it had
just been like, look at Vince Vaughan again, looking as
though he needs to sleep, which is how Vince Vaughn
often looks. He's a hard working guy. He's a hard
working dude. So one way nations have historically tried to
(29:58):
ease these tensions, you know, try to relax and chill
out a bit, is through scientific collaboration, international assistance, with research,
funding and manufacturing. We see this happen in Antarctica in
the South Pole. Here researchers stay at the compounds of
other nations all the time. Right, That's why we did
that episode, didn't we on what happens if someone commits
(30:19):
a murder into Antarctica? Yeah, it gets complicated. We did that,
ridiculous history, We did that, Okay, so it is worth
checking out. The answer is not simple. The problem here
is that we can't have the scientific collaboration that eases
concerns about dual use technology because there's a US law
(30:41):
from twenty eleven that bans any official contact with Chinese
space officials. This exacerbates the already thick tensions and miasma
of mistrust.
Speaker 3 (30:51):
Wow, And that is why in recent history, Vice President
Michael Pence he went to the Pentagon. This was in
January as well, and he accused China and Russia of
developing technologies and weapons to target US satellites and working
to bring new weapons of war into space itself.
Speaker 1 (31:14):
Yeah, nobody acts aggressively on their own right. We're always
acting in defense of something.
Speaker 3 (31:20):
Why would you guys take weapons of mass destruction into
space while we're doing it too, I'm just kidding. I
have no proof that we're doing that, but it.
Speaker 1 (31:30):
Leads to ulterior motives. Well, I mean, what is the
X thirty seven B doing up there right? That is
the unmanned spacecraft that has orbited for more than one
hundred and eighty days before No one officially knows what
it's doing. So what if there are ulterior motives to
the newest the newest fouries into space by China, what
are they to quote Tom Waits building up there. This
(31:55):
builds on the concern about the militarization of space and
the next question becomes more specific, what are they making?
One guess would be a potentially massive resource mining business,
because China could potentially make an enormous windfall by transporting
fusion ready helium three. This is something that was new
(32:15):
to me. Were you guys aware of this?
Speaker 3 (32:17):
We I believe we talked about it on a Moon
episode a while ago, or with the Mars episode, maybe
with Marshall Brain I can't remember, or maybe I've just
learned about this. God, I don't know. I thought I
talked with you about this. Ben Helium three a massive
source for future fuel, like what we're going to probably
be using, and the Moon has a whole heck of
(32:38):
a lot of it. Yeah.
Speaker 1 (32:39):
Helium three is a is a very tasty nuclear fuel
because there are no neutrons generated as a product of
the reaction, and the protons that do get generated have charge,
and they can be safely contained using electromagnetic fields. So yeah,
I think you are right. We did talk a little
bit about this. Maybe the good mister brain people once
(33:02):
imagine that Saturn or Jupiter would be the right place
to get your hands on some helium three. But now
it looks like China has their site set on the Moon,
and we have a quote about how much stuff might
be up there.
Speaker 4 (33:19):
This comes from Extreme Tech, and it says although the
Sun dispenses ample amounts of helium three wherever it blows,
the Earth is largely shielded from this windfall by its
own magnetic field, and the little we do have is
mostly generated by various terrestrial processes like cosmic ray bombardment
and even relic sources from leftover nuclear warheads. The Moon,
(33:41):
on the other hand, is a far more concentrated depot,
with up to five million tons conveniently embedded in its
top surface layer.
Speaker 1 (33:50):
So it's not even that difficult to mine it.
Speaker 2 (33:52):
No, no, it's not buried deep.
Speaker 1 (33:55):
In the lunar surface.
Speaker 3 (33:56):
But guys, you're changing the Moon if you take that
stuff off. You know what I'm saying, like an escape.
If you mind enough of this helium three, what are
you going to do to the not only the composition
of the moon, but also, oh, I don't know the
mass of the moon. If we mind it the way
we you know, we take down trees in the Amazon, like,
(34:17):
good lord, we're gonna have a hollow moon.
Speaker 1 (34:21):
You know, I get the feeling that you're thirty percent joking, yes,
but seventy percent raising a legit concern, right, Yeah, it's true.
It's that that's one ulterior motive, and it's potentially it
potentially could be an ecological disaster or an astronomical disaster,
(34:44):
perhaps because you know, I wonder would they ever actually
mind so much of a resource off the moon? Would
humanity ever mind so much of a thing off the
Moon that it does affect its mass and its orbit.
Speaker 3 (35:00):
I can't imagine that it would happen anytime in the
near future, and by that I mean hundreds and hundreds
of years. But still we would be mining it for
a while. Why would we stop mining it unless we
could at least prove that, oh, it's gonna crash into
the Earth now, or you know, we're gonna change the
tide's X amount because of this. And I can't even
(35:22):
imagine helium having enough of an effect on any of
that stuff just with the amount of mass it has
in volume all.
