Zeitgeist, 9/11, and Other Conspiracies

[jammies]

So mikey, can you explain what the point is of demolishing a building that is going to have an airplane smash into it? Was MacGyver going to show up and fix 'em with some duct tape and 2 X 4s?

GWB Jr: "I dunno Dick, we're gonna crash them planes into the WTC and do some awesome damage, but what if they get repaired after?"

Cheney: "Yeeeesssss.... I see your point. The kinetic force of a 200 ton airplane full of fuel smashing into a skyscraper at full speed will probably do nothing more than shatter a few windows. What if we... say... BLOWED THEM UP at the same time? MWHAHAHAHA!!"

GWB Jr: "Gosh Dick, that's a great idea! After all, we won't be able to proclaim a world-wide war on terror unless the buildings are completely destroyed! No one will fall for attacking the Arabs if we just kill a few hundred airline passengers and a dozen floors full of office workers, plus maybe some firemen and cops and anyone hit by debris and maybe some more people that jump out of the towers in panic and of course you can't forget the possiblility of the tower falling on top of another building and killing some people that way too but - "

Cheney: "George, George. Remember the BLUE pills are for the afternoon, not the red ones. Just let me handle this - nobody will suspect a thing, and if they do, we'll discredit their ideas by only allowing them to be published on the Internet. Nobody believes anything they see there."

[photon]

Lol I didn't notice your architect was Richard Gage.. His resume is available online, if you look at his work history it's shopping malls, school gyms, but no high-rises. And he basically repeats what Jones and others say, I don't recall ever seeing anything original from him.

This is the same Gage that talked about "silent thermite", which is kind of self defeating if audible explosions are a support of the demolition theory. The same Gage that didn't know the difference between static load and dynamic load in a debate. The guy who thinks cardboard boxes are the same as buildings:



The guy who hasn't actually contributed anything himself: http://www.ae911truth.org/techarts.php

More info: http://911guide.googlepages.com/ae911truth

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by photon

Of course, it's an alloy so it'll change depending on the ratio of the impurities.

However I notice your reply doesn't actually contain any information. What kind of steel was used in the towers? What is the strength profile of that kind of steel? How much variation is there among different grades of steel?

Those would be important questions to answer to support your position.

http://www.designaids.com/wtc/appendixb.html

[Berger_4_]

Holy hell. I'm actually mad after reading all of this.

Mikey, please just give me some numbers. Photon has repeatedly backed up his statements with hard numbers. You reply by simply saying that there's different grades of steel. No numbers, no saying what kind of steel was used in the towers, nothing. Pull your head out of your ass man.

[transplant99]

Originally Posted by Berger_4_

Holy hell. I'm actually mad after reading all of this.

Mikey, please just give me some numbers. Photon has repeatedly backed up his statements with hard numbers. You reply by simply saying that there's different grades of steel. No numbers, no saying what kind of steel was used in the towers, nothing. Pull your head out of your ass man.

As sung by Sum 41...

The faster we're falling,
We're stopping and stalling.
We're running in circles again
Just as things were looking up
You said it wasnt good enough.
But still were trying one more time.

Maybe we're just trying to hard.
When really its closer than it is too far

Cause Im in too deep, and Im trying to keep,
Up above in my head, instead of going under.
Cause Im in too deep, and Im trying to keep,
Up above in my head, instead of going under.
Instead of going under.

[mikey_the_redneck]

Originally Posted by Berger_4_

Holy hell. I'm actually mad after reading all of this.

Mikey, please just give me some numbers. Photon has repeatedly backed up his statements with hard numbers. You reply by simply saying that there's different grades of steel. No numbers, no saying what kind of steel was used in the towers, nothing. Pull your head out of your ass man.

I do not remember the grade, but it was in one of the films I watched last week. I am not going to go in and dig it up again as I dont have the time......I hated steel strengths in school as is.....I usually don't post this much in a thread, because my 3 fingered T-Rex typing skills are becoming exhausted.

photon, you are a moderator here correct? Well...........I just dont want to spend as much time here as you do. There are holes from BOTH views of this incident, and it is much easier to pick apart a "conspiracy theory" than actually doing your own research. I believe there is more to this attack than what meets the eye. 9/11 launched this massive effort called "the war on terror"....look how much has changed in our lives since then.

