on 9/11 conspiracy theories

The topic on 9/11 conspiracy theories came up in a Facebook thread today. Here are my posts from a discussion thread from Slashdot on this from last year, with a lot of links debunking conspiracy theory arguments. Quoted material is from other Slashdot posters (except as otherwise attributed), see the link for context.

Making multi minute phone calls from 30k ft with 2001 phone tech and no onboard plane phones (I already know its not possible, but would love to see them try)

You know that's not possible? So you tried it, eh? Please, post the details of your experiment.

Getting a 767 sim and attempt to fly the same path as pentagon plane

Why would you try it with a sim for a plane of a different model than the one that hit the Pentagon? Flight 77 (with a former co-worker of mine and his whole family on board) was a 757.

Of course, why let facts get in the way of a good batshit conspiracy theory?

why there was NO remainder of anything a passenger plane crash leaves in a crash site, and there were NO bodies, passenger belongings, pieces of bodies, ANYTHING but fairly intact TWO bodies in the scene.

Are you saying there were no bodies, or were you saying there were two?

Allyn E. Kilsheimer, CEO of KCE Structural Engineers (a company involved in providing emergency engineering and post-collapse assistance) said "I held parts of uniforms from crew members in my hands, including body parts."

Of course, once you reach the level of batshitness you've achieved, you can simply ignore his testimony by saying "they got to him too!"

And I'm sure you simply don't accept the claim that the remains of 184 people were identified; surely "they" got to all 102 DNA analysts, sample processors, logistics staff, and administrative personnel at the Armed Forces DNA Identification Laboratory. It's a DOD facility, after all.

Are you saying there was no debris from the plane? That's simply incorrect; hell, you can even see photos of a bunch of it at this batshit conspiracy site. And photos of the plane debris inside the building (where, in answer to your question about the lawn, most of it ended up, in agreement with conservation of momentum) can be seen at this somewhat less batshit crazy site. And some more photos here. And more photos, with amazingly detailed analysis, here

But I'm sure "they" got to the owners of all of those sites.

tell me where the hell did the 767's huge tail has vanished.

757. If you can't get that much right after being corrected, I don't see any point in talking to you further.

Like most of the plane, the tail and wings got shredded, and ended up inside the building. As Mete Sozen, a structural engineer who studied the impact in computer simulation, put it, "At that speed, the plane itself is like a sausage skin. It doesn't have much strength and virtually crumbles on impact."

It's like shooting an aluminum foil origami crane out of an air cannon at high speed, through a stack of steel cheese graters, and then demanding "where's the crane's tail? There must be a trick!"

please, spare the bullshit. as if the world has never seen a passenger liner crash.

Into a building? One as hardened as the part of the Pentagon that was hit? Please, name me one similar crash.

Oh, and by the way, regarding your original question about simulating the piloting of the crash, see this:

Brian also consulted with a pair of commercial airline pilots who decided to try this kind of approach in a flight training simulator. Although the pilots were not sure the simulator models such scenarios with complete accuracy, they reported no significant difficulties in flying a 757 within an altitude of tens of feet at speeds between 350 and 550 mph (565 to 885 km/h) across smooth terrain. The only issue they encountered was constant warnings from the simulator about flying too fast and too low. These warnings were expected since the manufacturer does not recommend and FAA regulations prohibit flying a commercial aircraft the way Flight 77 was flown. These restrictions do not mean it is impossible for a plane to fly at those conditions but that it is extremely hazardous to do so, and safety was obviously not a concern to the terrorists on September 11. An aircraft flying at those high speeds at low altitude would also likely experience shaking due to the loads acting on it, but commercial aircraft are designed with at least a 50% safety margin to survive such extremes.

One of the pilots summarized his experiences by stating, "This whole ground effect argument is ridiculous. People need to realize that crashing a plane into a building as massive as the Pentagon is remarkably easy and takes no skill at all. Landing one on a runway safely even under the best conditions? Now that's the hard part!" While he may have been exaggerating a bit for effect, he does raise a valid point that flying skillfully and safely is much more difficult than flying as recklessly as the terrorists did on September 11.

Look. I know a lot of otherwise intelligent and sane people have gone batshit crazy over 9/11 conspiracy theories, almost like some national variant of PTSD. And, yes, it's not unreasonable to think that Bush and Co. would do something like this if they could; they are even more batshit, and much more dangerous, than the 9/11 conspiracy folks. I'm even willing to entertain the possibility that the administration knew an attack was imminent and let it go, so they could take advantage of it (as many allege FDR did regarding Pearl Harbor). Not saying it is the case, only that I wouldn't dismiss it out of hand.

But your assertations about the events of 9/11 are wildly inaccurate. I like a good crazy as much as anybody - hell, I'm throwing a party next week in honor of Emperor Norton. But his crazy did some good; 9/11 conspiracy crazy distracts us from the real wickedness the government is engaging in.

(In fact, one might almost propose that the 9/11 "truth" movement is a government conspiracy meant to keep the masses distracted...)

after all those nsa/homeland security/executive authority shit, the only thing you can trust is a video.

Why in the world would we trust video more or less than still photos? If you're postulating a group of conspirators powerful enough to have pulled off 9/11, faking video would be trivial for them.

What makes the photographic record reliable is the variety of sources, and the analysis of the imagery, not the medium itself. (Though I'm sure you'll now pop up with "experts" who claim that photos were faked. They probably also have "evidence" that the Apollo photographs were faked, too...)

do not even dare to object to this, for, over 2-3 months we are talking on news government gagging and repressing many different companies and groups through fbi here in slashdot.

Oh, I must dare. Government attempts to gag dissent are completely different from getting hundreds of people, from airline workers to random eyewitnesses to cleanup workers, to spout similar sets of lies.

That the government lies about many things, is not proof that the government lies about everything. When a known con artist tells you that the sky is blue, you don't need to invoke some massive conspiracy about how it's really red but clones of Elvis Presely, using invisibility technology from the UFO that crashed at Roswell and led by the preserved brain of Richard Nixon, are actually following you around in hot air balloons with colored filters to keep you from seeing it.

and we dont see any passenger liner in pentagon yard in those videos.

I have already explained to you that most of the debris ended up inside the Pentagon. When someone is shot with a hollow-point, do you look for the bullet to be on the ground in front of the victim?

The debris ended up inside the building. The videos you refer to were shot from a distance and obscured by smoke; absolutely nothing can be determined from them.

this government has tried to manufacture many 'evidence' to justify a war with iran.

The mendacity of the government is not the subject of our disagreement. But it only takes a handful of people to slant, or even outright manufacture, intelligence reports about a foreign government; batshit crazy 9/11 conspiracy theories require the cooperation of thousands of people.

excuse me, but a fuckin twin engined passenger liner debris cant fill that hole the pentagon had.

I have already linked to pages explaining that the "entrance wound" hole in the exterior wall was just about the size of the fuselage of the plane -the hole was was 16 to 20 feet wide; a 757's body is about 13 feet in diameter. It's a very good fit.

and there were no passenger liner pieces in those holes they videoed.

As I have already explained to you, videos taken immediately after the event were from a distance and obscured by smoke. Most of the plane was reduced to tiny scraps. Of course nothing would have been visible.

also, governments, interest groups, political factions have been mounting millions of unbelievable plots since the dawn of time.

If you choose to believe in vast conspiracies, no amount of evidence will sway you, since any piece of data can be dismissed as part of the conspiracy. Nothing and no one can be trusted.

In common parlance, we call that "batshit crazy".

I hope someday your mental health improves.

This ends my comments on the subject.