Speaker 1 (35:28):
That, But what if that's a What if that's a
cover story as well? What if the mining is cover story?
What if they're looking for something else. According to one
of the United Kingdom's favorite tabloids, The Sun, last year
twenty eighteen, a guy named Carl Wolf, the technician at
the Air Force Tactical Air Command Headquarters in Langley, Virginia,
(35:50):
claim to have discovered artificial structures on the far side
of the Moon.
Speaker 3 (35:55):
Go on.
Speaker 1 (35:56):
They found strange shapes and images taken by the Lunar
Reconnaissance Orbiter, a probe that circled the Moon since back
in nine and according to Wolf, these were structures that
were definitely not created by natural means such as meteors
or ancient collisions with other heavenly bodies. He believes that
the structures were quote created by intelligent beings. Most noticeable
(36:19):
was what looked like radar antenna is very similar to
what you could see on Earth.
Speaker 3 (36:24):
Hold on, Yeah, what is going on here? This is
a gentleman that appears to have some credentials from the
Air Force Tactical Air Command Headquarters that is saying these
things nol.
Speaker 2 (36:38):
Why Noel?
Speaker 3 (36:40):
What does that mean? We've been here before? Someone has
been here before and set up all of like maybe
a base is already there. What what is happening to you? Guys?
Speaker 1 (36:52):
I you know what, I'm gonna let that simmer because
I have an update for that, but I was I
wanted to save it for the end of the day show.
Speaker 2 (37:00):
Is that?
Speaker 1 (37:00):
Okay, okay, it's going be a weird update for everybody
to know going in. It's going to be a weird one.
But for now, let's just remember that Carl Wolf, technician
Air Force Tactical Air Command, totally believes there are structures
of some sort that did not occur naturally that exist
on the far side.
Speaker 3 (37:18):
Of the Moon, and they have evidence from pictures.
Speaker 1 (37:21):
Yes, and has, in his opinion, visual evidence.
Speaker 4 (37:25):
Oh guys, let's take a quick pause and then have
a word from our sponsor, and we're back with more
for you about returning to the Moon.
Speaker 1 (37:38):
There are other people who argue that maybe we're opening
a door we shouldn't open. There are some conspiracy theorists
who say that the probe could put us all in
mortal danger, arguing that alien races living on the Moon
to go with us here for a second, could see
the landing as an act of war against their space,
(38:00):
potentially with devastating consequences. Other people believe that the dark
side of the Moon is peppered by craters left by
secret NASA military bombings.
Speaker 3 (38:10):
Okay, bombing.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Wait, you mean like from when we tried to blow
up the moon, Yeah, or.
Speaker 3 (38:17):
When we tried to blow up the alien races that
are living.
Speaker 1 (38:20):
Yeah.
Speaker 3 (38:21):
Oh no, no, no.
Speaker 4 (38:22):
But there's that whole story where we were trying to
intimidate other countries by shooting missiles of the Moon that
would make a big cloud that they could see to
demonstrate our superiority.
Speaker 2 (38:29):
Didn't Is this that I make this opposite?
Speaker 1 (38:31):
No, that's true. That's the thing that really happened. It
never got past the planning stages. But that's what it's rights.
That's what mister Show was referencing and their famous blow
up the Moon sketch.
Speaker 4 (38:40):
So you're saying, there are craters that possibly were left
by some version of what we're talking about that did happen.
Speaker 1 (38:47):
People, there are people who believe it. Yes, that's interesting.
I myself, it's I am of the opinion that it
seems like a lot of trouble to go to, right,
especially given the propaganda you would want to detonate something
like that on the Earth facing side.
Speaker 3 (39:05):
Yeah, but if you were an alien community or in
an extraterrestrial community living, existing on that dark side of
the Moon would be pretty advantageous.
Speaker 1 (39:16):
Oh yeah, it'd be dope.
Speaker 3 (39:18):
You're not going to be found, You're not getting you know,
you can actually make your own radio programs and not
get interrupted by all the noise.
Speaker 1 (39:26):
This this theory first arose in two thousand and nine
after NASA deliberately fired a rocket and satellite into the
lunar surface. They said it was an attempt to kick
up moon dust so they could analyze this debris from
Earth and determine if the Moon held any water. So
that's that's their that's their story, all right, Matt, Matt, Yeah,
(39:51):
are you over the lies of Big NASA?
Speaker 3 (39:53):
No, it's just not as much fun, that's all it is.
We're gonna look at a cloud, study its content.