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption. Maybe some of you need to pull your heads out of your asses. North American politics/business is not lollipops and sunshine like you think it is.

[Hockey PhD]

I'm usually a lurker but this thread has been very entertaining; the 'Insider' probably takes the cake for being the most absolutely, ridiculous piece of "information" I have read in a long time (and I just read 150 first year undergrad papers). I'm not going to chime in on the whole 9/11 conspiracy topic, although I would be interested to know what Alex Jones credentials are (assuming he has any). What has really interested me is why people actually believe and continue to believe in things that seem so far-fetched?

I've poked around some academic databases and the work on conspiracy theories is fairly meager, but the few articles I did find were quite interesting. By no means am I claiming to be an expert but it is interesting to hear what experts (in peer-reviewed articles) have to say on the matter. One idea that was most striking was that consipracy theories tend to be unfalsifiable to those that believe them because of the individuals ability to account for any factor that could be refuted. Here's a few of the gems I came across which might give some insight into conspiracy theories and how those that believe in them think.

"Because conspiracy theorists almost always wish to see conspiracies exposed, they are typically quite dedicated in their search for evidence relevant to their favorite conspiracy theory and are usually able to overwhelm you with a deluge of evidence in favor of that theory." (Clarke, S. (2002). Conspiracy theories and conspiracy theorizing. Philosophy of Social Sciences, 32, 131-150).

"Conspiracy theorists baffle us only when they take one further step and turn the conspirators’ intentions of controlling all the variables in a situation, of deceiving all outsiders and of cooperating with one another as closely as possible, into the premises on which to base their own investigations into suspected conspiracies. The separation of conspiratorial groups from the rest of society, their boundless power and lack of scruples, as well as the no less boundless ignorance and gullibility of ordinary people outside the conspiracy, are all presupposed without further explanation. As a result, theories about real-world conspiracies are not falsifiable. They are feeding and reinforcing both a preexisting suspicion towards any ‘official’ truth and a solipsistic sense of self-assurance and superiority towards the noninitiated." (Heins, V. (2007). Critical theory and traps of conspiracy thinking. Philosophy and Social Criticism, 33, 787-801)

I think this one might be particularly relevant in the current context:

"Conspiracy theories are like black holes - they suck in everything that comes their way, regardless of content or origin Everything you’ve ever known or experienced, no matter how ‘meaningless,’ once it contacts the conspiratorial universe, is enveloped by and cloaked in sinister significance. Once inside, the vortex gains in size and strength, sucking in everything you touch." (Bale, J. M. (2007) Political paranoia v. political realism: on distinguishing between bogus conspiracy theories and genuine conspiratorial politics. Patterns of Prejudice, 41(1), 45-60)

And finally, why many people question (and rightly so) the legitemacy of conspiracy theorists claims:

"A progressive research program is one in which novel predictions and retrodictions are made that are generally successful. In a degenerating research program, successful novel predictions and retrodictions are not made. Instead, auxiliary hypotheses and initial conditions are successively modified in light of new evidence, to protect the original theory from apparent disconfirmation." (Clarke, 2002)

[photon]

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

photon, you are a moderator here correct? Well...........I just dont want to spend as much time here as you do.

To be honest neither did I (as far as spending time in this thread), but I have a pathological need to reply I think

The thing though is you talk about not wanting to spend time (which is completely fair!), but meanwhile you have already reached a conclusion and are unwilling to look at any of the evidence presented instead referring back to a film you saw. It's very easy to fall into an appeal to authority fallacy with this stuff.

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

There are holes from BOTH views of this incident, and it is much easier to pick apart a "conspiracy theory" than actually doing your own research.

