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Lenz warranty certificate — statement warranted

The Great Wall of China is visible from the Moon with the naked eye.

Warranted: this statement is false.

€10,000 per certificate, €500,000 across all Lenz certificates in any rolling 12 months.

Lenz pays when all of these hold
  • You published this statement, or sent it to someone outside your organisation, after the qualified timestamp below.
  • A court or regulator later contradicted this verdict, finding it true, once the time to appeal has passed or appeals are exhausted.
  • Damages were awarded against you on that basis.
  • When you verified, you had no reason to expect a proceeding over it.
  • The proceeding began within 12 months of publication, and you told Lenz at support@lenz.io within 30 days of being served.

Fines, penalties, settlements and defence costs are not part of the warranty. Full conditions in the terms →

Verdict and basis

Verdict: False · Lenz Score: 1/10 · Confidence: 10/10

Summary — not warranted

The Great Wall cannot be seen from the Moon with unaided human vision. Its apparent width at lunar distance is far below the eye’s resolution, consistent with NASA information, astronaut observations, and optical calculations. Images or disputed sightings from low Earth orbit do not support visibility from the vastly more distant Moon.

Warranted scope
  • Visibility from low Earth orbit is not equivalent to visibility from the Moon.
  • Photographic detection using magnification or image processing does not establish naked-eye visibility.
  • Sources that merely repeat the popular belief do not provide evidence for it.

These qualify what Lenz warrants. A finding that turns on something a warning already flagged does not contradict this verdict.

