'9/11: Science and Conspiracy,' not quite/National Geographic Channel special aims to debunk/By Tom Conroy Aug 31, 2009
'9/11: Science and
Conspiracy,' not quite
National Geographic Channel special aims to debunk
By Tom Conroy
Aug 31, 2009
Intended to address the issues raised by people who question the official story of the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, the documentary “9/11: Science and Conspiracy” probably won’t change anyone’s mind on either side.
Airing tonight, Monday, Aug. 31, at 8 p.m. on the National Geographic Channel, the two-hour program depicts several scientific experiments that have been staged to answer the major points raised by the conspiracy theorists.
The documentary, however, doesn’t feel scientific. It often falls back on standard devices to build tension: hushed narration, ominous music, quick cuts to darkened or bleached-out shots of wreckage.
The sound and look clash radically with the documentary’s purpose, making it seem like one of those old “In Search of…” shows, which were intended to question official versions of events, not support them.
The experiments are presented in a more straightforward fashion: Well-credentialed experts attempt to reconstruct events in the attacks that the skeptics, known as “truthers,” say couldn’t have happened the way they were supposed to.
For example, to address the charge that burning jet fuel couldn’t have caused the World Trade Center’s steel girders to buckle, a testing laboratory ignites a puddle of jet fuel below a smaller girder, which buckles in less than four minutes.
Throughout the documentary, some leading truthers view the footage of the experiments and give their reactions. The narrator invites us to observe how they “process information contrary to their beliefs.”
One says that in real life the jet fuel burned out quicker; another says that their theory involves explosives, so this is irrelevant.
Until someone sets up an experiment in which a 100-story building built exactly to the World Trade Center’s specs collapses after being hit by a commercial airliner, these people aren’t likely to change their minds.
Some of the issues raise by the truthers, however, aren’t addressed, or are addressed in brief asides. This leaves this documentary open to charges of picking and choosing which points to cover.
“9/11: Science and Conspiracy” spends too much time discussing the psychology behind conspiracy theories—which isn’t really a hard science. It’s unclear why the producers chose the novelist David Baldacci as one of their experts on this topic.
When asked to provide an overarching theory of how and why the attacks occurred, the truthers who appear on camera are careful to say that they’re only questioning the official story, not offering their own narrative.
But as one writer interviewed on the show points out, any plausible conspiracy would have to involve so many people that someone would have spoken up by now.
That’s probably the best answer to the truthers, but you don’t need science to figure it out.
Tom Conroy is a Connecticut writer and longtime TV critic.
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Fire Down Below; The Sound Of Silence
"For example, to address the charge that burning jet fuel couldn’t have caused the World Trade Center’s steel girders to buckle, a testing laboratory ignites a puddle of jet fuel below a smaller girder, which buckles in less than four minutes."
That experiment is useless! Why? Because one would need a steel-NETWORK like the towers had in order to control for thermal conductivity (heat sink effect). Heat is transferred from hotter areas of the steel network to cooler areas. If only one small girder is used, then there is no heat sink effect.
"But as one writer interviewed on the show points out, any plausible conspiracy would have to involve so many people that someone would have spoken up by now."
You mean the bastards who carried out 9/11 hired persons with big mouths? Gee, I would guess the contractors who carried out 9/11 were all previous employed and trusted operatives, so they wouldn't have spoken up.
Dean Jackson/Editor-in-Chief DNotice.org
Washington, DC
Worse fires
To say nothing of steel skyscrapers subjected to much worse fires, that should have manifested the kind of effect they're hoping to demonstrate to the nth degree--but instead, their core structures remained standing, despite serious damage.
'As Seen on TV'
"Until someone sets up an experiment in which a 100-story building built exactly to the World Trade Center’s specs collapses after being hit by a commercial airliner, these people aren’t likely to change their minds."
