So now you're arguing that Al-Qaeda doesn't exist? Or that that's not its name? I don't understand you.
Second of all you've taken turns of phrase I've used and quibbled about my word use as a way to misrepresent my arguments, and then accuse me of intellectual laziness. Obviously I don't think all conspiracy theorists think alike. I'm just commenting on a commonality I've noticed in many many discussions regarding conspiracy theories. I don't think anyone else here had trouble comprehending that. Second of all, when I said you'd be wrong about the keeping secrets thing, I was responding to your argument in kind. You didn't actually present any arguments in favour of secret keeping. You just said "I could argue that..." This thread is already full of examples corroborating my view of the likelihood of the government managing to keep a secret like this. The burden of proof is on you. I'm not dismissing arguments, what I'm saying is you haven't made any good ones. All of your inconsistencies, all of your "unasnwered questions" aren't unanswered. They aren't inconsistent. And yet, time and time again, I've seen from many (Though not all) conspiracy minded individuals an unwillingness to let a simple matter like a lack of any reason to doubt the official story get in the way. Now, stop quibbling, stop nitpicking my word use, stop building straw men, and start actually arguing, or just go away. Your choice.

@Darwyn, you idiot. al-Qaeda means "the base" in arabic. You *are* a stupid fuck, aren't you.

@Darwyn - Where did Invictus and I imply the US started the wars? You idiot, we merely pointed out that getting into a war started years before (3 years earlier is a conservative estimate) was possibly the result of a form of conspiracy. In the case of WWII we were bound to get involved and the attack was going to happen, but by sending the carriers out to see and then letting the attack happen without warning the base, it solified support for our entry in a more active level than if we had been fully prepared and kicked Japan's ass at Pearl Harbor. But that wasn't starting the war. Try not twisting words.

Darwyn, I mock because I've come to the conclusion that you're a person that lacks meaning in his life for some reason. Something in your life is insufficient to satisfy you. This may be at something as simple as a crap job, or the religion of your fathers not being enough to satisfy you. Any number of things (most of which I'm not going to bother)

So therefore, you are looking for something. Looking for something in all the wrong places, because the alternative is true introspection, and I have a feeling that would scare the crap out of you. You claim that you have secret knowledge that the average person is too lazy/stupid/blind to know, and therefore you have a superior understanding of how things work.

Shit happens for stupid reasons, kids. Yes, people are greedy and immoral, but the simple fact that the number of both high and low level conspirators with nobody turning coat on what would be a massive operation to kill both American and international lives.

And that simply doesn't make sense.

Darwyn, I'm sorry. You're looking for deeper meaning in the wrong set of events.

The destruction of the Death Star was an inside job.

Well, the second one was. Do you not think the Emperor could have kept it together with the force had not Vader thrown him into the reactor core?

I love SW, but the ending is complete BS.

1) The destruction of the DS would completely destroy all life on Endor

2) Why did the Empire just stop attacking? They had an entire armada, not to mention all the troops and ships stationed throughout the Galaxy. Did every single Imperial Commander just say "The Emperor is dead; fuck it!"?

@abgemacht - 1. It was ths size of a small mon, which implies smaller than our moon. It's destruction would not have destroyed all life, but it would have been a bit more of an event to Endor or Yavin than it was. 2. Of course they just gave up. It's happened in real history before. Cut off the head of the snake and the snake withers and dies.

I'm being sarcastic of course.

Endor Holocaust:

http://www.theforce.net/swtc/holocaust.html

So, Darwyn, you've asked a couple times how many inconsistencies there needs to be before I get suspicious.

The answer is "not a lot" - but that works on both sides.

Let's take the whole "Controlled Demolition" thing.

Generally speaking, people who believe this theory usually can be described "I don't understand how it could have happened, therefore it couldn't have happened that way. Therefore, something else happened."

To disprove the theory that the towers fell just due to the aircraft would be complex but *easily* doable: prove that the combination of the impact and the fire would not cause the towers to collapse. The plans and composition for the tower are easily available, and determining at what temperature a steel beam starts to lose structural integrity is also something that can be done - not that I'm not saying "melts" or "gets all buttery", but "starts to deform when you have tons of crap on top of it and it's on fire"

There are numerous people who have the education and expertise necessarily to validate this theoretical model, and they almost *invariably* state that the towers collapse was inevitable at the moment of impact - high rises just aren't designed to have tens of thousands of gallons burning jet fuel laying around.

Now, some people disagree - but they're usually *not* people with the expertise necessary to model this. It's possible to *obtain* that level of expertise, but since the deniers are firmly convinced that it was explosives, little things like using science to prove their points tend to be dismissed.

