9-11/anomalies/collapse/debate

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right-arrow debaticon WTC1, WTC2, and WTC7 were destroyed by controlled demolition.
down-arrow debaticon 1 Controlled demolition goes from the bottom up, while the twin towers clearly collapsed from the top.
up-arrow debaticon Standard protocols were probably not followed.
up-arrow debaticon The demolition was not for legitimate purposes, so the demolition engineers were not necessarily constrained by convention, law, or ethics.
up-arrow debaticon Top-down demolition is more in line with the goal of being frightening ("shock and awe"), since it is more dramatic.
up-arrow debaticon Top-down demolition aids the goal of supporting the appearance of structural failure due to the impact, thus hiding the sabotage.
down-arrow debaticon To accomplish such variation "with the skill that is brought to the standard method would require a tremendous amount of work to avoid error - which" further emphasizes the need for skill and organization (see below).
up-arrow debaticon On the contrary, the demolitions of WTC1 and WTC2 were extremely clumsy -- nearby buildings were totalled, and there was no apparent attempt to shape the destruction so as to minimize loss of life. These seem more like the hallmarks of an unskilled operator misusing a skilled operator's tool than those of a skilled operator performing a hitherto-unknown variation on a known technique.
up-arrow debaticon The pattern of attributes matches controlled demolition much better than any other previously-known cause of collapse.
up-arrow debaticon WTC7 did collapse from the bottom.
down-arrow debaticon 2 It is extremely improbable that those planning such a complicated demolition would be able to predict the exact location the planes would impact the towers, and prepare the towers to begin falling precisely there.
up-arrow debaticon 2.1 They didn't have to know in advance; CD is usually radio-controlled. The demolition controllers presumably started the demolition near the impact points in order to support the appearance of structural failure due to the impact.
down-arrow debaticon 2.1.1 This implies that there are explosives near the point of impact. This implies - unless you think they knew the point of impact - there are explosives throughout the building. Besides immensely complicating the task of setting these explosives (see Counterpoint 4), this would either require that the explosives be left over at the crash site and need quiet disposal (see Counterpoint 4) or that they all be detonated during the collapse (which would be very loud - and the sound of these explosions are not reported by witnesses.
"i" debaticon Yes, the demolition theory does require explosives throughout the building -- on every floor, in fact. This is highly consistent with observations -- required by them, even. If it could be conclusively shown that explosives were absent from many of the floors for which forcible outward expulsion is seen in the video recordings, that would be a serious blow to this hypothesis.
"i" debaticon Counterpoint 2.1.1 breaks down into the following points:
down-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.1 Setting all those explosives is an immensely complicated task, making it highly incredible that it could be done in secrecy.
up-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.1.1 This is a duplicate of Counter #4.
down-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2 This represents a sufficient quantity of explosives that one of the following two conditions must be true:
down-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2a There would inevitably be some evidence of their presence left over [at the crash site] in the rubble, which would then need to be quietly disposed of (see Counterpoint 4).
up-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2a.1 Much of the evidence was, indeed, quietly and quickly disposed of before it could be properly analyzed. (This fact is part of the case against the official story.
up-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2a.2 Several photos of the clean-up show diagonal cuts in the vertical support elements; these are characteristic of controlled demolition, not of cuts made to reduce debris to smaller size for removal.
up-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2a.3 Thermite particles were found in dust from the collapses.
down-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2b The vast majority of these explosives would need to have been detonated during the collapse.
"i" debaticon I should think that the demolition hypothesis rather requires them to be detonated... the building isn't going to come down if the explosives don't go off. ??
down-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2b.1 This would be very loud - and the sound of these explosions are not reported by witnesses.
up-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2b.1.1 Actually, there are many instances of witnesses reporting explosions, and at least one audio recording in which what sounds like timed explosions can be heard -- repeated bangs with a frequency of 2-4 times per second. This description is consistent with some of the witness reports; other witnesses in different parts of the building heard or experienced a smaller number of isolated explosions; these may have been more related to the initial impact.
"i" debaticon If the NIST is claiming that witnesses did not report explosions, that is a flat-out lie -- and further reason to suspect the integrity of their conclusions.
up-arrow debaticon 2.1.1.2b.1.1 On top of that, there are video recordings in which firefighters said they saw what looked like explosives in the building.
down-arrow debaticon 3 WTC2 did not fall straight down, as the North Tower and buildings leveled by controlled demolitions typically fall, but rather began tilting from the point of impact.
up-arrow debaticon There are a number of reasons why an otherwise-controlled demolition of WTC2 might have resulted in the observed tilt.
up-arrow debaticon If structural elements were being severed by thermite shortly before collapse, this might have been enough to start the top of the building tipping over before the main demolition began.
up-arrow debaticon There is strong evidence that structural elements were severed by thermite.
up-arrow debaticon Diagonally-severed beams were found in the rubble.
up-arrow debaticon Thermite particles were found in dust from the collapses.
up-arrow debaticon There is significant evidence that steel was being melted by something other than the impact fire minutes before WTC2 collapsed.
up-arrow debaticon Streams of molten metal were seen pouring from one corner.
up-arrow debaticon The impact fire never reached temperatures sufficient to melt steel.
up-arrow debaticon The tilt might have been an extra bit of drama to add to the "shock and awe" effect.
up-arrow debaticon Some elements of the controlled demolition rig might have been set off prematurely, either due to events within the building (metal beams falling and shorting something out, heat from the fire melting something and crossing wires or initiating some chemical process) or due to human error on the part of the remote control operator(s).
down-arrow debaticon 4 In order for controlled demolition to have taken place, hundreds of people would have to be involved. "Three may keep a Secret, if two of them are dead." ("point 0" on LessWrong)
down-arrow debaticon "Everyone involved in setting up the controlled demolition (no easy task) has to plan, prepare, and execute the task."