Speaker 1 (40:00):
But it's important if you want to build a colony
on the Moon. This is the more long term question,
and it reminds us, It reminds me, at least of
that Martial Brain episode where he walked us through his
thought experiment on how to set up a Martian society.
He had some pretty articulated social theories, right, And one
(40:22):
thing that's almost inescapable, whether you're talking the Moon or Mars,
is that after some amount of time, any actual self
sustaining non Earth colony will eventually inevitably become an independent entity,
kind of like the colonies in North and South America
when it used to be called the New World. The
(40:42):
cost of transportation and governance eventually became too high for
the European powers, and the terrestrial overlords of the future
will also have a tough time maintaining control unless they
bake in some specific, unchangeable dependencies. They probably want rule
the Moon for long. Maybe they would have to do
(41:03):
something like be the gatekeepers of food supply, right, or
be able to turn off the air or something.
Speaker 3 (41:10):
Yeah, but then that all changes as soon as the
colony is self sustaining and you're growing plants and some
kind of biosphere thing, you know, I mean, quickly the
colony becomes in control of itself.
Speaker 1 (41:23):
Yeah, if the colony doesn't collapse under its own the
weight of its own social functioning, right, I mean, look,
we've all seen Biodome. It is a harrowing exploration of
the human psyche.
Speaker 3 (41:36):
It really is almost the documentary.
Speaker 1 (41:39):
Almost its documentary. I believe the future will prove it
to be so, right, I.
Speaker 3 (41:44):
Squeeze the juice, wheeze the juice or whatever.
Speaker 1 (41:48):
He's still out there.
Speaker 2 (41:49):
He's wheezing the juice to this day. So there was
from Encino Man too, But I know I don't through.
Speaker 1 (41:57):
Both of those. Yeah, didn't just have the set catchphrases
that he said in every film.
Speaker 2 (42:01):
No, I don't think so.
Speaker 4 (42:03):
I think Wee's in the Juice was pretty specifically, and
in the Sino Man when they go to the convenience
store and they terrorized that poor clerk by whueezing the jews,
which is basically theft because they're just stealing slurpy juice
and it's very unsanitary. He's just putting his mouth right
on the slurpy nepple.
Speaker 3 (42:19):
It really is.
Speaker 1 (42:20):
But they probably faked a lot of that, right. The
cashier was a paid actor. They didn't actually break into
a thing.
Speaker 2 (42:27):
What you're saying, Sina Man wasn't a documentary.
Speaker 1 (42:29):
Then it's not. No, it's a speculative nonfiction. I see
if that feels better. This leads us to one of
the last questions about the lunar landing in the Chinese
Lunar Landing project, which is, of course we all saw
this coming, did they fake it? The rumors about a
hoax were started by a guy named Scott C. Warring
of UFO Sightings Daily, and he said, I guess China
(42:53):
may have decided since NASA faked the first Apollo moon
landing and got away with it, then China won it
in on it too. And he supports his evidence by
doing the same thing that Carl Wolf did, which is saying,
look at the original photo. You'll see there are no
other lines in the entire giant panoramic photo. OMG, this
(43:13):
is so very disappointing. Note the lack of moon rocks
on the entire surface of the Moon, which is exactly
what the first Apollo moon landing also showed a sign
of being faked on a stage. What I know. For him,
this is like a smoking smoking gun. And as we
mentioned before, a lot of people, a surprising amount of
(43:35):
people got behind this, because you know, twenty one million
people in the US alone still believe the moon landings
were faked for one reason or another. And if you
were one of those twenty one million people, we'd love
to hear your story. You can write to us directly.
You can find us on the Instagrams, the twitters and
the facebooks. But where does this leave us? All? Now?
Speaker 2 (43:58):
Here?
Speaker 1 (43:58):
We are now, it's the twenty nineteen is we record this?
Things are about to go. Nuts and bananas on our
nearest rocky relative out there.
Speaker 3 (44:08):
In orbit, Nuts and bananas on the moon.
Speaker 1 (44:12):
Nuts and bananas on the moon.
Speaker 3 (44:13):
Yeah, We've never thought about pairing those with the cheese
unless it was like a fine breeze. Maybe moon cheese. Yeah,
isn't the Moon made out of cheese?
Speaker 4 (44:22):
Well, moon cheese is a very specific snack available at
your local Starbucks and health food stores.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
I think yeah, And the moon is probably made out
of cheese with very high helium three content. So I
don't know what side of the argument that puts you
on map that. I just want you to be aware
of that.
Speaker 3 (44:42):
Okay, thank you, absolutely no, but you're right, Yes, it's
going it's gonna get very busy up on the moon.