Actually, there's no need; NIST built a scale model, used less fireproofing, doubled the weight- and they still didn't collapse. From Kevin Ryan's 'Propping Up the War on Terror', citing NIST:
"In August 2004, Underwriters Laboratories evaluated the Pancake Theory by testing models of the floor assemblies used in the WTC buildings. Despite all the previous expert testimony, the floor models did not collapse. NIST reported this in its October 2004 update, in a table of results that clearly showed that the floors did not fail and that, therefore, pancaking was not possible.14 NIST more succinctly stated this again in its June 2005 draft report, saying: "The results established that this type of assembly was capable of sustaining a large gravity load, without collapsing, for a substantial period of time relative to the duration of the fires in any given location on September 11th."15"
http://911review.com/articles/ryan/lies_about_wtc.html
Also see:
http://911research.wtc7.net/reviews/kevin_ryan/newstandard.html
This kind of debunking may affirm what some already want to believe about 9/11, but if they try and use this info in a discussion with anyone who's looked into it, it's not going to work for them. People that don't have a vested interest in believing the govt is the big protector and public 'servants' can always be trusted to tell the truth and do the right thing aren't going to be fooled. Such disingenuous tripe will probably encourage more people to do their own research than it convinces there's nothing more to the 9/11 story than what the TV says.
Hit piece 'review' in the Miami Herald:
TV review | Truthers couldn't be further from the truth
http://www.miamiherald.com/living/story/1207110.html?mi_pluck_action=com...
The above shill acknowledges "1/3" think 9/11 was allowed or caused to happen by people in the US govt in order to go to war and cites a "2006" poll, but writes the article as if all skeptics believe the same thing, i.e. controlled demo and Pentagon missile. Author doesn't say Scripps poll, provides no link and doesn't acknowledge that the poll found 16% believe the WTC may have been or probably was destroyed by controlled demolition, 12% Pentagon-missile.
http://911reports.com
http://www.historycommons.org
UL already performed that test...
I heard no mention that UL already performed fire tests on the steel under longer and hotter conditions and it held up superbly. Thanks to Kevin Ryan, we all know about these tests now. The deception by using a smaller piece of steel, unsupported, with the load on the horizontal of the beam proves nothing, but I am sure to a lot of hardened Kool-aid drinkers out there, its all they need.
Something else I picked up on, Dr. Eagar made an appearance in this program and I heard him say it was the heating of the entire floor that weakened the steel. Hmm.. Didn't he say in his published paper that it was the "uneven" heating of the steel that caused the collapse? Which is it Dr Eagar? (pls correct me if wrong here)
Other notables: No Evidence of Controlled Demolition? The fact each building fell straight down is evidence of a CD. A total of 267 floors of concrete and steel fell to the ground in all under 30seconds. Missing floor pans? Thousands of steel file cabinets gone? Bone fragments 2 football fields away on top of the Duetche building? Squibs all up and down the building? The south tower falling over and pulverizing to dust while its coming down? FEMA Report Appendix C? NIST admitting to 105ft of freefall acceleration? Note the lack of any forensic evidence of any of the collapse videos done in the piece. Of course with any hit piece, its only half of what they say, its the multitudes of evidence they leave out.
I was shocked to see they actually showed pictures of the nano-thermite in the piece. I guess as more scientists publish their findings, and it appears that will be happening soon, the deception of this show will become far more evident. I am also glad they allowed Prof Jones to make the point that not knowing HOW they could have done it is no reason to not investigate. How else would we find out?
As for this article, it does point out some of the shows flaws and weaknesses, it still has a very condescending tone towards the movement. But it can't last for long. Again, as more scientists publish, the truth will become known.
peace all
dtg
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"The obscure we see eventually. The completely obvious, it seems, takes longer." - Edward R. Murrow
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Hub, Spoke & Wheel
"But as one writer interviewed on the show points out, any plausible conspiracy would have to involve so many people that someone would have spoken up by now."
Yeah, if it's a black op gig you need hundred, nay thousands of players. But if you're a dude in a cave undergoing kidney dialysis ya' only need about eighteen give or take.
jhf
“911 is a naked con any Girl Scout with a web connection could bust wide open over a weekend and still have time for a bake off.”
