Some thoughts on conspiricy theories...
Sep. 2nd, 2006 06:24 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
kallistiiI have a number of really creative and interesting friends...but sometimes, they really amaze me as to the theories they support....and one that is very topical at the moment is the idea that the US Government destroyed the Twin Towers and other buildings in the World Trade Center complex. Some people say that the live TV of the planes hitting the towers were staged, and explosives were used to destroy the buildings.
Conspiracy theories are nothing new...especially when something that is massively shocking and almost incomprehensible happens. Add to that, governments thrive on cover-ups and "creating reality" to suit their interests. So there is good reason to be suspicious of governments.
Many conspiracy theories are given "feet" by the lack of understanding of facts involved with the incident. The collapse of the Twin Towers is a great example of this. I've watched a few films and visited a few web sites that claim the impact of the two planes and the fires they caused could never have brought them down. And, if they had been traditional buildings, that is true.
The first skyscraper and tallest building in the world to suffer the impact of an airplane was the Empire State Building. It had a traditional frame structure...that is, they are like the old Erector Sets, where you build essentially a series of square boxes, and pile them one upon the other until you have a tall building. The big problem with building tall structures is that the struts that make up the frame of the building end up taking more and more space to support the load of the building. The Empire State Building (ESB) is near the limit of how high you can build such a building and still have lots of floor space for offices. Because of the frame structure, you can damage or break a certain number of the struts and the remaining ones will take up the load. Add to that, in many ways, the ESB was grossly over-engineered. When the B-25 bomber struck it in 1945, most of the damage was thus cosmetic, not structural. That is why, 60+ years later, the building still stands, and the floor that was hit is still in use.
The World Trade Center's Twin Towers, on the other hand, had a very different design. Rather than having an internal frame, it has an outer load-bearing structure with an inner load bearing structure.. The easiest way to visualize this is to take the empty tube from a roll of toilet paper and place it on it's end. Next, place a book upon it. Chances are, although it is a flimsy cardboard, it will support not just one book, but many. In fact, you might be able to put all of your weight on it It is a tremendously strong structure. Up through the center was the elevator shafts, which were also of a unique design to allow the high-speed elevators needed for a building that tall. Suspended between the structure of the elevator shafts and the outer frame were the floors. These floors also provided cross bracing between core and the outer tube such that they prevented the "tube" from bowing outwards under the stress.
To further visualize this, think of that toilet paper tube again, and then put a bundle of Bic pens in the middle. Now imagine suspended between the inner pens, and the outer tube were the "floors", with strings between the pens and the tube, holding up the floors, and keeping the outer system and the inner system connected.
The design was a wonder...it allowed the building of a structure with huge amounts of floor space, with a great deal of strength, on a record-setting height.
To understand how the impact of the planes affected the structure of the Twin Towers, take that tube you were using, and which might be able to hold up your weight when standing upon it. Now put a slight crease in the side, then put just a few books on top of it...and chances are, the tube will collapse fairly quickly.
But the Twin Towers also had a central core...so they were stronger than just the outer tube. And this was part of the "over engineering" that most modern structures today have. Thus, if they had only suffered an impact, they might have survived. But the planes were fully loaded with fuel. But the type of fuel they use, JET A-1, burns at around
1500 degrees F. This is below the temperature at which steel melts, but it is hot enough to reduce the amount of load it will carry.
But there is another effect of heat that has not been addressed...and everyone one has seen it...Those expansion joints on bridges are a good indication of it.
Most metals expand when heated. And if you don't heat a metal evenly, it will twist. Between the weakening caused by the burning JET A-1 fuel, and the distortions in the steel due to uneven heating, it is not hard to see that it could have easily stressed the structure to the point of failure.
According to another theory, there was another type of burnable material that burns very hot...and there was tonnes of it...Two of the main structural metals used in modern aircraft today are aluminum and magnesium. Between the jet fuel burning, the impact and any chimney effects, it is quite conceivable that either metal, or possibly both could have been ignited. These metals burn at around the same temperature as thermite (which consists of aluminum and iron oxide), that is, around 4000-5000 degrees F. Water will not put these materials out. So the sprinklers would be of no use. Temperatures such as these will melt steel without any trouble at all... We know that the planes lodged against the inner elevator columns, and with upwards of 60 tonnes of burning aluminum and magnesium burning at 5000 degrees F, it is not inconceivable that the central structure was compromised and collapsed, causing the Towers to seemingly implode upon themselves and collapse.
