10 Skeptic Questions, Answered

This originally was a reply to a thread, but it's snowballing and people seem to want to discuss a new video out there. I'll post the link to the video 10 Questions every Skeptic must Answer I must warn you, # 10 features graphic photos of maimed and dead people for a couple minutes. I dont remeber the exact timestamp but it's a little before or after 10 minutes.

And yes i can comment on that piece of filth trying to make a "smart" person answer 10 questions.

1. Why no terror attacks in USA since 911. Because there has been no "organized" terror group that has attacked us. The last terrorist attack on america before 911 was at guess what, the World Trade Center. In 1993 there was a car bombing and i belive 6 people died. The reason there have been no attacks YET is because security is higher than ever. Before 911 security in general was very relaxed in the united states, and it was easy to manipulate the system. You can't use the VT killer as some kind of "proof" that we are not protected against terrorist attacks, because then you would have to say that the Columbine kids were also terrorists. Terrorists are usually backed by a government or ideology that supports organized killing of people by a group. Terrorists swear alliance, you can't assume because we haven't had an attack by a state sponsored terrorist group in USA yet, that we won't ever again. 911 was also somewhat of a once-in-a-lifetime event. Technically they say 911 is in the real of pearl harbor. How many years was it between Pearl Harbor and 911? There is not a mathematical chance of a terrorist attack happening again any time soon, but it is still a very real probability.

Why did it look like CD = Well my first question to these people is Didn't you look at your film before your broadcast it? At 3:23 they show a building falling apart due to flames, in a very clear picture. You see the building breaking off and collapsing. So how can you show me evidence that buildings can collapse due to fire, and then say it's not possible? Secondly, anyone who has watched footage of controlled demolitions can see differences in the WTC collapses. I will debunk your science later, but keep in mind that steel buckling due to strain, that causes 20 stories of steel and concrete above it..will have the same kind of displaced energy as blowing all the floors out on a specific level with bombs. At 4: 22 there are no explosions at all in whatever video clip is being shown. The tape tries to say that we can "hear" the bombs going off. Where? I had my computer speakers cranked all the way up and all i hear was static. Also you can tell that the video has been run through many audio filters. What we are hearing is some kids lame attempt to isolate and restructure certain sounds on the original tape, to try and FOOL US into thinking we hear something. What makes you think this looks anything like a Controlled Demolition? Where are the sounds of explosions? Where are the thousands of cracks of bombs going off? What warning did anyone have? The buildings were structurally unsafe but if you watch live news footage of that day you can see that when the tower starting falling, everyone was shocked. Even one reporter screamed "We better get out of the way." There was no countdown to the explosion. More that 5:00 minutes in and there is still no logic in this video.

Why did news report it earlier than it did? They didn't. There's no actual timestamp on the video..Raw news footage has something called a timestamp. Not some idiot graphic that comes in for 2 seconds and said "THIS IS WHAT TIME THIS HAPPENED" The idiot making this video obviously never has been in a news room. When you watch the footage there is a time saying what time it is broadcast over the air. When an archive is made, one monitor records the actual live broadcast..into a backup tape. The tape displays the exact time the footage was aired, and also has a date of the original airing. Without ANY of this information..how can we verify what time those broadcasts were occurring? They could have been at 6 at night for all we know. You also can't throw in a reporter in the shot saying literally "you can see the smoke from the wtc behind me" with the wtc7 still standing, and claim it's "proof" it was reported to early. It does not prove anything because without seeing the ORIGINAL HARD COPY TAPE playing with TIMESTAMP your guess could be anywhere from 1 in the morning till 10 at night. Again, BS offered as proof of some conspiracy.

Why does official report contain so much anti science nonsense? Because CTers hate science. The fact is that the NIST report contains hard documented science, with variables..equations, explanations, and proofs of scientific findings. CTers then choose to say "HEY WAIT NO YOUR SCIENCE IS NOT CORRECT I DIDN'T STUDY ANY FORM OF MATH OR SCIENCE BUT EVERYTHING YOU ARE SAYING IS WRONG". So you telling me that every structural engineer that worked on the 911 report is an idiot? They didn't spend 4 years or more studying their science? The fact that you can try to offer your "Real" science over someone who probably has a 7 year phd in physics, is insanity. This is like asking me to belive that my doctor, never went to medical school and that i shouldn't listen to him when he tells me to eat more vitamins.

