9-11/disagreement/position quiz

The 9/11 Position Quiz

The following questions are an attempt to itemize all of the significant areas in which disagreement might exist so that parties debating this issue can focus in on resolving their actual disagreements rather than what they imagine the other person might believe. It should also be helpful in preventing discussion participants from shifting position without notice.

Instructions

Before engaging anyone in debate on the topic of 9/11, do the following:

1. copy and paste the following questions to a web page somewhere -- options include:
   • Post on your Issuepedia userpage (create an account)
   • Post on the discussion page
   • Use your own blog or journal
   • Comment on the ICMS page for this topic
2. Add your personal answer to each question on that page. Please include at least a "yes" or "no"; further explanation is optional.
3. Under "Answers", below, post a link to wherever you have done this.

Answers

• Woozle

The Questions

General

• A1. Is the official story essentially true and complete?
• A2. Was the official investigation conducted in a reasonable way?
• A3. Is any further (re-)investigation a waste of time?
• A4. Have all the questions surrounding the events of 9/11 been answered satisfactorily?
• A5. In the days prior to 9/11, did the Bush administration respond appropriately to any warnings they might have received?
• A6. On the day of 9/11, were the Bush administration's actions reasonable, under the circumstances?
• A7. On the day of 9/11, did the military act appropriately?
• A7a. If not, was this an understandable lapse under the circumstances?
• A8. Is it reasonable to think that men carrying no weapon other than box cutters could overcome trained professional pilots and seize control of four commercial jets?

Meta

• B1. Is there any reason to distrust the accuracy and even-handedness of mainstream news reporting, as it has existed for the past decade or so?
• B2. If available evidence points strongly towards a particular set of circumstances, is it reasonable to be skeptical of any conclusion which states that those circumstances did not occur?
• B2a. Is it necessary to explain how those circumstances could have arisen in order to successfully argue that the evidence indicates they did?
• B2b. If so, does that explanation need to be just as rigorous as the evidence pointing towards the circumstances?

  In other words: is it sufficient to demonstrate that the circumstance is possible because there are possible chains of events which could have led to it? Or is it necessary to show that a particular chain of events is likely to have occurred before accepting as valid the evidence that it did occur?

• B3. Is there any reason to distrust statements made by the Bush administration?
• B4. Is there any reason to distrust conclusions reached by federal commissions?
• B5. As an explanation for the level of governmental incompetence displayed regarding Hurricane Katrina, do you think that malice might be a better explanation than stupidity/incompetence?
• B5a. If YES to B5, why do you believe this (what is the evidence)?
• B5b. If YES to B5, what do you think the motive might have been?
• B5c. Regardless of your answer to B5, do you believe that the levels of government malice OR stupidity/incompetence displayed regarding Katrina are consistent with whatever levels of government malice or stupidity/incompetence you believe were at work on 9/11?
• B5d. If the evidence pointed to a significantly different level of Administration competence on 9/11 than it does for Katrina, would this be grounds for (a) rejecting the evidence, (b) trying to determine what might have changed, (c) not worth worrying about, or (d) other?

Fringe

Those who believe the official story can skip these, as the "official" answer is "yes" in all cases.

• C1. Is it likely that WTC1 was hit by American Airlines flight 11?
• C2. Is it likely that WTC2 was hit by United Airlines flight 175?
• C3. Is it likely that the Pentagon was hit by American Airlines flight 77?
• C4. Is it likely that the source of the wreckage seen in Pennsylvania was United Airlines flight 175?
• C5. Is it likely that all of these were essentially normal civilian aircraft without any equipment having been installed specifically to aid their use as weapons of terror?

Demolition

to be written

Notes

• The B5 series of questions were suggested by Eliezer Yudkowsky.