So if you go back to the toilet paper tube with the inner core of Bic pens, imagine if you suddenly pushed those pens downward...the walls of the tube would fold in on themselves, much like putting your hand into a sock, and pulling it it inside out. Needless to say, any strength that the tube and pen structure had is now gone.
Thus it was with the Twin Towers on September 11th, 2001. And it was a good thing too, If they had fallen over sideways, the loss of life would have gone up by possibly an order of magnitude! Falling sideways, they would have devastated many blocks of adjacent buildings, still filled with people.
There are many reasons why the Twin Towers fell, simple reasons, without the need of complex conspiracy theories.
Remember Occam's Razor:
"The simplest answer is usually the correct answer."
Think about how complex a conspiracy theory you need to create to control all of the news feeds of all the TV networks, plant charges to blow up the buildings, cover up the facts, and get away with it.
The destruction of the Twin Towers was a very traumatic event for North American society, and like dealing with the death of a loved one, the first phase of grieving is disbelief. That is where we are now. We are searching for other answers than the one before us. It seems too simple, seemingly too easy to destroy two icons of North American society, and cause the death of thousands of innocent people. But it wasn't simple. It took years of planning. All we saw was the last couple of hours of those years of plans. Death on such a scale is never simple or easy. And that is part of what is keeping us safe now.
Here are some of the sites I used for reference:
http://www.st911.org
http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=179
http://www.civil.usyd.edu.au/wtc.shtml
http://www.tms.org/pubs/journals/JOM/0112/Eagar/Eagar-0112.html
Conspiracy theories are nothing new...especially when something that is massively shocking and almost incomprehensible happens. Add to that, governments thrive on cover-ups and "creating reality" to suit their interests. So there is good reason to be suspicious of governments.
Many conspiracy theories are given "feet" by the lack of understanding of facts involved with the incident. The collapse of the Twin Towers is a great example of this. I've watched a few films and visited a few web sites that claim the impact of the two planes and the fires they caused could never have brought them down. And, if they had been traditional buildings, that is true.
The first skyscraper and tallest building in the world to suffer the impact of an airplane was the Empire State Building. It had a traditional frame structure...that is, they are like the old Erector Sets, where you build essentially a series of square boxes, and pile them one upon the other until you have a tall building. The big problem with building tall structures is that the struts that make up the frame of the building end up taking more and more space to support the load of the building. The Empire State Building (ESB) is near the limit of how high you can build such a building and still have lots of floor space for offices. Because of the frame structure, you can damage or break a certain number of the struts and the remaining ones will take up the load. Add to that, in many ways, the ESB was grossly over-engineered. When the B-25 bomber struck it in 1945, most of the damage was thus cosmetic, not structural. That is why, 60+ years later, the building still stands, and the floor that was hit is still in use.
The World Trade Center's Twin Towers, on the other hand, had a very different design. Rather than having an internal frame, it has an outer load-bearing structure with an inner load bearing structure.. The easiest way to visualize this is to take the empty tube from a roll of toilet paper and place it on it's end. Next, place a book upon it. Chances are, although it is a flimsy cardboard, it will support not just one book, but many. In fact, you might be able to put all of your weight on it It is a tremendously strong structure. Up through the center was the elevator shafts, which were also of a unique design to allow the high-speed elevators needed for a building that tall. Suspended between the structure of the elevator shafts and the outer frame were the floors. These floors also provided cross bracing between core and the outer tube such that they prevented the "tube" from bowing outwards under the stress.
To further visualize this, think of that toilet paper tube again, and then put a bundle of Bic pens in the middle. Now imagine suspended between the inner pens, and the outer tube were the "floors", with strings between the pens and the tube, holding up the floors, and keeping the outer system and the inner system connected.