Van Romero Spoke The Truth
What did the expert on building explosives say on September 12, 2001 about the World Trade Center collapses:
"It could have been a relatively small amount of explosives placed in strategic points [of the towers]." -- Van Romero; Albuquerque Journal; September 12, 2001.
http://911research.wtc7.net/disinfo/retractions/romero.html
On 9/11 Van Romero was the former director of the Energetic Materials Research and Testing Center at Tech, which studies explosive materials and the effects of explosions on buildings, aircraft and other structures.
Dean Jackson/Editor-in-Chief DNotice.org
Washington, DC
Exactly
There was some 90,000 tons of steel in each tower, not one bare steel beam. Their experiment obviously did not accurately reflect the conditions in the tower as NIST discovered in their investigation,
'"Of the more than 170 areas examined on 16 perimeter column panels, only three columns had evidence that the steel reached temperatures above 250ºC[482F]… Only two core column specimens had sufficient paint remaining to make such an analysis, and their temperatures did not reach 250 ºC."
3 of the 4 sides of the perimenter columns...
... were on the outside of the buildings.
As for the core columns, there was little to burn in the cores: the cores consisted mainly of concrete, stairwells, and the 46 massive support columns.
The idea that a single steel support structure would have been dramatically weakened by the office fires is ludicrous, and this needs to be made clear to everyone.
Mete Sozen
Mete Sozen in the documentary seems to imply that the columns reached much hotter temperatures than the evidence indicated. Referring to the columns he said,
"The temperature here could have reached beyond 1200F and that doesn’t melt the steel, it softens it."
He seems to be confusing the temperatures of the fires(air temperature) with the temperature of the steel. It is the latter that matters. NIST found no evidence that any of the columns were heated beyond 1200F.
This seems like another attempt by Mete Sozen and NatGeo to mislead the American public.
"To date, there's been no evidence produced that...
...shows that the towers were demolished."
Bullsh*t!
A scientific, peer-reviewed paper shows unexploded chips of nanothermite.
Bentham Science Publishers: "Active Thermitic Material Discovered In The Dust Of The WTC Catastrophe"
http://www.bentham-open.org/pages/content.php?TOCPJ/2009/00000002/000000...
This discovery has been independently confirmed by Chemical Engineer, Mark Basile and another researcher in Europe using independently obtained dust samples of good provenance.
That's PROOF!!
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I guess they DID talk about the paper a little. But they really failed to talk about the iron microspheres that RJ Lee, the USGS and Jones et al have found in the dust. These iron microspheres were everywhere and they are the result of a thermite reaction - which Jones has shown.
Science and Conspiracy and Rolling Stones, Thowing Stones
http://911truthburn.blogspot.com
It was disturbing to watch our guys fall into a typical fox news type trap. Where the emphasis of this third rate show should have been
on science it rested its case on some unscientific opinions by a conspiracy author and the goofy Matt Taibi of Rolling Stone.....real scientific experts for you!
The show lumped "all" truthers ( God do I hate that term, I prefer Truth Movement people if you must ) into the same basket thereby making it easier to easily and quickly put down the entire movement.
Where was Kevin Ryan? David Chandler? Dr Harrit? Rather than have to answer this pathetic exercise in manufactured consent, we may want to re-think appearing in these types of dog and pony shows in the future, and focus instead on placing our own science shows in new places in new innovative ways. Perhaps a little research, like Kevin Ryan finding that this wretched show is 67% owned by Fox News, should have alerted us to the folly of playing into their hands. For Christs sake guys!
It wouldn't matter who appeared on the show..
All they would do to whomever appeared opposing to the OCT would be to take little snippits of the interview and the overlay their own context over it. Posting entire comments and/or interview never happens. Here they just used the "conspiracist psychology" paintbrush to make those in the movement as stubborn and dismissive of all evidence to the contrary as if to say "you see, you show them the proof and they still won't listen!" Soon, they will call it a "profile" to indoctrinate it into the newspeak. I don't see it as dismissive rather than the conviction and power of KNOWING your science is right. (Galileo anyone?)