People HAVE done the research though. It's actually not easy to pick apart a conspiracy theory because it changes radically depending on who you talk to (because it's all based on emotion and unanswered questions rather than evidence).

You're throwing out factoids which have long been debunked, and the holes usually are unanswered questions which as I've said before are not evidence, and most of the unanswered questions are nonsense questions based on nothing manufactured in such a way to evoke an emotional response.

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

I believe there is more to this attack than what meets the eye. 9/11 launched this massive effort called "the war on terror"....look how much has changed in our lives since then.

Sure it has. I don't doubt for one second that politicians will take advantage of ANYTHING for their own benefit. Even the way "terrorism" is used in the vernacular in the US is startling even now sometimes.

So why can't it just be politicians taking advantage of something for their own ends? Feeding Bush incorrect information so he makes a desired decision is far more plausible than nano-thermite.

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption.

False dichotomy fallacy. Paranoia and blind trust are not the two only options.

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

Maybe some of you need to pull your heads out of your asses. North American politics/business is not lollipops and sunshine like you think it is.

Strawman fallacy. No one here is actually saying that, you are making that up so you can attack it.

When you have a statement with a logical fallacy in it, that means that the conclusion drawn is invalid (not necessarily incorrect, but invalid).

EDIT: I would like to add that I also see that 9/11 and the resultant government actions have had a chilling effect on civil liberties in the US, and people are fighting that, as they should. It's something that seems to go back and forth with time; I find it unlikely that the US would become even like the UK for that sort of thing let alone worse.

[Mean Mr. Mustard]

[quote=mikey_the_redneck;1891178]I do not remember the grade, but it was in one of the films I watched last week. I am not going to go in and dig it up again as I dont have the time......I hated steel strengths in school as is.....I usually don't post this much in a thread, because my 3 fingered T-Rex typing skills are becoming exhausted.

photon, you are a moderator here correct? Well...........I just dont want to spend as much time here as you do. There are holes from BOTH views of this incident, and it is much easier to pick apart a "conspiracy theory" than actually doing your own research. I believe there is more to this attack than what meets the eye. 9/11 launched this massive effort called "the war on terror"....look how much has changed in our lives since then.

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption. Maybe some of you need to pull your heads out

First - really nothing has changed in my life. I guess gasoline is more expensive which seems to be on the surface related to instability in the global market associated with 9/11, but that could also be do to growing demand from the third world countries who are going through an industrialization period. I have to have a passport to get into the states, but that really doesn't impact me that much because I don't travel there that often. I guess there could be things going on behind the scenes, but they were likely happening before as well, plus I have absolutely nothing to hide.

Who is saying that the government is all sunshine and lollipops? Everyone with half a brain knows that there is some messed up crap that happens in the world. That being said not every horrific event is the result of big business and the government.

Frankly I don't really see all the holes in the official events that you seem to be interested in discrediting, everything has a pretty simple and logical explanation. And the conspiracy theories seem to be primarily built around attempting to pick holes in the official story, which is backed by science and rational thought and a disjointed "theory" has been put forth, in which..... The Jewish guy teamed up with George W. Bush in order to commit insurance fraud as well as give Bush a reason to invade.... Afghanistan and Iraq for their oil. This was done with the help of the CIA and a bunch of people who put the explosives into 3 buildings without being recognized by any of the hundreds of thousands of people the area.

Do you not see how absolutely foolish this sounds? Why would Alex Jones... a guy who on September 10, 2001 was about as important as a rock, be the one to uncover all of this "information"? Lastly this Jones guy has made his own little career out of propagating the September 11th conspiracy theories. That alone starts to throw "his" opinion and the facts that he dug up into disrepute.

[RougeUnderoos]

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

I believe there is more to this attack than what meets the eye. 9/11 launched this massive effort called "the war on terror"....look how much has changed in our lives since then.

What has changed in your life? If I want to go to the States I'll have to get my passport renewed and I'd do that anyway.

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption. Maybe some of you need to pull your heads out of your asses. North American politics/business is not lollipops and sunshine like you think it is.