The design was a wonder...it allowed the building of a structure with huge amounts of floor space, with a great deal of strength, on a record-setting height.
To understand how the impact of the planes affected the structure of the Twin Towers, take that tube you were using, and which might be able to hold up your weight when standing upon it. Now put a slight crease in the side, then put just a few books on top of it...and chances are, the tube will collapse fairly quickly.
But the Twin Towers also had a central core...so they were stronger than just the outer tube. And this was part of the "over engineering" that most modern structures today have. Thus, if they had only suffered an impact, they might have survived. But the planes were fully loaded with fuel. But the type of fuel they use, JET A-1, burns at around
1500 degrees F. This is below the temperature at which steel melts, but it is hot enough to reduce the amount of load it will carry.
But there is another effect of heat that has not been addressed...and everyone one has seen it...Those expansion joints on bridges are a good indication of it.
Most metals expand when heated. And if you don't heat a metal evenly, it will twist. Between the weakening caused by the burning JET A-1 fuel, and the distortions in the steel due to uneven heating, it is not hard to see that it could have easily stressed the structure to the point of failure.
According to another theory, there was another type of burnable material that burns very hot...and there was tonnes of it...Two of the main structural metals used in modern aircraft today are aluminum and magnesium. Between the jet fuel burning, the impact and any chimney effects, it is quite conceivable that either metal, or possibly both could have been ignited. These metals burn at around the same temperature as thermite (which consists of aluminum and iron oxide), that is, around 4000-5000 degrees F. Water will not put these materials out. So the sprinklers would be of no use. Temperatures such as these will melt steel without any trouble at all... We know that the planes lodged against the inner elevator columns, and with upwards of 60 tonnes of burning aluminum and magnesium burning at 5000 degrees F, it is not inconceivable that the central structure was compromised and collapsed, causing the Towers to seemingly implode upon themselves and collapse.
So if you go back to the toilet paper tube with the inner core of Bic pens, imagine if you suddenly pushed those pens downward...the walls of the tube would fold in on themselves, much like putting your hand into a sock, and pulling it it inside out. Needless to say, any strength that the tube and pen structure had is now gone.
Thus it was with the Twin Towers on September 11th, 2001. And it was a good thing too, If they had fallen over sideways, the loss of life would have gone up by possibly an order of magnitude! Falling sideways, they would have devastated many blocks of adjacent buildings, still filled with people.
There are many reasons why the Twin Towers fell, simple reasons, without the need of complex conspiracy theories.
Remember Occam's Razor:
"The simplest answer is usually the correct answer."
Think about how complex a conspiracy theory you need to create to control all of the news feeds of all the TV networks, plant charges to blow up the buildings, cover up the facts, and get away with it.
The destruction of the Twin Towers was a very traumatic event for North American society, and like dealing with the death of a loved one, the first phase of grieving is disbelief. That is where we are now. We are searching for other answers than the one before us. It seems too simple, seemingly too easy to destroy two icons of North American society, and cause the death of thousands of innocent people. But it wasn't simple. It took years of planning. All we saw was the last couple of hours of those years of plans. Death on such a scale is never simple or easy. And that is part of what is keeping us safe now.
Here are some of the sites I used for reference:
http://www.st911.org
http://www.damninteresting.com/?p=179
http://www.civil.usyd.edu.au/wtc.shtml
http://www.tms.org/pubs/journals/JOM/0112/Eagar/Eagar-0112.html
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no subject
Date: 2006-09-02 06:28 pm (UTC)This does not preclude that the US was in on the planning of this event. This does not preclude that there WASN'T a conspiracy of sorts behind it. In fact, if you ask me, it speaks HIGHLY of a conspiracy of some sort, whether or not the US govt had a part in it. And to be honest, I'd be hard-pressed to believe that the US WASN'T involved in it.
no subject
Date: 2006-09-02 07:04 pm (UTC)ttyl
no subject
Date: 2006-09-03 01:38 am (UTC)Then, we are supposedly trying to find this guy who keeps eluding us. Yeah, right! They can find needles in haystacks but they can't find this guy.