I believe Kevin Ryan did not appear because of a disagreement in terms of what he could present. He blogged about it here if you missed it, it was great piece as usual. http://www.911blogger.com/node/20950 Which begs the question, should it keep being done? Everytime a CNN/ABC/Discovery.. MSM does one of these pieces, they resort to these methods every time. They want to marginalize and to re-inforce stereotypical fallacies and by appearing it gives them the "ammo" so to speak. Of course, if no one appears, they will make a negative point of that too. We will have to see how much traffic it generates to A&E's website, journalof911studies, etc.. Dr Griffin's books, loose change, and hopefully the exposure will get more people out to the live lectures and presentations., this is where they see the whole truth and all the evidence. The chance to meet real activists and not whacky tin-foil hat conspiracy theorists.
If a TV series is really serious about debunking the movement and wants it to go away, then do a real science vs (OCT)conspiracy show. Don't make up "replica" experiments, use real scale ones like UL or the The Cardington Fire Tests. Don't just dismiss what was found in the dust by saying it was looked at already and nothing was found or the samples aren't reliable; go get a reliable sample from USGS or RJ Lee or EPA and run a magnet over it and tell me what you find? Instead of computer models of the plane hitting pentagon, show the damn tapes. And video inside the pentagon too. Why no warnings in the building when the young man informed the VP, "the plane is 50 miles out, sir."? Here's a grand idea, now that they've sat though your experiments, how about you gather up all your "experts" and your "journalists", and your producers around a conference table and sit through one of Kevin Ryan's presentations, or David Chandlers, or Dr. (DR!) Jones (they always seem to leave that Dr part out in these shows) or Richard Gage's and let's get THEIR reactions live on camera. Lets put it on ABC, Primetime, 20/20, 48hrs, Anderson Cooper, you name it.. Bill Moyers.. ya, I like that. Let Bill Moyers host it.. THAT I would like to see. 2 hours would never be enough time but would be a start. thanks for the vent..
Peace all
dtg
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"To be persuasive we must be believable; to be believable we must be credible; to be credible we must be truthful." - Edward R. Murrow
Dr. William Pepper
http://911truthburn.blogspot.com
I also found it telling that their so called "conspiracy experts" never mentioned the work of Dr. William Pepper and the exoneration of James Earl Ray in a civil trial that proved a government-state conspiracy. Please let's not fall prey to these types of phony science hit pieces again.
We don't need the msm propaganda machine,
it does, however, need some of us to pretend to be credible when it puts on charades such as this .
The movement needs to realize how strong it is and operate from that position of strength.
One way to do this is to refuse to be part of the controlled game and only appear on live programs which cannot be edited for the needs of the propaganda machine.
I made these points at our last meeting when we were discussing this "special".
We need to stop assisting our adversaries and continue to educate the public using the means we already have and by leveraging any new media that becomes available.
Always remember that a majority of Americans doubt the government's 9/11 conspiracy theory and at least 33% know it is a false flag of some kind. This is what we need to build on.
Let's work smarter and harder, brothers and sisters, we have the truth on our side!
The truth shall set us free. Love is the only way forward.
Science and Conspiracy and Rolling Stones, Thowing Stones
http://911truthburn.blogspot.com
It was disturbing to watch our guys fall into a typical fox news type trap. Where the emphasis of this third rate show should have been
on science it rested its case on some unscientific opinions by a conspiracy author and the goofy Matt Taibi of Rolling Stone.....real scientific experts for you!
The show lumped "all" truthers ( God do I hate that term, I prefer Truth Movement people if you must ) into the same basket thereby making it easier to easily and quickly put down the entire movement.
Where was Kevin Ryan? David Chandler? Dr Harrit? Rather than have to answer this pathetic exercise in manufactured consent, we may want to re-think appearing in these types of dog and pony shows in the future, and focus instead on placing our own science shows in new places in new innovative ways. Perhaps a little research, like Kevin Ryan finding that this wretched show is 67% owned by Fox News, should have alerted us to the folly of playing into their hands. For Christs sake guys!