So when it comes to this particular question, people have to choose to believe people who should know what the hell is going on and people who are just random folks from the internet.

The problem *in general* I have with conspiracy theorists is that they constantly play a game of moving the goal posts and ignoring inconvenient data. For example, I gave you an example of someone who explained exactly why the towers collapsed, but you didn't appear to consider it for a moment - you're continuing to act in this discussion as if the "controlled demolition" theory is just as valid as the "nineteen nutjobs hijacked some planes and rammed them into things" theory.

This is what is known as the "Balance Fallacy". "There's a kind of notion that everyone's opinion is equally valid. My arse! A bloke who's been a professor of dentistry for 40 years doesn't have a debate with some idjit who removes his teeth with string and a door!"

In other words, "I think that someone blew up the buildings" needs a little more evidence than has been presented - especially since nearly every point that the blow-em-uppers have raised has been debunked.

Now, you can continue to point out random people from the internet saying random things, who don't bother to cite any reliable sources, but that doesn't make it true.

I'm unfortunately out of time, but you seem to have a vested interest in believing the worst in the US Government, and that seems to cause you to believe things that would make them look bad compared to things that would make them.... well, bad, but not evil at least. This makes you want to believe that BushDidIt.

And that's fine, but just bringing up an endless series of 'doubts' - and I mean endless in the sense of 'if you rebut me on this point, I'll find another, rather than reconsidering my view' - doesn't make your view anywhere near to being likely to being correct.

Earlier you accused me of expressing contempt for the Truthers. Well, that's because I *feel* contempt for them - I feel contempt for anyone who is going to let their passions determine what they believe, and damn little things like the facts. I have contempt for Birthers and Creationists and Fundamentalists and Homeopathic Practitioners and Scientologists and that idiot at my office who seems to believe that deadlines apply to everyone but them.

Normally I don't exactly go out of my way to rub it in people's face... but you *did* ask.

when it comes to tupac:

many of his posthumous album and song titles seem eerily to reference the fact that he is dead, (or perhaps faked his death)

the one he did just before he died, makieveli, references this idea in a number of ways, the most important being:

machiavelli (who he was a big fan of at the end) advocated faking your own death to escape your enemies, and

on the album cover he is made out to look like jesus who.... rose from the dead.


again no hard evidence but... damn.. he sure has had a lot of posthumous albums, hasn't he?

Oh and also, when he got shot, none of his companions chased the killer, though there were 4 cars with tupac.

idk. could he be dead? yeah. but if anyone faked their death, it's tupac shakur.

by the way can we drop the 9/11 truther thing, or move it to another thread?

it bores me.

let's talk about what OP wanted to talk about - which conspiracies you believe, and for those you don't, what you'd need to believe.

that's far more interesting than all this

"well the smoke was this color and controlled demolitions..."

yadayadayada. i don't give a fuck.

sorry lol im in a weird mood that comment was in poor taste. but yeah can we maybe move that discussion elsewhere?

@stratagos - "So when it comes to this particular question, people have to choose to believe people who should know what the hell is going on and people who are just random folks from the internet."

No, they don't. They simply need use common sense and figure it out on their own...this is what I've been trying to get at all along.

Fire is the official cause of both collapses that day. Both buildings collapsed in identical fashion...not dissimilar to a controlled demo in look, sound and end result. It stands to reason that to replicate this, a similar cause must be applied...that all load bearing columns must fail at the same time, as is the case in a controlled demolition. Again, Fire is the official cause of the collapse...but fire, by nature, is chaotic (that is to say unpredictable) as was the damage done by impacts to both buildings.

Yet, we are to believe that both of them fell in exactly the same fashion? Different damage = *identical* result? And I haven't even mentioned WTC 7, which also collapsed in an *identical* fashion to 1 and 2 but *wasn't* hit by a plane, because the 9-11 Commission decided not to report on it. All I want is to hear is an explanation as to how different, unpredictable and chaotic variables can cause absolute *identical* results. How is it even mathematically possible? Any other argument that doesn't include explaining it, is subordinate.

I have yet to see this argument. You must now begin to consider an alternative explanation and *that* implies that someone is lying.

So, let me present this a step further...what does it mean to even consider a conspiracy? Again, I will acknowledge that their are wacky ones, but those, like anything else can be easily dismissed with common sense.

I'm going to use a quote:
"Most people prefer to think that their leaders are just and fair even in the face of evidence to the contrary, because once a citizen acknowledges that the government under which he lives is lying, and corrupt the citizen then has to choose what he, or she will do about it. To take action in the face of a corrupt government entails risks of harm to life, and loved ones. To choose to do nothing is to surrender ones self image of standing for principles. Most people don't have the courage to face that choice. Hence, most propaganda is not designed to fool the critical thinker, but only to give moral coward an excuse not to think at all."