Who has blind faith that the government is honest and incapable of corruption?

The people who were in power when this event happened have all been sent into early retirement and will be punchlines until the day they die.

Can you see the contradiction? The same people who have been flushed right out of power and are openly mocked by the mainstream media are, according to you, the same people that control the mainstream media and were capable of pulling off the greatest and most complicated hoax in history.

[Berger_4_]

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

I do not remember the grade, but it was in one of the films I watched last week. I am not going to go in and dig it up again as I dont have the time......I hated steel strengths in school as is.....I usually don't post this much in a thread, because my 3 fingered T-Rex typing skills are becoming exhausted.

How long have you spent in this thread? You get confronted about showing some numbers (multiple times in fact) and now you blame your typing as an excuse to get out of it.

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption. Maybe some of you need to pull your heads out of your asses. North American politics/business is not lollipops and sunshine like you think it is.

I never said that. Of course a government can be corrupt. Of course there are some backwater dealings. But no government would ever kill that many of it's own innocent civilians willingly.

[transplant99]

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption

Who said that ANY government was incapable of corruption ANYWHERE in this or any other thread in CP history? No one...ever that i recall.

That is SOOOO far from being able to pull off the single biggest conspiracy in the worlds history though.

think about it man....this thing would have taken, literally, hundreds and hundreds (if not thousands) of people to pull this off...and at the highest levels of multiple agencies.

Simple questions have been asked of you and others who either believe or are leaning that way...yet no answers.

A controlled implosion of building 7......OK.....but when did they plant these explosives and how was it that no one noticed. Thousands of really smart people worked there...including the Secret Services largest field office, the CIA had an office there along with multiple financial companies. These are pretty smart people and the security in that building was likely among the best in the world when you consider that the SEC also had a large office there.

The bigger question is why would they do it...and you said it was because Silverstein wanted insurance money....OK....but why did he then turn right around and rebuild the damn thing with that money? What was the point and where was the gain?

On top of all that....the claim that the Bildenbergs would of been behind this thing as "they" control the world....yet "they" would of had massive investments in a majority of the businesses affected that day....which would of lost them multiple billions of doallars in business etc as the market crashed afterwards. What did they gain out of it?

Just use some logic and common sense with a smitten of critical thinking and one can only draw one real conclusion.

This was ALL an act of terrorism...period and end of story.

[Azure]

It has nothing to do with having blind faith in the government.

My distrust in the government isn't because I think they carry out attacks on their own people, but because they are incapable fools that don't even know now to manage a budget, let alone successfully carry out an attack like this.

The quotes that HockeyPhD posted perfectly explain how frustrating it can be to 'debate' any of this stuff with the people that believe it. I personally know a couple, and I've talked to them before, and outside of the government flatout coming out and admitting that they did indeed plan out the whole thing, nothing will satisfy them.

So, what kind of logic does one use? How do you satisfy these conspiracy theorists?

Oh, and posting articles saying they're 'interesting', when in fact its nothing more than deceitful lies that morons post on the internet because they know they can dupe people into believing it doesn't help your cause either.

[mikey_the_redneck]

Originally Posted by Berger_4_

How long have you spent in this thread? You get confronted about showing some numbers (multiple times in fact) and now you blame your typing as an excuse to get out of it.



I never said that. Of course a government can be corrupt. Of course there are some backwater dealings. But no government would ever kill that many of it's own innocent civilians willingly.

Where the hell did you come from? You wanted to come in and pile on so you can feel all proud of yourself?
I'm not blaming my typing for anything, other than its getting tiresome for me. You probably have not looked at any of my links. Watch the films and read some of the articles. Why am I putting links in if I have to re-hash everything that is contained within them??

"But no government would ever kill that many of it's own innocent civilians willingly" - You are dead wrong. Hitlers Germany, Stalin's Russia.

[Berger_4_]

I was turned onto it by a post in the random thoughts thread. I'd never heard of the movie, so I was never interested in a thread about it. After reading it, I got mad enough to post in here. I don't care if I'm late to the party. I'm not "feeling all proud of myself" I'm simply pissed off and a little incredulous that such stupidity exists in today's day and age.