Why did bush torture people into admitting to 911? None of the news stories or quotes shown indicate that anyone was tortured into admitting to 911. They twist scandals at prison camps, and claim that people were "tortured" into admitting to 911. Fact is within the same week of the terrorist attacks Bin Laden and Al Queda admitted they were the ones behind the attacks. Further research of the hijackers lead to the revelation that they were supplied by Al quaeda and had trained for many years in 3d World countries for 911. The problem is that you can't understand, or accept the fact that TERRORISTS exist. It's so far beyond your comprehension, that you think the idea of almost 1,000,000 people pulling some "fake terrorist operation" on the USA is more probable. Go look up Yemen on the map, and see what the average person there makes in $$ a day. You have no concept of ABJECT POVERTY. Terrorist exist because they have no other option in life. Nobody tortured anyone into making false confessions. The people behind 911 stood proudly behind their actions.

Why did the hijackings work when the terrorist only had box cutters and they never learned to fly planes? Idiots. Yes they did learn to fly planes. At 10: 18 they say hijackers had no experience, and jets pilots need jetliner training to be able to fly, but the thing is they did learn how to fly. They took months of flight lessons from local schools. They trained for months, never learned to take off or land..simply fly. There are videos of their old flight instructors recalling the hijackers training. There is records of them learning to fly planes for many months before the attacks. They also trained on flight simulators as well as killed pigs back in terrorist training camp, to learn how to cut thoughts. The idea that they had "no training" is fiction. Boxcutters worked for many reasons. Boxcutters are a dangerous weapon. It's not like anyone on the plane had a gun. At 10:30 the video claims a box cutter cant cut a suitcase? BS. A box cutter can mangle a suitcase, or human in seconds. Boxcutters are VERY sharp because THEY ARE USED TO CUT BOXES. Also the video makes an assumption like anyone in the passengers shoes would have done better. When was the last time you were hijacked on a plane? Robbed at gunpoint? Held by men who said they had a bomb and would kill you and your family if you tried to move? Who is anyone to judge the actions of the passengers? This kind of disrespect and second guessing of others should get people hanged.

Why was hijackers passport found on street. Because of natural disaster anomalies. Why can a tornado pick up a tree and leave a mailbox intact in the ground? Why did trinkets like photos, necklaces, earrings, bracelets, ties, makeup, shoes, cell phones, photo IDS, drivers licenses, and all other sorts of little knick knacks appear in the NYC streets? Did the government plant all those items as "evidence" too?

Why did bush say he saw the 1st plane he hit the tower when no media footage was aired till the next day?To get reelected.He never said which plane, 1st or second that he saw. Who knows he could have buttered up some story to make himself look like a powerful leader, for the elections. Again, another quote taken entirely to literally, or completely out of context.

Why no effective military response to the hijackings? You would have rathered them blow up innocent civilians because of suspicion of terrorism? When was the last time BEFORE 911 that you heard about a brutal hijacking. When was the last time planes were hijacked to crash into buildings? The problem with this is you assume everyone had some kind of terrorism manual, and could predict the future. How would the USA look if they shot down a group of civilians on a plane, all because of some suspicions activity. The military didn't' know how to handle this situation, BECUASE IT HAD NEVER OCCURED BEFORE.

Why would islamists do something so harmful to their cause? What? Are you on some kind of illegal drug? The argument that islamist "hurt themselves" by getting usa to invade iraq is BS. How did al quaeda hurt their cause? They've since riled nations like Iran against the united states, and gave hope to people like Hezbolla that their terrorist actions are the right path. Getting USA in an embarrassing 7 year war, toppling our famous landmarks, and dividing the american people was EXACTLY what the terrorist wanted. Islamists won by making usa look weak. The false questions was a lame excuse to show gory pictures of the iraq war, and claim their hate for america. The photos where completely offensive and totally unnecessary. IT just shows you that the 911 Truth movement is not meant to spread truth, but to shock. IT's an excuse for angry teenagers to flip off their parents. IT's an excuse to sell Alex Jones T-shirts and manipulate people through propaganda. 911 truthers are scum and deserved to be wiped from the face of the earth

It's also very funny to see the films conclusion. You will shout in favor of the terrorists and scream, "the islamists were framed!" because every answer to your question is 911 WAS AN INSIDE JOB. Why did they raise the price at the pumps? "BECAUSE 911 WAS AN INSIDE JOB". Why did it rain yesterday instead of clear skies? "BECAUSE 911 WAS AN INSIDE JOB" Why did the unicorn get married to the donkey? "BECAUSE 911 WAS AN INSIDE JOB". So you see there's no rational debate with truthers, because the truth is that they have made up their minds already.

