9/11 Occam's Razor

9/11 Occam's Razor

When looking at anything as complex as the 9/11 events, it is all too easy to get lost in the myriad of facts and assertions swirling about. That is why the concept of "Occam's Razor" is so important if one really wants to get to the truth... or at least whatever "truth" we are able to actually know.

The concept is simple really:

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."

So, when looking at all the issues and suggested scenarios, it is prudent to find the one thing that is most easily proven, least ambiguous, and least open to alternate explanations.

That means that:

1) Video evidence is more compelling than photographic evidence since one can observe the timing of events in videos.
2) Photographic evidence is more compelling than witness testimony since photographs are not open to interpretation.
3) Laws of physics are more compelling than anecdotal evidence since they are not open to error or misinterpretation.

When looking at all the events surrounding 9/11, there is one single issue that trumps all others, and depending on the explanation for this event, 9/11 will either be shown to be as the official story purports (a conspiracy of a few middle eastern conspirators) or it will become clear that it is a conspiracy of much larger proportions. Either way, however, it was a indeed a conspiracy of some sort.

The single pivotal event, the one that best determines the true nature of how the twin towers fell is this: the timing of the twin towers collapse.

If it can be shown beyond a shadow of a doubt that it would be impossible for the twin towers to fall in the time that they did under the gravitational forces of their own weight, then it would be established with 100% certainty that they did not fall because of a "pancake" theory as purported by the official account.

How long did it take?

Here I will quote from an excellent analysis that is both fair and accurate:

Source

The roofline of WTC1 (The North Tower) begins dropping with sudden onset and accelerates uniformly downward at about 64% of the acceleration of gravity (g) until it disappears into the dust. This means it is meeting resistance equal to about 36% of its weight. The implication of this, however, is that the force it is exerting on the lower section of the building is also only 36% of the weight of the falling section. This is much less than the force it would exert if it were at rest. The acceleration data thus prove that the falling top section of the building cannot be responsible for the destruction of the lower section of the building.

Now, despite "trusters" saying that "truthers" don't have good science, there are indeed many professional experts who have done a solid job of trying to get to the TRUTH, as opposed to simply "trusting" what they are told by others.

As an example, here is an excellent video from the man who made the above quote, explaining fully how he came to the conclusions he came to:

So, roughly 15 seconds for the buildings to fall according to both the seismic and video evidence.

Now, the real question is, assuming that a "pancake" theory is possible, what is the shortest time possible for such an event to occur?

To suggest that under a "pan-caking" progressive collapse lower floors would not provide any resistance to upper floors is just plain wrong. Each floor has a great deal of mass (including all the equipment and such on each floor), and mass cannot be accelerated without a loss in kinetic energy.

As each floor hits the floor below, the material in both floors would be pulverized, thereby causing a loss of mass concentration through dispersal.

As each stationary floor is encountered, there would be a slight reduction in momentum as the mass from above (which is being lessened as it disperses out sideways) impacts the stationary floor below, causing it to accelerate or be pulverized into dust.

Even a small 1/4 second delay for each of the 80 to 100 floors (below the impact points) would introduce 20 to 25 additional seconds to the overall collapse time. Adding this to the free-fall speed of 9.21 seconds, gives us a total of between 29 to 34 seconds... much longer than the 15 seconds recorded.

A more detailed analysis can be seen by first looking at the paper published by Zdenek Bazant and Mathieu Verdure where they try to establish that a progressive collapse was indeed possible, and then at the counter-discussion by several reputable scientists:

Mechanics of Progressive Collapse: Learning from World Trade Center and Building Demolitions

Discussion and replies to Bazant and Verdure paper

So, what enabled the buildings to fall as fast as they did (at about 64% of gravity)?