Unfortunately for Thucy, I have more common sense arguments. This is where I've been trying to go with this thread...when do you stop listening to yourself and start listening to authority figures?

So what do you tend to believe? Your own eyes and instincts? Or the authority on the matter? Is it possible to be so blinded or dazzled by the numbers or analysis of an "expert" that you disregard common sense? I believe that is called propaganda, isn't it?

Well it is a conspiricy theory after all - just a rather stupid one given all the evidence points to the theorists being wrong. Reread Strat's post for what I was going to say before realising he had.

One I like is the Lunar Landings conspiracy, where I think the logic of the situation is summed up best in this little clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6MOnehCOUw

Oh Darwin, I do hope you're not serious with the 9/11 conspiracy theories?

Also, another brilliant Lunar vid - this one in support of the conspiracy (ish!) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=umEpXKdTm5k

"Well it is a conspiracy theory after all"...no, it's not even a theory, it's an attack on the official story.

@ Draugnar - "we merely pointed out that getting into a war started years before (3 years earlier is a conservative estimate) was possibly the result of a form of conspiracy"

really? "was *possibly* the result of a *form* of conspiracy?" lol...can your dancing around the ghastly 'c' word be any more obvious? Besides that, what does that even mean?

Invictus says "The only conspiracy theory I really believe is that the United States entered the First World War because American bankers had invested too much money in an Entente victory to allow Germany to win."

You say “I'd even go so far as to say that the reason the intel was so slow to arrive at Pearl (WWII, not WWI, but still) was to provide an excuse to enter into the war."

Both statements are indictments of a conspiracy. My question is where is your proof? How have you come to such a conclusion?

"Oh Darwin, I do hope you're not serious with the 9/11 conspiracy theories?"

If I told you I was serious, what then? What if I said I wasn't serious? I'm just curious...

"One I like is the Lunar Landings conspiracy, where I think the logic of the situation is summed up best in this little clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P6MOnehCOUw "

You didn't read the first post like I referenced in the message of the original thread. :(

@figlesquidge That's a good one. Maybe we should ask the Chinese to take a few snap shots of the landing sites while they are up there.

@Darwyn - I did actually, but unfortunately had forgotten by this point :S
If you did think 9/11 was an inside job I'd be worried by your logic, interested in the purported motive, and surprised.

The towers coming down is not even relevant to any 'provocation' conspiracy theory. Even if they had continued to stand, they were not in salvageable condition and would have to demolished anyway.

I think its a reasonable possiblility that the U.S. security organs could have 'let something happen' to gain political leverage for subsequent operations afghanistan, iraq, iran etc.

Really when you look at society it's hard to see *anything but* conspiracies.

Darwyn, you are misrepresenting me. I believe that the real reason the United States FINALLY decided to enter the war in 1917 was because Americans had invested so much in Entente war bonds, rather than JUST the resumption of unrestricted submarine warfare and lingering revenge for the Lusitania and that Zimmerman Telegraph. There were Congressional investigations in the interwar period that confirmed this, but the stigma of isolationism after WWII has made history ignore these findings.

I'm not saying an evil cabal cooked up the US involvement, I'm saying there were reasons beyond ones that actually were part of America's geostrategic interests (although I won't claim to predict that a Kaiser Wilhelm run world would necessarily have been) . It's a much sharper point than you're trying to pigeonhole me into.

I know the government is dishonest and corrupt. I find (again in general, I'm not claiming this is a trait that every conspiracy theorist shares) that conspiracy theorists like to paint all non conspiracy theorists as naive simpletons who honestly believe that the government always acts in good faith, and with complete openness and honesty. Let me assure you right now, that is not the case. It's not a matter of believing what the government tells me or not. It's a matter of weighing the plausibility of various accounts. Clearly in some ways we differ on this, and yet I simply cannot see how you find a vast conspiracy of government agencies and private security contracting agencies and so on and so forth, orchestrating a massive false flag operation, a more plausible account than, well, a relatively small conspiracy of just a handful of terrorists, committing a straightforward terror attack. Agreeing that the official account provided by the government seems plausible and trusting the government, are very very different things. Don't get the two confused.

"I don't understand how it could have happened, therefore it couldn't have happened that way. Therefore, something else happened."

QFT--This is why people said the Pyramids were built by aliens, too.

@stratagos - "So when it comes to this particular question, people have to choose to believe people who should know what the hell is going on and people who are just random folks from the internet."

No, they don't. They simply need use common sense and figure it out on their own...this is what I've been trying to get at all along."

***

That is, without a doubt, one of the most idiotic things I've ever heard. Are you channeling Stephen Colbert?