Lets review. So far this video has, 1: shown human pain and suffering for personal gain. The video had no reason to show all those gory pictures of iraq, it did NOT advance the story. It was thrown in for shock value and was a cheap way to get people to "belive". 2: absolutley disregarded science. It proudly stated that they don't belive 200+ college educated people that wrote the official 9-11 report. IT said their degrees don't matter, because our INTERNET SCIENCE IS BETTER. 3: Offered contradictory evidence. There was a clear picture shown in the movie of a building falling apart due to fire. The entire video is also filled with contradictions, and false assumptions. 4: Offered false evidence. This gets it's own number becuase it's different than a contradiction. It shows alleged video footage of WTC7 being reported as falling down before it did, however there is no TIMESTAMP on the raw footage, and someone made a separate graphic that allegedly tells us the time, and cut+pasted it for a couple seconds before the video. All this adds up to fabricated evidence. 5: Called anyone who doesn't think 9-11 is a conspirocy, crazy. IT basically mocks you if you don't belive into the paraniod dillusional idea that 9-11 was the USA government. So basically if i take the word of 200+ college educated engineers and scientists, over the word of some punk on the internet, then I'M the one whos crazy. 6: sympathized with the terrorists. They said that the muslim terrorists "hurt their cause" and also made the muslims out to be "victims" and "scapegoats". So basically this video is saying that you should just join al quaeda, since there are no terrorists and everyone except USA is guilty. This kind of language would have gotten you condemmed to death for TREASON back in the old days, for what it's worth...

Pathetic. Whoever made this terrible video is an idiot. Just another reason why you shouldn't belive the "truth" movement.

wow, where did you go to school? It looks like some where in the couuntry (or another) they acually have a good working educational system.

Using the pause and type method to avoid forgetting a thought that enters mind. I hope for this not to become a rewrite of Spawwwn's post.

Point 1. The assumption that a college degree magically transfers intelligence is one of the downfalls of our ecconomy. A nice example is one time we had a semi-consciece elderly patient that would thrash about and swing wildly everytime he was moved physically or rolled in a gurney (trolley--UK readers). I was called to deal with him. Observed his actions and applied thumb and index finger to a pressure point everytime we had to move him. The ER doctor asked what I did. Told her I applied accupressure to subdue motion sickness. He was no longer aware of movement and stopped lashing out. It was enough that she researched it and took an instruction class on it. She would ask me questions from time to time and share things she learned and I showed her a few things that would not be taught. My job at the time was security guard.

Question 1. This question does not address foiled plots, the Anthrax mailings and instead would like to imply that the thoughts and actions of one person that was secretive could not be stopped therefore the planning and commuications of an organised terrorist group threat could not. Too recent for the video would be the 3 out of 4 captured plotting the JFK Fuellines, to throw out an example.

Question 2. Interesting that material is covered so quickly like rattling off a shopping list. No CD has ever imploded a building from the top down leaving a solid foundation. The dust cloud is caused by the crumbling collapse of a building in CD as well. In a CD all the structural support is blown allowing for gravity to collapse the building. In a CD great pains are taken to calculate how it will fall to avoid ejecta from damaging nearby buildings. As there was lots of damage to neighboring buildings the CD team would have been pretty incompetent to say the least.

Question 3. Flight 93 was reported as landed in Cleveland, OH. A truck bomb was reported as exploded outside the Capitol building in DC. ABC coverage had no idea what caused the thick black smoke in DC at first. First thoughts were an unknown building a few blocks away from the White House. A news report that the VA Hospital in Dayton, OH was struck due to black smoke visible and loud booms earlier. That smoke was a tire fire and the booms were escort jets breaking the sound barrier to reach Air Force One on the return to DC. Lots of crazy things were reported. WTC7 had been leaning for several hours and many felt it would fall. In the news game first is more important than factual. You can always make a retraction or you can always be last.

Question 4. Many college educated individuals have problems working a cell phone, rebooting a computer when there is a problem, driving a car worth a darn. Surfing myspace pages, texting friends, watching reality shows and nuking a bag of popcorn are hardly scientific studies. Just one of those unscientific guesses but I would think that debris went through the floors in a semi-fluid manner like an avalanche or sand through a hourglass several floors ahead of the crumbling exterior. Hotspots are common after fires. Some retain enough heat to cause the fire department to come back 1-3 days later to put out the fire again. Given the amount of concrete debris in chunks and powders form, the creation of kilns is not out of the realm of possibility holding the heat deep inside the rubble. Could the tower top been pulled back in to the building by that super indestructible core that gets loads of talk? Maybe it was that the back part was still attached (unlike the detacted plane impact that was the fulcrum of the collapse) and pulled the tower tip along with it as it fell? The video/no video arguement is a good example of ignoring evidence to create a fallacy that was just mentioned before. There is video evidence on WTC1 that part of the core stood, the dust cloud does obscure how long it stood. There paragraph as a whole is correct. Editing to create a contradiction is misleading. The repeating of nonsense, no sense, nonsense is an attempt to drive a point, a form of conditioning.