Peer-Reviewed Paper: Nano-thermite Found

The Open Chemical Physics Journal is a reputable peer-reviewed journal that covers all topics of chemistry and physics. It recently published a scientific paper from the University of Copenhagen showing that nano-thermite was indeed used in the WTC twin tower collapses:

ABSTRACT: We have discovered distinctive red/gray chips in all the samples we have studied of the dust produced by the destruction of the World Trade Center. Examination of four of these samples, collected from separate sites, is reported in this paper. These red/gray chips show marked similarities in all four samples. One sample was collected by a Manhattan resident about ten minutes after the collapse of the second WTC Tower, two the next day, and a fourth about a week later. The properties of these chips were analyzed using optical microscopy, scanning electron microscopy (SEM), X-ray energy dispersive spectroscopy (XEDS), and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The red material contains grains approximately 100 nm across which are largely iron oxide, while aluminum is contained in tiny plate-like structures. Separation of components using methyl ethyl ketone demonstrated that elemental aluminum is present. The iron oxide and aluminum are intimately mixed in the red material. When ignited in a DSC device the chips exhibit large but narrow exotherms occurring at approximately 430 °C, far below the normal ignition temperature for conventional thermite. Numerous iron-rich spheres are clearly observed in the residue following the ignition of these peculiar red/gray chips. The red portion of these chips is found to be an unreacted thermitic material and highly energetic.

Source

If we could limit discussion to this central topic, I believe it could help to establish a foundation of understanding and agreement.

I know many will ask "but how did they get the thermite in the building" or "how can so many people be in on a conspiracy?" and other questions like that. Those are very valid questions indeed, but just because we don't have the exact answers to those yet, that does not invalidate the conclusions of the Occams' Razor. Once we can agree that a conspiracy is not only possible, but well within the realms of potential, it then becomes possible to explore the likely ways in which the conspiracy was carried out. As long as people try to invalidate an alleged conspiracy by ridicule or other ad hominem techniques, those questions of "how it was done" will never be approached with open and honest investigation. It is never helpful to start an investigation with a preconceived solution.

reply to post by downisreallyup

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."

Precisely why it was not one of the conspiracy theories advocated on here as opposed to what truthers call the "official story"

Originally posted by Swampfox46_1999
reply to post by downisreallyup

 

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."

Precisely why it was not one of the conspiracy theories advocated on here as opposed to what truthers call the "official story"

The "official story" is the explanation with the most assumptions. You simply refuse to look at them I guess. This list has been enumerated countless times, so there is no need for me to get into all that with you.

It's not much appreciated the way you just cherry-picked one line from my OP in order to try and say something so unsubstantiated. If you really want to make the point you tried to make, please enumerate a comparison of the assumptions present in both the OS and the controlled-demolition explanations. It will be very telling to see how fair and complete you are in that list.

Originally posted by Swampfox46_1999
reply to post by downisreallyup

 

"The explanation requiring the fewest assumptions is most likely to be correct."

Precisely why it was not one of the conspiracy theories advocated on here as opposed to what truthers call the "official story"

What's your goal anyhow? Why are you such a "truster?" Do you believe the government never lies to the people? Do you believe that conspiracies can't happen? Do you think the 9/11 Commissioner and Nebraska Governer Bob Kerrey was lying when he said we are dealing with a 30-year conspiracy?

Really, what IS your agenda? Don't you love your country and want to see the corrupt elements removed from the government?

i dont think occams razor applies here ... well in all conspiracy really ... You can eliminate different conceptions based on which is simpler... and in all conspiracies its far less likely to believe that a small group of people did something for a relatively insignificant amount of gain than a wider group of people with religious motivation

and on second thought the very nature of a conspiracy is not to get caught so they would line up a more viable culprit... making occams razor doubly as useless
[edit on 12-2-2010 by conspiracyrus]

[edit on 12-2-2010 by conspiracyrus]

for three weeks, crews were in doing remodel work with paint in certain areas

reply to post by downisreallyup


You already had a bad enough topic without saying:

The Open Chemical Physics Journal is a reputable peer-reviewed journal that covers all topics of chemistry and physics. It recently published a scientific paper from the University of Copenhagen showing that nano-thermite was indeed used in the WTC twin tower collapses:

It's not even 'reputable', but peer reviewed? So many lies, so little time...



[edit on 12-2-2010 by Whyhi]

Originally posted by downisreallyup

Peer-Reviewed Paper: Nano-thermite Found

Who peer reviewed that paper. A simple question, so who peer reviewed it?

Originally posted by Whyhi
reply to post by downisreallyup

 

You already had a bad enough topic without saying:

The Open Chemical Physics Journal is a reputable peer-reviewed journal that covers all topics of chemistry and physics. It recently published a scientific paper from the University of Copenhagen showing that nano-thermite was indeed used in the WTC twin tower collapses:

It's not even 'reputable', but peer reviewed?

So many lies, so little time...