Not Impressed...
National Geographic should stick to documentaries about girls who cry blood.
was this recorded by anyone yet?
for those of us with no TV? Thank you in advance!!
I am sure/hope a review will
I am sure/hope a review will be done on this website and I am sure someone will link to it either in a torrent or youtube/google video.
"Truth Does Not Fear Investigation No Matter Who It Offends"
http://www.geocities.com/louisdkrauss/911.html
911tv recorded it, but apparently it is copy protected
so they can't do anything with it.
I hope National Geographic or someone else will make it available online, as I'd like to see it myself.
Cheers
The truth shall set us free. Love is the only way forward.
There were some benefits, some positive aspects...
There can be no doubt that National Geographic DELIBERATELY and intentionally perverted scientific aspects and omitted very important data. There is a line in the sand and we can now further ID which individuals and entities are traitors to truth. They named themselves as treasonous scum, because it was no mistake on their part...it was deliberate. Blood is on their hands.
Others could probably mention some positive aspects about this hit piece better than I.
~I was very glad to see true icons of the 9/11 Truth Movement featured (i.e. Dylan, Gage, Griffin, Jones). We were lucky in this aspect, because National Geographic could have picked a few wild card characters instead.
~"Loose Change" was mentioned. This is a plus point, like a name-brand beer 'accidently' shown during a movie. With the new Loose Change Film coming out, this is free national advertising.
~We were lucky that so much valuable written and video material is available on the internet in association with Gage, Jones, Griffin, Dylan.
National exposure to their names.
This is a lot of air time...free advertising. Lots of $ value.
~Despite all the edits left on the cutting room floor (most of us watching could tell), there were some excellent statements which slipped through.
~Mainstream media is completely worthless, and National Geographic helped to make this contrasting aspect very clear. While many people might not recognize this fact now, eventually they will. The 9/11 Truth Movement is winning, it is growing dynamically each year. Eventually, there will be thousands of engineers and architects for 9/11 Truth. Hit pieces like this National Geographic and Popular Mechanics are actually mainstream media's suicide bullet.
Thanks for Watching & Reporting TomT
I would not turn my television on for this. Yet I am still extremely curious as to how it went.
http://911truthburn.blogspot.
http://911truthburn.blogspot.com
Sorry Tom, I disagree with you on your conclusions on the positive effects of our guys appearing in the show. There were no positive effects. People were left with the heavy airtime given to the goons at the end of the piece. The overall effect was to make us look like a bunch of losers barking up the wrong tree. The film ends with the wording something on the effect of..."we should just be happy that events like 911 should always be left in mystery"...that's was their parting shot. Can you believe that? That's not even good enough for Michael Jackson.
I am okay with your opinion. I feel we got mucho FREE Ads.
My opinion is that we want to incite curiosity into the subject.
We want to entice people to further investigate on their own.
We got a lot of air-play with this.
Tens and tens of thousands of dollars of free TV time.
Free ads for 9/11 Truth.
I will take it over no TV time.
National Geographic looks pretty silly in this hit piece, except to the "robot TV watchers" or sheeple.
Some viewers will become more curious.
I personally would become very suspicious on the day that mainstream media actually prolifically displays all the facts concerning 9/11... ...would it be an attempt to hi-jack the Movement?
We all know enough that mainstream media is a sham.
We all know that only on rare occasions are we going to get good play in the Press.
We all know that a person can not become educated by just a one hour presentation on 9/11. It takes much more time for an individual to research, investigate and educate oneself on the subject. I feel that a primary objective which we have is to get people to investigate, to get people curious enough to actually LOOK for themselves. The more often the subject is brought up, the better our chances of inciting curiosity.
Building 7... they left out a tremendous amount of info re: 7
Building 7 is the achilles heel. National Geographic deliberately did not go into detail about Building 7. This aspect alone points out how they were intentionally trying to hide the truth.