Sources — evidence, retrieved during the analysis
  • Great Wall
    Despite myths to the contrary, the wall isn't visible from the moon, and is difficult or impossible to see from Earth orbit without the high-powered lenses used for this photo.
  • Feature
    The Great Wall of China, frequently billed as the only man-made object visible from space, generally isn't, at least to the unaided eye in low Earth orbit. It certainly isn't visible from the Moon. … "The only thing you can see from the Moon is a beautiful sphere, mostly white, some blue and patches of yellow, and every once in a while some green vegetation," said Alan Bean, Apollo 12 astronaut. "No man-made object is visible at this scale."
  • Is it Really Possible to See the Great Wall of China from Space ...
    Obviously, it would be even less likely to see the Great Wall from the moon, situated at a minimum distance of 350,000 km, because the visual acuity would have to be 17,000 times (!) better than that of the normal human eye (in this case it would amount to seeing the cable from a distance of more than 1000 km).
  • 太空月球上能看到长城?- · 科普中国网
    Of course, if the Great Wall cannot be seen clearly from low Earth orbit, it is even more out of the question to see it from the Moon. Standing on the Moon, even the largest man-made structures cannot be seen with the naked eye.
  • 宇航员焦立中拍照证实 肉眼太空看长城难度大
    In addition, some people equate space (generally referring to the altitude of spacecraft) with the Moon, which is a fallacy, because it is absolutely impossible to see any man-made objects on Earth from the Moon.
  • Is China's Great Wall Visible from Space? | Scientific American
    Or, more remarkably, it's the only human artifact on Earth visible from the moon. Both are false, say astronauts and remote-sensing specialists. … But he could not make out any man-made structures from the lunar surface, which averages a distance of 230,000 miles (370,000 kilometers) from Earth.
  • 太空月球上能看到长城?_腾讯新闻
    Of course, if the Great Wall cannot be seen clearly from low Earth orbit, it is even more out of the question to see it from the Moon. Standing on the Moon, even the largest man-made structures cannot be seen with the naked eye.
  • 不,你无法从太空看到中国的长城 | 大众科学 - 大众科学
    When I was a child, probably in middle school, I remember a friend telling me that Apollo astronauts could see the Great Wall of China from the Moon. If someone told me this now, I would know almost instinctively that this claim is nonsense. At that distance, the Great Wall looks like a line one-tenth of an arcminute thick. Resolving this feature is roughly equivalent to seeing a human hair from a kilometer away with the naked eye. I think you would agree that this is absolutely impossible!
  • Can you see the Great Wall of China from space?
    It was during the Apollo missions that the myth of being able to see the Great Wall of China from the surface of the Moon was empirically debunked. … Apollo 12 Lunar Module Pilot Alan Bean is quoted as saying: "The only thing you can see from the Moon is a beautiful sphere, mostly white, some blue and patches of yellow, and every once in a while some green vegetation. … "No man-made object is visible at this scale."
  • Is the Great Wall of China Visible from the Moon? | Snopes.com
    The claim that China's Great Wall is the only man-made object that can be seen from the moon with the naked eye is one of our more tenaciously incorrect "facts," a bit of erroneous speculation which was spawned decades before we had the means to demonstrate it true, and which continues to have currency despite having long since been proved false.
  • Can you see the Great Wall of China from space? | Britannica
    A popular myth, the claim was disproved when astronauts stated that the Great Wall of China was not visible with the naked eye from the Moon.
  • The Great Wall of China is not actually visible from space with the naked eye — astronauts from Apollo to the ISS have confirmed it — and the popular myth that it is predates space travel itself, with the best-known version coming from a 1932 Ripley's Believe It or Not cartoon
    The Great Wall of China is not actually visible from space with the naked eye — astronauts from Apollo to the ISS have confirmed it — and the popular myth that it is predates space travel itself, with the best-known version coming from a 1932 Ripley's Believe It or Not cartoon … The original popular framing held that the Great Wall was visible from the Moon, a claim several Apollo crews had the opportunity to test directly. Alan Bean of Apollo 12 famously said: “The only thing you can see from the Moon is a beautiful sphere, mostly white, some blue and patches of yellow, and every once in a while some green vegetation. No man-made object is visible at this scale.”
  • 卫星照片显示:宇航员在太空肉眼可看见长城
    The European Space Agency stated in its bulletin that during his visit to Singapore in February this year, US astronaut Eugene Cernan asserted that the Great Wall of China can indeed be seen with the naked eye from an Earth orbit at an altitude of 160 to 320 kilometers.
  • The Great Wall
    An often repeated myth has been that the Great Wall is the only man-made object visible from the moon. … But Apollo astronaut Alan Bean wrote that "The only thing you can see from the moon is a beautiful sphere, mostly white (clouds), some blue (ocean), patches of yellow (deserts), and every once in a while some green vegetation. … No man-made object is visible on this scale.
  • 月球上能看到长城吗