[edit on 12-2-2010 by Whyhi]

You have no idea what you are talking about. Bentham Science Publishers is a huge "journals giant" and there is no reason for you to spew diatribes here. If you are going to cast aspersions in that manner, I will have to insist that you provide evidence to your claims. Also, do not accuse anyone of lying, for that is not what I or anyone else am doing. I am presenting truth as it appears to me, based on my honest assessment of facts. It is against ATS policy to cast personal insults, and when you accuse someone of lying you are accusing them of a moral crime, and that is not an acceptable thing to do.

Even though I happen to believe that the "truther" position is more solid than the "truster" position, I do not accuse trusters of lying... I merely say they are unwilling to open their eyes, and therefore, they are mistaken.

Originally posted by dereks

Originally posted by downisreallyup

Peer-Reviewed Paper: Nano-thermite Found

Who peer reviewed that paper. A simple question, so who peer reviewed it?

The peer-review on this paper was grueling, with pages of comments by referees. The tough questions the reviewers raised led to months of further experiments. These studies added much to the paper, including observation and photographs of iron-aluminum rich spheres produced as the material is ignited in a Differential Scanning Calorimeter (see Figures 20, 25 and 26). The nine authors undertook an in-depth study of unusual red-gray chips found in the dust generated during the destruction of the World Trade Center on 9/11/2001. The article states: “The iron oxide and aluminum are intimately mixed in the red material. When ignited in a DSC device the chips exhibit large but narrow exotherms occurring at approximately 430 ˚C, far below the normal ignition temperature for conventional thermite. Numerous iron-rich spheres are clearly observed in the residue following the ignition of these peculiar red/gray chips. The red portion of these chips is found to be an unreacted thermitic material and highly energetic.” The images and data plots deserve careful attention.

Source

Now, go look into it and you will find out that indeed this paper was peer reviewed through a tough and long process. Instead of being so negative about that prospect, why don't you just open your minds and look at the information openly? You may just learn something...

Originally posted by downisreallyup
You have no idea what you are talking about. Bentham Science Publishers is a huge "journals giant"

And they will publish anything you pay them to

Who Peer reviewed "Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe"

You say it is peer reviewed, so who did the review?

Originally posted by downisreallyup
Now, go look into it and you will find out that indeed this paper was peer reviewed through a tough and long process.

So who peer reviewed it? Who were the referees?

A simple question, so who were they?

Originally posted by dereks

Originally posted by downisreallyup
You have no idea what you are talking about. Bentham Science Publishers is a huge "journals giant"

And they will publish anything you pay them to

Baseless accusation... don't be a typical "truster" please. If you are going to cast those kind of accusations, please back it up with some kind of reality-based facts. Thank you kindly.

Some of you may want to cast baseless aspersions at Stephen Jones or at Bentham Science Publishers, but unless you can "argue the facts" of the Jones' papers or the papers presented in the 200+ Bentham journals, you are only "barking" like an angry dog.

Stephen Jones is a reputable scientist, peer-review published in several notable publications:

· J. Rafelski and S.E. Jones, "Cold Nuclear Fusion," Scientific American, 257: 84-89 (July 1987).

· S.E. Jones, "Muon-Catalysed Fusion Revisited," (Invited article) Nature 321: 127-133 (1986).

# S.E. Jones, et al. "Fourteen Points of Agreement with Official Government Reports on the World Trade Center Destruction", Open Civil Engineering Journal, April 2008.

# K. Ryan, J. Gourley and S.E. Jones, "Environmental Anomalies at the World Trade Center: Evidence for Energetic Materials", Environmentalist, August 2008.

# Niels Harrit, Jeffrey Farrer, Steven Jones, et al. "Active Thermitic Material Discovered in Dust from the 9/11 World Trade Center Catastrophe", THE OPEN CHEMICAL PHYSICS JOURNAL, April 2009.

· S.E. Jones and J.E. Ellsworth, "Cold (metal-enhanced) fusion, geo-fusion, and cold nucleosynthesis", Condensed Matter Nuclear Science, 2005, London: World Scientific, p. 617.

