Scientific Applications of Lunar Laser Ranging: Proceedings of a Symposium Held in Austin, Tex. , U. S. A. , 8 - 10 June 1976

The progress of science during the past centuries has been in some measure energized by the development of new technologies. People are no more intelligent now than they were five centuries ago, or indeed five millenia ago. The differences are in the pool of past experience and the availability of means for manipulating the physical and mental environment. Until fairly recently, the development of new technologies in astronomy and geodesy has served primarily either to broaden the scope of phenomena that could be studied or to improve the precision with which one could examine already-studied phenomena. There seemed to be no likelihood that a situation could arise similar to that in particle physics, where the uncertainty principle indicates that the observation of the state of an object alters that state, affecting the observation. Indeed, we have not yet reached that point, but certain of the new techniques have introduced a degree of complication and inter­ dependence perhaps not previously encountered in the macro­ sciences. When observational capability is so fine that the data can be corrupted by the tidal motions of the instruments, for example, then there are a myriad of physical effects that must be considered in analyzing the data; the happy aspect of this is that the data can be used to study exactly these same effects. The complication does not, however, extend only to predictive computations against which the data are compared. Front Matter....Pages I-XVII Maurice Ewing and the Exploration of the Oceans....Pages 1-8 Mathematical Modelling of Lunar Laser Measures and their Application to Improvement of Physical Parameters....Pages 9-18 Front Matter....Pages 19-19 Scientific Expectations in the Selenosciences....Pages 21-36 Present Scientific Achievements from Lunar Laser Ranging....Pages 37-50 Lunar Dynamics and Selenodesy: Results from Analysis of VLBI and Laser Data....Pages 51-52 Free Librations of the Moon from Lunar Laser Ranging....Pages 53-63 A Numerical Study of the Effects of Fourth Degree Terms in the Earth-Moon Mutual Potential on Lunar Physical Librations....Pages 65-77 Analytical Theory for the Rotation of the Moon....Pages 79-86 Front Matter....Pages 87-87 Verification of the Principle of Equivalence for Massive Bodies....Pages 89-89 Consequence of Integral Conservation Laws on Metric Parameters in the Analysis of the Nordtvedt Effect....Pages 91-102 Front Matter....Pages 103-103 Whole Earth Dynamics and Lunar Laser Ranging....Pages 105-130 Core-Resonance Effects on the Earth’s Angular Momentum Vector and Rotation Axis—A Generalized Model....Pages 131-132 Effects of Oceanic Tides on the Rotation of the Earth....Pages 133-141 Dynamics of Polar Motion and Plate Tectonics....Pages 143-148 The Role of Extremely Accurate Surveying Techniques in Existing Geodetic Networks....Pages 149-156 An Intermediate Term Strategy for Deployment of Mobile Laser Stations....Pages 157-165 Suggested Pacific Plate Distortion Experiments....Pages 167-167 Front Matter....Pages 169-169 On the Problems of the Astrometric Methods and of the Lunar Laser Ranging in the Study of the Earth’s Rotation....Pages 171-178 Earth Rotation Study Using Lunar Laser Ranging Data....Pages 179-190 Earth Rotation as Inferred from McDonald Observatory Lunar Laser Observations During October 1975....Pages 191-200 Front Matter....Pages 169-169 Accuracy Obtainable for Universal Time and Polar Motion During the Erold Campaign....Pages 201-216 McDonald Uto Results and Implications for the Erold Campaign....Pages 217-218 Universal Time: Lunar Ranging Results and Comparisons with VLBI and Classical Techniques....Pages 219-220 Front Matter....Pages 221-221 A Review of Perturbing Parameters which Affect the Quality of Laser Distance Measurements....Pages 223-239 Tidal Corrections at McDonald and Haleakala....Pages 241-254 Strategy for Geophysical Observations at Laser Sites — McDonald Observatory....Pages 255-262 The Deformational Environment of the Haleakala Lunar Laser Ranging Observatory....Pages 263-275 The Measurement of the Positions of Points on the Earth’s Surface using an Absolute Gravimeter and a Multi-Wavelength Geodimeter as Complements to Extraterrestrial Techniques....Pages 277-283 Geodesy by Radio Interferometry....Pages 285-286 Alsep-Quasar VLBI: Complementary Observable for Laser Ranging....Pages 287-287 Laser Ranging Techniques Required to Test Dirac’s Cosmological Model....Pages 289-302 Back Matter....Pages 303-305 Proceedings of a Symposium held in Austin, Texas, U.S.A., June 8-10, 1976