I can't help it. It just "feels" wrong to me. The whole thing smells.
no subject
Date: 2006-09-03 08:04 am (UTC)We do know that even before they were elected, the neo-cons wanted to go into Iraq. Bush Jr probably wanted to go since Hussein was the bad man who went after his daddy. If they had gone into Iraq rather than Afgranistan after 911, then I would say there is some credance to your theory. Afganistan has nothing in the way of resources that the US needs, and there is no reason to go there other than to take out the Taliban. Iraq, on the other hand, has lots of oil, which the US needs.
I do agree about "Ozzy" bin Hiding...I am sure they could get Pakistan to cough him up at any time they want...probably just before the next presidential election.
ttyl
engineering safety reports et al
Date: 2006-09-02 09:25 pm (UTC)conspiracy? maybe, but i really doubt it.
conspiracy is a new religion, meant to explain the inexplicable.
Re: engineering safety reports et al
Date: 2006-09-02 10:47 pm (UTC)ttyl
Reality & Illusions
Date: 2006-09-03 01:41 am (UTC)http://www.physics.byu.edu/research/energy/htm7.html
To infer that anyone who does not accept any government's official story is aconspiracy teorist or adupe of same is basically yellow journalism.
Academiocs have questions of stuff all the time.
Without qurestions there would be no journalism and no science.
I'm no conspiracy theorist. I havea good solid sense of when somene is wading into BS territory.
I am interested in checking things out when either my gut or my brain goes - wait a second, something might be wrong here, best to check thoroughly.
There is in fact an entire journal of studies devoted to looking at the collpase of the Twin Towers.
I had a German friend, who died recently, a highly decorated scientist; during WW2 he was a sergeant with the Luftwaffe. He and his fellow soldiers beleived in his elected government - he beleived that they would not gas the Jews, that it was all conspiracy nuts.
Of course when they found out the 'nuts' were telling the truth and that their government really was building extermination camps, these same soldiers - with not much experience in politics - wanted to crawl into a hole and die.
There are a large number of questions that have arisen as a result of 9/11 and I for one want to see the truth and not just opinions from one sixde or the other determined to keep their piece of mind, rather than look into the darkness and find out what's real and what is an illusion.
Re: Reality & Illusions
Date: 2006-09-03 07:57 am (UTC)A quick check of the domain of said journal (http://www.journalof911studies.com) shows that it is registered probably by the same person/group that registered the Scholars for 9/1 Truth (http://www.st911.org), but neither provide valid contact info, and hide behind email anonymisers. I find that suspicous, as all academic journals that I have looked at that have a web presence have non-hidden email addresses. The physicist you mention is the main person quoted on all the above, and a number of the related sites. All related sites have been registered via anonymiser services to hide the identity of the people registering the domains. That raises red flags to me. For all we know, it could be just one person behind *all* of the domains...or some government agency. In fact, the name Steven E. Jones keeps on comming up on many sites...
I've done a lot of studying of the events that led to Pearl Harbour, and there are a number of similarities between the two. But a couple of them are important...one is the intellgence failure. Both 911 and Peal Harbour were known to the government well in advance...but other branches of the government didn't believe said intellegence, and thus didn't act upon it. And the other is the reason why those branches didn't believe the intellegence...they didn't believe that anyone would dare attack America on it's home ground...the Land of the Free, Home of the Brave.
It is that last one that is sticking in the craw of most Americans, and is part of, I believe, the reason there is such a swirl of conspiricy theories about 911.
As for the Germans...It took less than 5 years for the mass murder of Gypies, Jews, Gays, etc to come to light...and they had absolute control of the media. The US Government doesn't have much control over the media in the US, and even less, if any, out side of the US. I don't trust the media, it's profit motive almost always outweighs their willingness to report on things. But I do know that if they had a chance to prove their government was behind 911, they would be all over it, with visions of Pulitzer Prizes dancing in their heads. It would be the biggest media coup since Watergate, and would certainly bring down the Bush Government. Whoever broke it would reap a fortune in both prestige and money...Every media outlet dreams of breaking the next Watergate...
I, personally don't see a proponderance of evidence to make me suspecious enough to believe the US Government was behind 911. And I know a great deal about the evils that it has committed in the past.