I'm not going to bother to respond to your 'questions', as you're not *interested* in what the truth really is. You know in your gut what is right, after all, and I could spend hours refuting each and every point you brought up and you'd just keep believing whatever you want to believe. After all, it's common sense, right? Far be it to pay attention to what the experts in the field have to say - it conflicts with your common sense, so *every single one of them* must either be wrong, deluded, or In On It.

You're not interested in gaining the expertise necessary to answer your questions, either. Why bother, when you can just find people who support your view to quote as "experts", and ignore the "experts" on the other side. Never mind that the only "expertise" the guys on your side have is "wearing tinfoil hats" and the guys on the other side have "decades of experience in answering exactly the questions you're asking."

If *I* thought that someone was feeding me a crock of shit - and if I gave enough of a fuck to care about it - I'd take the time to prove their story doesn't mesh, not just "ask questions" I'm not interested in the answers to, or float cockamaime theories that I have absolutely zero evidence for because my 'common sense' doesn't take into account the knowledge and experience necessary to understand what happened.

So, given that there is no combination of words, sources, experiments, ect that could get you out of your nice comfortable The Man Did It mindset, I don't feel any particular need to respond any longer. You've proven yourself to be someone completely uninterested in the facts and logic.

You're not interested in the answers to your questions, because they don't conform to your worldview. Which is both intellectually dishonest and just friggin pathetic, in someone who otherwise passes off as a thinking individual.

You 'win', in the sense that I'm not going to even bother rebutting what you say any longer, unless I think there's a danger someone else is going to go down the same idiotic "instinct not logic" rathole.


When do I believe a conspiracy theory? When the conspiracy theorists are intellectually honest enough to consider evidence that doesn't mesh with their conspiracy

anyone want play now??? join to the 5 min turn please ancient war 2

@Invictus - "I'm not saying an evil cabal cooked up the US involvement, I'm saying there were reasons beyond ones that actually were part of America's geostrategic interests (although I won't claim to predict that a Kaiser Wilhelm run world would necessarily have been) . It's a much sharper point than you're trying to pigeonhole me into. "

ok, there were reasons beyond...America's...interests. Who's reasons and tell me why? I can only assume you mean bankers cuz that's what you mentioned earlier.

@Mafialligator - "I find (again in general, I'm not claiming this is a trait that every conspiracy theorist shares) that conspiracy theorists like to paint all non conspiracy theorists as naive simpletons who honestly believe that the government always acts in good faith, and with complete openness and honesty."

That's mostly correct, yes. but the reverse is also true. that non-CTer's paint all CT'ers as tinfoil hat wearing chicken littles. I'm sorta trying to break this mentality with this thread. There are people like me who haven't fallen for ALL of the nonsense. Cuz I know how you non-CTers like to take just one point, declare it as nonsense to dismiss the rest. The No-Plane at the Pentagon is an example. This, like the towers, is easy to dismiss. Lots of witnesses claim to have seen it fly in...none of them claim to have seen it fly away. It's really that simple.

"It's a matter of weighing the plausibility of various accounts. Clearly in some ways we differ on this, and yet I simply cannot see how you find a vast conspiracy of government agencies and private security contracting agencies and so on and so forth, orchestrating a massive false flag operation"

No, it is not. It's absolutely NOT about the plausibility of various accounts. It is only about the plausibility of the official story! That is all. No other account matters. Why should it? After all, they are the experts, right? They are telling us what happened.

What did you see at 10:05am and again at 10:28am? I saw two identical controlled demos...so did a lot of people, including news casters who reported. How long did it take for the experts to convince you otherwise? I'm just wondering...

The experts told us it was fire. Well, the fire excuse doesn't pass the sniff test as I've already indicated. So again, until someone can explain how different, unpredictable and chaotic variables can cause absolute *identical* results no other analysis is needed.

We are all drowning in data about this or that, debunking each other with this or that...but have we all forgotten to use simple common sense?

So with one hole punched in the official story, do you still cling to it? What if I presented another? Do you cling to it then? Why would you? Oh, that's right...they are experts. But also because you are somehow convinced that any other account is impossible...which is strange because if it's not X, it must be Y or Z or A or B or... The only thing that needs to happen is for the experts to prove to us their story...and it's clearly unconvincing. That can mean only one thing...

They are liars. They didn't "get it wrong", it wasn't an accident, they lied. Deal with it.

At no point should you allow your judgment to be clouded by any other account but the one presented. Why would you do that? It is not logical to hold onto a false theory simply because other theories are "impossible". We may never know exactly what happened...but we do know the official story is absolute bullshit and that is all that matters.

It's time to deal with the implications of the story being false. We can explore other accounts just as soon as you are ready to accept this simple truth.