· S.E. Jones, E.P. Palmer, J.B. Czirr, D.L. Decker, G.L. Jensen, J.M. Thorne, and S.F. Taylor & J. Rafelski, "Observation of Cold Nuclear Fusion in Condensed Matter," Nature 338: 737-740 (April 1989). Results confirmed:2001: "Enhancement of the electron screening effect for d+ d fusion reactions in metallic environments", Europhysics Letters, 54:449 “...the observed enhancement of the electron screening in metal targets can, in tendency, explain the small neutron production rates observed in the cold-fusion experiment of Jones [reference 1989 Nature paper].” Also, K. Czerski, et al., Eur. Phys. J. A27:S01,83 (2006) “ As shown in [Europhys. Lett. 68:363 (2004)], the screening energy of order 300 eV determined in accelerator experiments can explain the neutron production rate observed by Jones et al. [Nature 338:737, 1989] at room temperature.”

· S.E. Jones, A.N. Anderson, J.N. Bradbury, A.J. Caffrey, J.S. Cohen, P.A.M. Gram, M. Leon, R.L. Maltrud, M.A. Paciotti, C.D. Van Siclen, and K.D. Watts, "Observation of Unexpected Density Effects in Muon-Catalyzed d-t Fusion," Physical Review Letters 56: 588-591 (1986).

Source

Just because you don't happen to agree with some of the things he has found out using sound scientific procedures, that does not mean he is not an accomplished scientist.

Besides, Jones is not the main author of this paper, Danish scientist and head of the Chemistry department at Copenhagen University, Niels Harrit is:




[edit on 12-2-2010 by downisreallyup]

Originally posted by Swampfox46_1999
Precisely why it was not one of the conspiracy theories advocated on here as opposed to what truthers call the "official story"

(Sigh) yep. If this guy is even remotely trying to say this conspiracy story of his satisfies Occam's Razor then he is unrepentently lying through his teeth. These 9/11 conspiracy stories are by far the most godawful convoluted Rube Goldberg mechinations I've ever heard, bar none.

Apparently, some secret force decided to blow up two gigantic buildings by sneaking in past 50,000 tenants, inspectors, security guards, custodians, etc, and planting concealed super duper demolition devices secretly in plain sight that exist nowhere else except in secret laboratories, PLUS, for good measure, they crashed two hijacked and/or remote controlled passenger aircraft into THE EXACT SAME LOCATION where the super duper explosives were hidden as a cover story, all without anyone noticing even a scrap of paper out of place or leaving a microbe of evidence behind.

Of course, this requires about 100,000 saboteurs, planted moles, disinformation agents, paid false witnesses, and other flunkies whole heartedly willing to betray their country and murder 3,000 people in the most massive coverup in all of recorded human history...all as a false flag operation to invade some completely worthless country that even makes Somalia look like Switzerland. Don't even get me started on the "staged a fake crash site out in the middle of nowhere for no appreciable reason whatsoever" claims, and the "1,000 witnesses around the Pentagon spontaneously came down with mass psychosis when they saw a plane instead of a cruise missile hit the building" excuses. *THIS* is supposed to be the most simple explanation for the 9/11 attack?!?

The most simple explanation is that yes, it really was a terrorist attack. We know muslim terrorists are capable of hijacking aircraft, we know muslim terrorists can and will perform suicide attacks, and we know they're so outer space fanatic that they'll even start rioting over cartoons in Danish newspapers. We ALSO know that the gov't suffers bouts of sheer incompetence so that they can't even hand out bottles of water to hurricane survivors in New Orleans without slipping on banana peels. Why these conspiracy people deliberately ignore the most simplest explanation and instead have to make up all these layers upon layers of convolution and paranoid drivel is really beyond me. It's as if they have some emotional need to believe the gov't is constantly plotting to murder us all...presuming it is the gov't, rather than the Jewish world order, secret satan worshipping cults, or whatever the [censored] it is they believe is out to get us.

Originally posted by GoodOlDave

Originally posted by Swampfox46_1999
Precisely why it was not one of the conspiracy theories advocated on here as opposed to what truthers call the "official story"

(Sigh) yep. If this guy is even remotely trying to say this conspiracy story of his satisfies Occam's Razor then he is unrepentently lying through his teeth. These 9/11 conspiracy stories are by far the most godawful convoluted Rube Goldberg mechinations I've ever heard, bar none.

Hey Dave... why don't you correctly represent how a conspiracy might actually work instead of showing that you have no idea whatsoever how one goes about implementing such a conspiracy. Nobody I know would ever suggest the outlandish things you have suggested there, so your words are just a pointless diatribe. At least I attempt to make my posts make sense and resemble some kind of reality... please do the same.