    Neil Armstrong, the first American to step on the moon, was asked more than once: Did you see the Great Wall from the moon? He had to explain to everyone again and again that on the moon, it is impossible to see any man-made structures on Earth with the naked eye. This answer is somewhat disappointing. Debunking this century-old lie actually does not require very rigorous scientific proof. Let's assume the width of the Great Wall is 8 meters, and the distance from the moon to the ground is 380,000 kilometers. When we scale down the Great Wall and the Earth-Moon distance proportionally, when the width of the Great Wall is as small as 80 micrometers, which is as thin as a strand of hair, what is the Earth-Moon distance? The answer is 3.8 kilometers. In other words, looking at the Great Wall with the naked eye from the moon is equivalent to looking at a strand of hair from nearly 4 kilometers away. Of course, it is impossible to see.
  • 太空月球上能看到长城? - 杭州辟谣网_杭州网-杭州媒体网站联合辟谣平台
    Of course, if the Great Wall cannot be seen clearly from low Earth orbit, it is even more out of the question to see it from the Moon. Standing on the Moon, even the largest man-made structures cannot be seen with the naked eye.
  • Is the Great Wall of China visible from the Moon?
    While astronauts have debunked the theory that the Great Wall can be seen from the moon – Apollo 12 astronaut said “No man-made object is visible at this scale” – the wall can be imaged by radar other high-resolution equipment. … So in conclusion, despite lasting for over 100 years, the theory that the Great Wall of China is visible from the moon is false.
  • 从月球上能看到长城?这些关于月亮的谣言你信过几个
    但直到宇航员们登上了月球,这一说法才被打破。阿波罗12号登月宇航员阿兰·比恩曾表示从月球上看地球:“唯一能够看到的是一个美丽的球体,大部分是白色(因为有云),还有一些蓝色和黄色的部分,有的时候还能看到星星点点的绿色。”2003年,我国航天员杨利伟在从太空返回地面后也曾表示,地球景色非常美丽,但的确没有看到长城。 … 他们指出,即使在通视条件极佳的情况下, 常人能够看到10米大小的物体, 形成平面形觉的极限距离大约是36千米, 远低于公认的太空高度, 何况长城宽度基本上只有2米左右, 除大的关隘城楼外, 一般城台(如烽火台)的宽度也只有5—6米。由此可以断定,宇航员是不可能从太空仅凭肉眼就看到长城的。
  • A clear view of the bigger picture | South China Morning Post
    The Earth is too far from the moon for any man-made object to be seen with unaided eyes, as scientists familiar with space imagery will attest.
  • Can anyone see the Great Wall of China with naked eye from space? | Knowledge News - News9live
    Well, while it is a much-believed theory in popular culture, in reality, one cannot see the Great Wall of China from the Moon with the naked human eye.
  • Can the Great Wall of China Be Seen From Space?
    However, astronauts such as Chris Hatfield, Buzz Aldrin, and Yang Liwei have all confirmed the wall cannot be seen from space using naked eyes. … According to them, the apparent width of the wall from the moon is similar to human hair viewed from about 2 miles away.
  • Can You See the Great Wall of China from Space? - Technology Org
    And certainly, the Apollo astronauts couldn’t see it from the Moon, even though that urban legend has been widely circulated. … The Apollo astronauts confirmed that you can’t see the Great Wall of China from the Moon.
  • Artificial structures visible from space
    The claim that the Great Wall of China is the only man-made object visible from the Moon or outer space has been debunked many times, but remains a common misconception in popular culture. … A viewer would need visual acuity 17 000 times better than the norm to see the Great Wall from the Moon.
  • Great Wall of China
    The Great Wall of China cannot be seen by the naked human eye from the Moon which orbits around Earth at an average distance of 384,399 kilometres (238,854 mi).
  • Can the Great Wall Be Seen from Space? — It Depends!
    The Great Wall can be seen from space, but only from low earth orbit distance and in the right conditions. It can't be seen from the moon.
  • Can the Great Wall Be Seen from the Space? - Travel China Guide
    The claim that “the Great Wall is the only man-made structure visible to the naked eye from the moon” first appeared in a letter written by British archaeologist William Stukeley in 1754, 215 years before the first human landing on the moon. … But he couldn't see any man-made objects on Earth from the moon.
  • Is the Great Wall of China visible from space?
    Can you see it from the Moon, with a naked eye? No: … "The only thing you can see from the Moon is a beautiful sphere, mostly white, some blue and patches of yellow, and every once in a while some green vegetation," said Alan Bean, Apollo 12 astronaut. "No man-made object is visible at this scale."
  • 争论70年成谜案:在太空肉眼能否看到长城?中国航天有了标准答案 | 新加坡新闻
    In 1969, NASA sent three astronauts to the Moon on Apollo 11. The first man on the Moon, Neil Armstrong, was asked more than once: "Did you see the Great Wall from the Moon?" He explained time and again that it is impossible to see any man-made structures on Earth from the Moon with the naked eye. ... When the photos of Earth rising over the lunar horizon taken by the Apollo 11 spacecraft were released, we could clearly see the blue planet, and the myth of seeing man-made objects on Earth with the naked eye was debunked. From this, we can draw the conclusion: the naked eye cannot see the Great Wall from the Moon!
  • Answered: The Great Wall of China is an enormous structure, its width approaching 7.0 m at the widest point. Some people claim that it is possible to identify the… | bartleby
    Some people claim that it is possible to identify the separate sides of the Great Wall from the Moon with the unaided eye.

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