I'm not going to bother looking at any of your links if you can't be bothered to post any credible information.

I suppose I should have been more exact with my statement...no country where the leaders are democratically elected would slaughter it's own people so a few of those in positions of power can increase it.

Now, stop trying to deflect the question that was posed to you...where are the numbers? What kind of steel was used to build the towers? You managed to track down all the links to articles and videos, but you're unable to look for anything pertaining to grades of steel?

[4X4]

Originally Posted by Berger_4_

but you're unable to look for anything pertaining to grades of steel?

Sorry. All I heard was BLADES... Of Steel...

[mikey_the_redneck]

Originally Posted by Mean Mr. Mustard

Frankly I don't really see all the holes in the official events that you seem to be interested in discrediting, everything has a pretty simple and logical explanation. And the conspiracy theories seem to be primarily built around attempting to pick holes in the official story, which is backed by science and rational thought and a disjointed "theory" has been put forth, in which..... The Jewish guy teamed up with George W. Bush in order to commit insurance fraud as well as give Bush a reason to invade.... Afghanistan and Iraq for their oil. This was done with the help of the CIA and a bunch of people who put the explosives into 3 buildings without being recognized by any of the hundreds of thousands of people the area.

What was the logical explanation of how NORAD was unable to intercept hijacked planes that were up in the air for that long??

And you are wrong Mustard, saying that the official story is "backed by science and rational thought"
There is no official story because there was no official investigation.
All that exists is a 9/11 commission report that says "we think this happened and well................it was Al Qaeda!" After that all you have is a bunch of bloggers debunking the supposed conspiracies floating around. The reality is that these "de bunkers" are no more an authority on it than Alex Jones is.
Hell..................there are books de-bunking the de-bunkers!!

Get it? You dont know the story any more than I do. I bought everything they said on CNN that day, and I have only come in to question it recently.

I never said "some jewish guy" teamed up with Bush.....
I dont know how Larry Silverstein fits into it. I only thought it to be awful suspicious that he added a multi-billion dollar terrorism insurance to his buildings 6 weeks before the attacks occured, and that all 3 of his buildings collapsed.
Stop putting words in my mouth.

[mikey_the_redneck]

Originally Posted by Berger_4_

I was turned onto it by a post in the random thoughts thread. I'd never heard of the movie, so I was never interested in a thread about it. After reading it, I got mad enough to post in here. I don't care if I'm late to the party. I'm not "feeling all proud of myself" I'm simply pissed off and a little incredulous that such stupidity exists in today's day and age.

I'm not going to bother looking at any of your links if you can't be bothered to post any credible information.

I suppose I should have been more exact with my statement...no country where the leaders are democratically elected would slaughter it's own people so a few of those in positions of power can increase it.

Now, stop trying to deflect the question that was posed to you...where are the numbers? What kind of steel was used to build the towers? You managed to track down all the links to articles and videos, but you're unable to look for anything pertaining to grades of steel?

I already said I am not going back through hours of film to find a steel number for you. Look it up yourself!

[Locke]

"Those who would give up essential liberty to purchase a little temporary safety deserve neither liberty nor safety."

- Benjamin Franklin, Historical Review of Pennsylvania, 1759

Amazing how true that rings.

[Flames Draft Watcher]

Originally Posted by mikey_the_redneck

You guys can believe in what you want, but go ahead put blind faith in our government as honest and incapable of corruption. Maybe some of you need to pull your heads out of your asses. North American politics/business is not lollipops and sunshine like you think it is.

Fail buddy

It has been mentioned in this thread before that one does not have to blindly believe in the gov't. Doubts are great. The problem is if you are putting your entire faith in some people who can't research properly. It makes you look gullible, as gullible as those who blindly believe whatever the gov't says.

There is a difference between being skeptical about what the gov't says and blindly believing a bunch of amateur hack conspiracy theorists. For some reason you can't seem to make the distinction.