12 people flew to the moon without landing on it, now only 1 is still alive (Fred Haise).
12 people walked on the moon, 4 are still alive (Buzz Aldrin, David Scott, Charles Duke, Harrison Schmitt).
(Conclusion: walking on the moon is healthy?)
Standard error of log-odds difference: √(1/1 + 1/11 + 1/4 + 1/8) ~= √(1 + 0.09 + 0.25 + 0.13) = √(1.47) = 1.47^0.5 = 10^(0.5 × lg 1.47) ~= 10^(0.5 × 0.16) = 10^0.08 ~= 1.2.
The effect is 1.75/1.2 ~= 1.5 standard errors from zero, thus not significant by common thresholds. You would find Fisher's exact test in agreement, but I like the (vepry slow) party trick of doing this all in my head. Techniques:
- Poor man's logistic regression: https://entropicthoughts.com/contingency-table-for-poor-mans...
- Mental logarithms: https://entropicthoughts.com/learning-some-logarithms
(If you like mental math you can then run an iteration of Newton's method: you take the remainder between the number and the square of your guess, 1.47-1.44 = 0.03, and divide it by twice your current guess, and add it to the current guess: 0.03 /(2x1.2) = 3/2.4 / 100 = 1.25 / 100 = 0.0125, so the next guess would be 1.2 + 0.0125 =1.2125. And the actual sqrt of 1.47 is 1.2124355653..., so that's pretty close. Newton's method roughly doubles the number of accurate digits at each iteration.)
The hardest part if you want to generate more digits is to keep track of the intermediary sum during the multiplication, that's why I never got past three significant digits. That would be an interesting little contest though!
Sqrt 10: Guess 3, then residual is 10 - 33 = 1, so next guess add 1/(23) = 1/6, so now we're at 3.166..., and the square of that is 10.0277..., so you're very close already.
NASA vetted the Apollo astronauts for those who did not have medical problems, so it would be more accurate to say they walked on the moon because they were healthy.
I mean, you don't have any data (or evidence) on that one way or the other; do you?
ADDED. Oops: the comment 3 levels above gives data. I regret wading into this thread.
If this conscientious attitude translates to health, that would mean "going to all your yearly checkups" and "don't pooh-pooh any small symptoms because you are macho and true men don't care". I know far too many men who died of something treatable by ignoring it until it was too late. (Women, at least around me, tend to be a lot more careful about themselves.)
I am now reading Michael Collins' biography - a talented writer btw. - and basically, they were used to very intrusive and systematic health checkups. I can see them developing a good habit out of this.
During the Apollo program any sign of weakness or vulnerability would be a reason to ground an astronaut, very likely permanently. So they regularly concealed absolutely anything and everything that wasn't directly expected or related to the mission. This included various forms of sickness or injuries, space adaption sickness, psychological issues, and more. Alan Shepard even managed to conceal symptoms of what would later turn out to be Meniere's disease.
Aldrin was friggin touring around Antarctica in his 80s where he ended having to get on an emergency evac! It's not exactly a caution first attitude to life. In general the secret to longevity is healthy living, good diet, and a positive outlook on life. Even the Ancient Greeks had countless people living into their 80s and beyond.
Someone that walked on the moon is probably feeling pretty dang good for a long time about themselves. And people want to talk to them.
Someone that flew but didn't probably doesn't have that same advantage.
Could also be impacted by fame / levels of personal income from being in one of the two distinct groups.
If only Apollo hadn't lost momentum ...
Same reason we've never sent people to Mars, it's even more complicated, magnitudes more dangerous, and what exactly are we accomplishing in doing so...? Nothin there.
https://www.npr.org/2004/01/15/1597182/bush-calls-for-manned...
The timeline is pretty entertaining and a bit depressing, if you wanted to see the plan succeed:
...
By 2014: The first manned mission for the Crew Exploration Vehicle.
By 2015: Astronauts will land on the moon using the Crew Exploration Vehicle.
By 2020: The United States will have established an extended human presence on the moon, using it as a launching pad for other manned exploration missions.
As for why, 1) to ensure the survival of humanity, 2) to drive scientific development and 3) because it's there.
2) science on earth drives scientific development. The fields of science best done on the moon are insanely narrow. All of the scientific advancements from Apollo etc were from building stuff to get there, not being there.
Yes we could collect, and study, more moon rocks. But outside of that theres not much to study (that can't be better studied on earth or in LEO).
The cost of study on the moon is a few orders of magnitude higher than LEO which in turn is a few extra zeros from study on earth.
I'll add that right now budgets for study on earth have been slashed. There's a lot more value to be gained spending that moon money here.
3) this argument is irrefutable. It's also pretty weak when appropriations are discussed. Apollo got killed because "been there, done that" with next to no reoccurring value.
Space has given us huge value. Mostly in LEO. GPS, Weather, Communications, satellite TV. Plus further out, Hubble, James Web, and probes like Voyager et al feed us data. This is the legacy of Apollo. Moon bases? Mars Bases? They make no scientific or financial sense.
SPOILERS AHEAD
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Longer version. Think of Earth's gravity well. It's the obstacle to any significant space infrastructure. Anything of matter can't be built on LEO, with resources shot from , because it would destroy Earth's atmosphere.
Unlike resources in Lunar regolith (sand on moon). Moons gravity is much lower and there is no atmosphere. Harder to land than on Earth, It's just that we would need a significant amount of mass to jumpstart Moon excavation.
I'll go with NASA vetted the hell out of the health of their astronauts.
(Also yes obviously the sample size is too low to draw meaningful conclusions)
More likely though, as you suggest, the same astronomical standards (pun intended) applied to all crew members.