? How many people does it take to set up a controlled demolition, if they have a weekend or two of unobserved time in which to do it?
down-arrow debaticon Every witness has to be found and suppressed
up-arrow debaticon This assumes that there were witnesses who were not part of the conspiracy and who knew enough to be damaging.
up-arrow debaticon Many witnesses of suspicious events in which the charges might have been planted have, in fact, come forward.
down-arrow debaticon Everyone in the chain of command to plan, order, and fund the project has to keep mum.
? How do we know who this would be, if we don't yet know who did it? (How do we know that not only haven't they been silenced, but that they have in fact been questioned?)
? If a rogue subordinate with access to the necessary materials were able to plant them, how would her/his superiors ever know that those materials had gone missing if they did not specifically check inventory?
? What companies had access to this sort of material, and did all of them check their inventories before and after 9/11?
? Was there, indeed, any investigation at all along these lines?
down-arrow debaticon Everyone whose job it is to monitor activities like this has to be kept quiet.
? Who would that be, and were they ever asked about any suspicious activities?
? Was there, indeed, any investigation at all along these lines?
up-arrow debaticon Just because you can't explain how something was accomplished does not negate the evidence.
up-arrow debaticon The evidence for controlled demolition is considerably stronger than that for pyromechanical failure.
up-arrow debaticon Rounding up a small crew to do the operation while ensuring their silence afterward does not seem that implausible.
up-arrow debaticon Several public figures have declared openly that we need another 9/11 in order to unify the country behind President Bush and the Iraq war. It seems quite conceivable that a well-funded organization could have, though a careful selection process, found enough similarly-minded people before 9/11 to help with this project.
"i" debaticon The "volunteers" might have been pumped full of patriotic fervor that they were going to be involved in some great and terrible event which would cost many lives but would unify the country as never before... then given specific instructions (you go into this building, and set these devices at the following locations) without explaining the expected results beforehand. With luck, you might convince them that what they did had nothing to do with demolition -- or, with the alternative being overwhelming guilt over a terrible crime, they might cling so fiercely to the rationale you've given them that they would never, ever betray you. There are less-extreme parallels which are better documented -- fraternity hazing, "first blooding" of gang members, etc.
down-arrow debaticon 5 It seems unlikely that such a well-coordinated event could have been accomplished without leakage by anyone in the Bush administration.
up-arrow debaticon The "demolition" theory does not require direct involvement by members of the Bush administration. Evidence for or against their involvement does not of itself affect the evidence for or against demolition.
up-arrow debaticon They didn't necessarily carry this out themselves. Although the overall strategy for dealing with Iraq was a huge mess, the initial invasion was reportedly done extremely well -- carried out by our well-trained and competent military.
up-arrow debaticon Bushco clearly do have skills in the areas of manipulating public opinion and controlling information.
up-arrow debaticon Bush's apparent incompetence may in fact be a sham; there is other evidence for this.
down-arrow debaticon 6 several groups have analyzed the collapses after the event and found them consistent with the mainstream narrative. Requiring that these analyses be false means either inducting them into the conspiracy (thus enlarging it -- see Counterpoint 1), designing the collapse so effectively that it appears to be due to the obvious factors (Counterpoint 2), or - probably - both.
"i" debaticon Crossed-out text indicates already-refuted point.
up-arrow debaticon There are other possible explanations for the analyses of these groups:
up-arrow debaticon Selective bias, rationalization, and other cognitive errors
up-arrow debaticon Manipulation via political means -- not necessarily complicity.
up-arrow debaticon There is a substantial and growing case for effective ownership of the mainstream media by the government.
up-arrow debaticon Merely stating that an argument has been refuted does not itself constitute a refutation. The refutation should be supplied, otherwise this is essentially argument from authority.
down-arrow debaticon Engineering is done using numerical methods, and "every human being who has [analyzed this situation numerically] has confirmed the simple, obvious story of events.
up-arrow debaticon This is utterly untrue.
"i" debaticon Without immediately going off and doing an hour of research, what I do remember is the following numerical analysis (there were others, will add them as I find or remember them):
"i" debaticon Free-fall collapse: all three buildings collapsed in about the time it would take for an unimpeded object to fall from the same height, starting at zero velocity. This disproves the "pancake" theory (to explain why the rest of the building collapsed downward from the point of impact) and the "spring-loaded ejection" theory (to explain why so much debris, some of it quite massive, was ejected so forcibly outward).