And it's cool to think that in the next twenty years,
Like the timelines that are mapped out for the Chengi
I guess the program and then as well as the
United State, it's trying to get up there. It's around
twenty thirty something, I think when all this stuff will
(45:03):
be completed. If you look at the US and China,
that's not that far away, and we could possibly see
lunar colonies. That is still mind blowing to me. But
all kidding aside, Beijing is careful distress that everything it's
doing on the Moon at this point and everything that's planning,
(45:24):
it's all peaceful motives. They're doing with peaceful motives in
exploring space. However, I mean, we have to just we
have to remember that the United States used China and
Russia as a potential threat to national security, and that's
why our current president, Donald Trump, he called for the
(45:47):
establishment of a space force by twenty twenty, a Space
Force NOL. That sounds familiar.
Speaker 2 (45:55):
I'm excited about it.
Speaker 1 (45:58):
Yeah. The problem is that most of this stuff, again,
you can say that you're developing it for peaceful means
all the livelong day. It doesn't take away the fact
that one really could turn it into turn some of
these technologies into weapons of war. The US and other
would be space vary nations obviously don't want to be
(46:19):
left out or caught defenseless. That is why on December eleventh,
the forty fifth anniversary the Apollo seventeenth lunar landing aka
the last time people walked on the Moon, President Trump
signed the Space Policy direct of one. It directs NASTAG
to take astronauts to the Moon with the help of
the US commercial space industry. So SpaceX l on Musk,
(46:41):
I'm sure is up in there. Yet there is very
little detail on exactly how and when this might happen
and how much the White House will spend, and in
the meantime, the clock is ticking. Would you like to
hear that last somewhat unpleasant.
Speaker 3 (46:59):
Update, Yes, I do, But I do want to add
this one bit of information that I got from NASA Dokov.
They've got a graphic that has the exploration campaign written
out up until twenty thirty, and it kind of gives
you a timeline. But none of this stuff is solid,
and it's all basically what we hope to achieve, and
(47:19):
you can find it on there.
Speaker 1 (47:21):
When you have to aim for the stars quite literally
in this instance, here's the weird update. That guy Carl
wolf who said that he had seen pictures of a
secret alien base on the Dark side of the Moon
during his time as a sergeant at Langley in nineteen
sixty five. Okay, in I want to say October of
(47:48):
twenty eighteen or somewhere thereabouts. He was killed and was
struck by a tractor trailer riding his bicycle on October tenth, actually,
and police were investigating the incident, but there were no
charges filed. The sheriff refrain from releasing the driver's name.
(48:08):
This is someone who had contacted doctor Stephen Greer as well.
Speaker 2 (48:13):
Our buddy Steve Greer.
Speaker 1 (48:16):
Carl Wolfe was in and of this world, but at
this time authorities do not suspect foul play. Buddy. He did,
unfortunately pass away. So for some people that's going to
indicate that he was a whistleblower. From other people, it's
just going to indicate how dangerous traffic is. The choices
up to you.
Speaker 3 (48:35):
Wow, Well, now I'm going to go and find myself
researching that for the next at least nine hours.
Speaker 1 (48:44):
Yes, sorry, Matt, it's okay. I should have opened with that,
but we want to hear from you do you think
the space race is a noble thing? Do you think
the countries involved are being transparent in their motives? Is
the government of China setting up a massive operation or
something more sinister? Or's this snocuous and everybody's just being alarmist.
(49:05):
We want to hear from you. Find us on Instagram, Facebook,
and Twitter. You can see our community page. Here's where
it gets crazy, where you will meet our favorite part
of the show, your fellow listeners.
Speaker 4 (49:16):
If you want to get up in me and Ben's
personal business, you can check me out at Embryonic Insider
on Instagram.
Speaker 1 (49:21):
And I am at Ben Bolan on Instagram in a
burst of creativity.
Speaker 3 (49:26):
And you will never find me on Instagram.
Speaker 2 (49:29):
I can't even find you.
Speaker 3 (49:30):
I have an account, but you'll never find it.
Speaker 2 (49:33):
That's very on brand for Matt Frederick, though I appreciate
that about you.
Speaker 3 (49:36):
I'm only kidding. It's like my name hsw or something.
You can find it, but you know, don't follow me
or whatever you do on Instagram.
Speaker 4 (49:43):
Follow yourself, Follow you, okay, follow your rs and your
nose to the delicious taste of fruit loops.
Speaker 3 (49:49):
You can also and that's the end of this classic episode.
If you have any thoughts or questions about this episode,
you can get into contact with us in a number
of different ways. One of the best is to give
us a call. Our number is one eight three three
st d WYTK. If you don't want to do that,
you can send us a good old fashioned email.
Speaker 1 (50:10):
We are conspiracy at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 3 (50:14):
Stuff they Don't want you to Know is a production
of iHeartRadio. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, visit the iHeartRadio app,
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Matt Frederick
Ben Bowlin
Noel Brown
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