Question 5. Can't say much on the torture part. Neither could the video, very short section. I don't have inside info and neither does the video. Interigation does sometimes require that the will to resist giving information is broken. Parading prisoners on leashes is "torture" to some. Cutting people's heads off with a Kbar is murder. The US doesn't do that but I guess that was outside the scope of the video as it may draw resentment against the wrong target.

Question 6. They were trained to fly. Don't let the complex layout fool you. Key instuments are the yoke, rudder, throttle, altimeter, artifical horizon and compass. The feel is different than a Cessna but with flight time (which they did have) you can learn once you know how to fly. The main pilot for the Pentagon was picked because he was the most experienced and that was the heardest target. John Lear says he could not hit the twin towers, I think I could. I can safely bet neither one of us would want to prove it in a real plane if they were still there.

Question 7. A good question and a fair question. But then again they found earrings, necklaces, driver's licenses and all kinds of stuff on the street. A tornado can drive a 6 foot long 2x4 into a tree and not strip off all the leaves. They say a penny dropped from the Empire State Building can become inbedded in the sidewalk. They also say it will most likely hit the building so many times that the impact would be no different than if it fell 40 feet. They say a paper cup can break you nose in a car crash from the kinetic force of the crash. Who knows for sure what happened.

Question 8. That conference was a few months after 9/11 I believe. The man can't pronounce "Nuclear" properly and yet you have to hang him from that sentence...also poorly structured, but hey I say things in an odd way sometimes too.

Question 9. I'll let this video explain this one. It is about 1.5 hours but well done and I feel should be required viewing for anyone passively interested in 9/11...or US government screw ups. SNAFU and FUBAR are real military jargon for a very real reason after all. video.google.com...

Question 10. Gratuitous photo collage of the horrors of war that doesn't go with the question at all. Also there is a world of difference between Islamists (proper word is Muslims--proof of education there, right?) and Islamic Terrorists. In that case, 9/11 the event and the US reaction has been quite the boon for recruiting I would imagine.

8 minute wrap up. My first thought is that now we only need a high school education to undestand this part but need higher education to understand the first part? Okay sounds like fun. "Just look at all ten question like an intelligent person would." Okay, maybe this won't be fun.

Question 1. Inside job, not Muslims...No supporting proof, wait we are supposed to assume it was an inside job, so we don't need to mention that OBL had officially declaired war on the US. Right, got to assume we are using high school style of spoon feeding information without question.

Question 2. Inside job, therefore CD. All scientific evidence supports this conclusion...man I am going to ace this test.

Question 3. Inside job. Foreknowledge, therefore make an error so no one can get the observational conclusion of CD to cloud the issue. Man those news agentcies were so silly, obviously in the information age someone would replay videos.

Question 4. Inside job. So make a report of three dollar words scrambled together, that will give the mouth breathers something to try to figure out for awhile. Make sure you state no pancakes, don't want them to think they are getting a free breakfast out of this.

Question 5 Inside Job. Yeah beat that guy with board of rusty nails until he said he did it. Innocent? They don't even talk right, so they got to be guilty of something.

Question 6. Inside job. Remote control. Bet those patsies had the blades in the wrong way. And that blood was corn syrup and red food coloring. Worked good enough in the 60's horror films.

Question 7. Inside job. Planted evidence just like OJ. Fua, fua, fua tha pole-lease.

Question 8. Inside job. bush found out about the attacks before they happen. "Oh by the way Mr. President while you are reading about that goat. We are going to do some grown up stuff. Play along or I will cap you in front of the kids....Oh, and the kids too, of course."

Question 9. Inside job. And the real leader sabataged our defenses. Like that one guy that had orders to take them out but had no missles or ammo in his guns.

Question 10. Inside job. Islamist (Muslims--education again) were framed. Even used a time machine to deliver OBL declairation a few years earlier to fool W.

End of film summery really reminds me of the educational films in "1984" by George Orwell. Actually the whole premise of concluding everything to be true based on the stated assumption of "Inside job" to be a very unhealthy attitude. Notice that we don't have that part warning about taking an idea and excluding everything that doesn't fit is a fallacy in logic and critical thinking when dealing with the inside job assumption that makes everything so clear that even unwashed, uneducated masses can pretend to be intelligent by just repeating Inside Job as answer to every question?

So let's show this film to a bunch of junior high kids, hand them guns and take them on a field trip to visit the president. Any guesses as to what would happen? Throughout the second trip through the 10 questions no evidence was used to support their answer except for the one picture of an unreadable page with no explaination.

Sorry, but have to call this a propaganda film for the style.