They could spacewalk and open CM hatch from the outside. Wrench for opening the hatch was stored in the lunar module.
It's not a stretch to think that the people who flew on the earlier missions could have been older on average, though. Just looking at some of the ages, 2 of the still alive crowd are younger than all of the Apollo 8 astronauts. All of them are younger than two out of the three Apollo 8 astronauts.
Even a few years difference in age can make a huge impact when we're talking about people in their 90's.
I became the math consultant for A Beautiful Mind in part because I was such an Apollo 13 buff. In my first call with Todd Hallowell, the executive producer, we spent an hour's aside discussing Apollo 13. This actually was part of the interview: Making a movie is intensely boring unless you're really engaged, and I demonstrated the required interest in detail.
Cool, awesome job, as far as i can tell as a fan of the movie!
So you did what was best for yourself... and the group.
Really seemed like a great guy, shame to hear about his passing.
In my second year, he came to the Electrical Engineering lecture hall and told the story of Apollo 13 to a packed crowd, standing room.
I believe it was during the events of the opening of Armstrong Hall in 2007
Unfortunately no one had smartphones then and I doubt it was recorded.
I barely remember the details but I still remember the feeling of watching someone deeply confident and caring who gave so much credit to the broader team he worked with. He remembered all the details including specific equipment and model numbers of switches. He spoke in that confident tone a lot of astronauts have but somehow still very humble and empathetic and answered so many questions.
He was 70+ at the time I guess so energetic he looked 40.
I honestly think this was the one time I met a "hero" who more than lived up to the hype.
Rest in Peace Commander Lovell.
Ad Astra ...
As a kid I had a book detailing hundreds of space missions—mostly probes, obviously—but my favorite mission to read about was Apollo 13. Just incredible.
Maybe when Jim got to heaven, the first place the angels took him to was where he would have landed on the moon.
Thanks in no small part to Horner's score, at least in my case.
It's a really good decision in a movie that made a lot of them, as it made the relief hit all at once.
And then you see Jim Lovell's cameo as the captain of the Iwo Jima, just to cap the movie off.
Apollo 14 (after they diagnosed the 13 issues and beefed up the spacecraft a bit with a few redundancies) actually did land where 13 was supposed to
Not so much the fact that he was gone - the fact that he was here.
Jim Lovell made us all better just for existing.
So true.
> Some of the space race was driven by Cold War politics.
Is it fairer to say, initiated by? Listen to Michael Collins speak on the first episode of “13 Minutes to the Moon.” “We did it.” The “we” being humanity, not nationalism.
Yes, it started with rivalry, but it lifted humanity’s ceiling. There is a lot wrong with the Apollo story (race, gender), but these issues were a symptom of the time, less a cause. These issues were reckoning against a legacy.
The goal was to show superiority, not leverage it. I wish this was the case for a nation capable of going to the moon today. Instead of leverage against shared and common issues, the goal was to better.
The Astronaut Scholarship Foundation wrote up a great tribute: https://www.astronautscholarship.org/assets/2025-asf-lovell-...
There won't be, but there should be.
Godspeed sir
Agreed. One of the best books I've read on Apollo was 'Apollo: Race to the Moon', by Murray and Cox. It spends a lot of time on the engineering and management challenges behind what they accomplished then. One of the book's best chapters was on the enormous team(s) on the ground behind the troubleshooting and problem-solving for Apollo 13.
I find it interesting that the argument briefly depicted in the 1995 film was added for dramatic effect. The real crew didn't even raise their voices!
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apollo_13_(film)#Technical_and...
Frank Borman Nov 7, 2023 William Anders June 7, 2024 James Lovell Aug 7, 2025
Borman commanded Apollo 8, the first manned flight to the moon, again with Lovell. However, Lovell had by then commanded Gemini 12. So the odd situation resulted in which the person with more spaceflight experience was not commander.[2]
Lovell has another distinction besides the whole "survived almost certain death in space on Apollo 13" thing: He is the only one of the three Apollo 8 crewmen to have not become a Fortune 500 CEO. (Frank Borman ran Eastern Airlines, and Bill Anders ran General Dynamics.)
[1] TIL that NASA's Gemini 7 space mission lasted for 14 days. After rendezvousing with Gemini 6 on the 11th day, the two astronauts had nothing to do other than read books in the very cramped cockpit. Frank Borman, the commander, said that the last three days were "bad".<https://www.reddit.com/r/todayilearned/comments/1ccpszs/til_...>
[2] This has happened a few more times, including the current Crew-11 to ISS, in which a rookie is commander while the other three have all flown in space before
He was literally closer to God and the Heavens than anyone else before or since.
RIP and ad astra to a great American
If you subscribe to a religion that not only assigns a physical known location to God, but puts that location at a significant distance away from humanity either in a specific direction, or in a general “anywhere except where those people are” sense. Is that a common belief structure?
How so?
RIP. QEPD.
Decent movie, but that scene ruins it
I recommend "A Man on the Moon" for anyone interested in that era.
Rest in Peace! Time to read up on him again.
The only thing on the graph is NASA not making the sensible economic decision by sending people to the moon (starting 2 years before Elon was born) and the guy went to work at NASA while still in college, yet he still "went full Elon" despite:
> Every fan of sci-fi has similar fantasies, nobody owns it.
It's clear you really want to talk about Elon instead, just not why. Well, at least until you start saying things like "triggerypuffs"... at which point why bother arguing good faith?
there, fixed that little glitch for ya!
and if you're skeptical, read his first biography, where he enumerated numerous things he'd never ever do -- specifically, using spacex for anything other than mars, explicitly he says the government would have to take it from him.