Originally posted by downisreallyup
why don't you correctly represent how a conspiracy might actually work

So just which conspiracy theory are you talking about?

The one involving beam weapons destroyingthe WTC's?

The one involving nuclear bombs being used to destroy the WTC's?

The one involving holographic planes?

The one involving pod carrying aircraft firing missiles into the WTC's?

The one involving thousands of USAF personell killing the passengers and crew of the flights hijacked?

The one involving explosives installed by invisible ninja's?

The one involving super duper top secret nano thermite that no one noticed the invisible ninja's installing?

The one involving remote controlled planes, that were laser guided?

instead of showing that you have no idea whatsoever how one goes about implementing such a conspiracy.

You are the one here with no idea how things work

Nobody I know would ever suggest the outlandish things you have suggested there

except conspiracy theorists have suggested all the silly conspiracy theories above....

Who peer reviewed the paper you mentioned? Why are you avoiding that simple question.... it looks like it was not peer reviewed after all!

Originally posted by downisreallyup
Hey Dave... why don't you correctly represent how a conspiracy might actually work instead of showing that you have no idea whatsoever how one goes about implementing such a conspiracy.

No, actually, this is what we keep asking of you truthers. Conspiracies are supposed to be goal oriented activities workign for some defined objective, not simply a bunch of randomly occuring stunts simply for the sake of pulling off randomly occuring stunts. Did the conspirators openly plant explosives the same way it was done in 1993? NO! They snuck in and planted secret demolitions and used hijacked aircraft as a cover story. Did the conspirators use this as a false flag to blame Iraq, Iran, Venezuela, or some other resource rich country that's been a thorn in our side? NO! We framed Afhgnaistan, the camel dung capital of the world. When we invaded Iraq, did we smuggle in WMD as a false flag operation to fool the world just like we did on 9/11? NO! We openly admitted Iraq had no WMD and invited the absolute scorn of the world. Did all these wars invite massive gov't spending and lead us to economic revival like it did in world war II? NO! the gov't is pinching pennies and we're in the worst recession in decades. And so on and so forth.

It sounds like the master conspirators behint all these plots are a bunch of stoned high school kids concocting plots involving secret controlled demolitions in between bouts of hallucinating worms crawling out of the walls, more than it does any goal oriented elite operation. Tell me, what was the goal oriented objective in the conspiracy for France and Germany to send troops to help us in Afghanistan, but NOT Iraq? Please explain that one to me, becuase for the life of me I genuinely don't know.

Nobody I know would ever suggest the outlandish things you have suggested there, so your words are just a pointless diatribe. At least I attempt to make my posts make sense and resemble some kind of reality... please do the same.

Please do not insult my intelligence. The forums on this site are chock full of every possible goofball conspiracy claim imaginable, from controlled demolitions to faked crash sites in Shanksville to the planes being holograms to even one guy who said the conspirators are a secret satan worshipping cult who blew up the WTC becuase it looked like a giant number eleven. One guy here even claimed the tragedy in Haiti was caused by secret gov't earthquake machines. If you're attempting to claim that hordes of crackpots are NOT being attracted to your conspiracy movement like a moth to a flame, then you are unrepentently lying through your teeth yet again.

I said it before and I'll say it again- if the conspiracy theorists would only hold their own conspiracy claims up to the same stringent level of critical analysis that they do the commission report, they wouldn't be conspiracy theorists, for very long.

reply to post by GoodOlDave


Thank you for pointing those little facts out.

Also recall that the hijackers were majority Saudi born. Not one Iraqi or Afghan. So yes, lets make the hijackers Saudi, and then we shall invade Iraq and Afghanistan! Makes 100% sense right?? Hey we got attacked by Canada, so let's go invade Mexico! Allright!

And you are absolutely right about the WMDs. We couldnt sneak one lousy chemical device, or nuke, or something all jazzed up to look like an Iraqi weapon? Not even till today? So all that planning with fake planes, magic silenced bombs, magic thermites, 1,000s upon 1,000s of people all working in on it, faking out millions of people with holograms and DNA matches to nonexistant passengers, and those geniuses couldnt even slip on dirty bomb into Iraq?? This is why I love the 9/11 Truthers. The stories and reasoning get nuttier and nuttier.