WTC 7 collapsing?
Did they show a video of its collapse?
Briefly, towards the very end.
I would have to rewatch the show to confirm this, but I think they only spent about 15 seconds on Building 7 and only with one visual of the collapse.
What is striking is that I do not recall them even mentioning the name of the Building.
Probably, the keynote introductory aspect which almost all people in the 9/11 Truth Movement mention is Building 7. National Geographic avoided the subject of Building 7 like a vampire avoids sunlight.
Dylan definitely mentioned it. I am sure Gage and others did also. http://www.911blogger.com/node/21047#comment-215639
National Geographic had very poor "entertainment value".
I want to mention this.
TV shows try to be entertaining.
From an entertainment perspective, the National Geographic show was dull and boring. By comparison, many of our 9/11 Truth documentaries are captivating and riveting. These folks at National Geographic really flunked on the entertainment value...it was dull compared to a 9/11 Truth documentary.
"Someone would have spoken up"
"any plausible conspiracy would have to involve so many people that someone would have spoken up by now"
The degree of naivety of reporters never fails to amaze me.
"Someone would have spoken up"
Whomever utters this line, needs to watch Barry Jennings testimony on WTC7 & understand what happened to him.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQY-ksiuwKU&feature=channel_page
Because it's only in other regimes
where people get threatened or killed for speaking up.
America, however, being the best thing to happen to humanity since sliced bread, is completely infallible.
We are a healthy, vibrant democracy complete with a free press which reports on pertinent issues and not on Paris Hilton.
Not only would someone have spoken up, but the authorities would have believed him!
Larry King and Oprah would have had him on and allowed him to unveil the plot to the world!
And I know these things, because you see, I read the postings of the good folks of the James Randi Educational Foundation.
If it's got the word "educational" in its title, it must be good.
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I make a point of reading all the down voted comments because I find many of them to be the best comments. - Atomicbomb
Time for all to send your thoughts
Natgeo needs to hear from all of us. Please send them your thoughts . I did, and I already feel better.
Use their subscription cards!
It is free to us and costs them money. It is easy to do and will reach people in their mail department who are not gatekeepers and could very well be influenced by what they read on the cards.
Every time you are in a bookstore or pass a news stand that has National Geographic just take a few minutes and get some cards. Later, when you are waiting for a bus or have a few minutes, write something useful and civil on the subscription card and drop it in a mail box at your leisure.
Flooding their website with comments is also good, too, but only people who go there will read it and most of those people will already have made up their mind or be paid shills.
Subscription cards work for all the msm mags, a steady trickle of cards will be noticed by some layers of management and those handling the cards, and the sense of satisfaction, while fairly limited, is still visceral.
Cheers
The truth shall set us free. Love is the only way forward.
Just one question debunks the entire OCT
Did the "young man" Minetta refers to in the bunker with Cheney just open the door and walk in, or did he have to sign in?
Melts in four minutes?
They discredit their own results with this experiment. They talked a lot about the weight above the weekend steel that helped bring the building down (what their experiment is meant to prove), but this experiment shows the buildings should have collapsed 4 minutes after impact. That is not what happened.
Where did they get the steel to test? Was it certified? Was it fabricated to melt quickly? Too many questions are left over, experiments are for answers, not more questions. And that's the key we use to discredit this show.
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Infowar Relay Station:
TruthgoneWild
They didn't account for engines
The simulation by Purdue completely omitted turbine engines from both wings and said the wings didn't have enough mass to cause significant damage to the facade. I call BS on that since the engines were steel and titanium, not hollow aluminum, and would have created much more penetrating holes than a hollow aluminum tube. Pretty pathetic hit piece, but it was so bad, that it was obvious they were gunning for one side of the story. They have only straw men left, no real arguments. The editing was terrible, too. It seemed as though they took a lot of comments out of context.
The love that you withhold is the pain that you carry
Debate at NG has truth winning 2 t0 1
An estimate
http://ngccommunity.nationalgeographic.com/ngcforums/shows/2009/08/911-s...