Yale Classmate: We Did The Prank Test That Ben Carson Is Talking About

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
a reply to: MotherMayEye

In that one picture, the light source is always coming from the same angle, the far side - away from the camera. You can't really turn it around.

What do you have to say about all the other pictures? Or should we just ignore those, because they don't fit your theory?

Right, because you can see the actual light source as it creates highlights and shadows on the RAISED pieces of the backside of the seal.

And yes, I can ignore the illusions you created with photos that don't show a clear light source. They are best viewed right side up -- the way the photos were published -- for the exact reason that rotating them creates a deceptive illusion.

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
a reply to: MotherMayEye

In that one picture, the light source is always coming from the same angle, the far side - away from the camera. You can't really turn it around.

You can't turn it around to create your illusion because you can't get rid of the light source proving the back of the seal is raised.

That's why that particular photo shows you are posting upside down illusions.

a reply to: MotherMayEye

I posted a pic of the SAME seal here:
www.abovetopsecret.com...

I'm finished arguing as I have proven that you CANNOT tell which side is raised from a 2D picture. You must have the document in your hand to tell that. But it's clear how much you and your star buddies WANT to believe.

If nothing else, we can put to rest Ben Carson's claim that he's been vetted more than any other presidential candidate in history! LOL!

a reply to: Benevolent Heretic

Sure I can. And Factcheck thought they could, too.

The back of the seal is raised and this photo rotated both ways proves it:





And Factcheck agrees, the back of the seal is raised. They took the photos, they know the backside of the seal is raised, and they captioned the backside as raised:



You can view that photo and caption here:

Born in the USA

a reply to: Benevolent Heretic

Really do you have a vetting meter?

I think the reference carson was making was to the networks that did not vet him but simply took every statement as truth without question. That was the majority of the networks.

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
a reply to: MotherMayEye

You must have the document in your hand to tell that.

From Factcheck:

FactCheck.org staffers have now seen, touched, examined and photographed the original birth certificate.

Born in the USA

Factcheck had the document in their hands and labeled the backside of the seal as raised.

You proved nothing.

Claiming that Factcheck somehow accidentally published every photo of the document upside down is not proof. It's stupid.

Claiming that the photo they captioned of the backside of the seal is not really raised -- even though it plainly shows it is raised no matter which way you rotate it -- is just stupid.

You are wrong and built your argument on optical illusions created by having to rotate every photo 180°. I think you should admit you were wrong, but I won't hold my breath. You would rather protect Obama from the scrutiny he deserves for partisan purposes. It's unethical.

EDIT: And, BTW, I provided the Hawaii Department of Health every photo of the seal that Factcheck.org published, in late 2010, and requested a copy of the seal in the photographs and they responded that they do not maintain that seal.

originally posted by: MotherMayEye
Factcheck had the document in their hands and labeled the backside of the seal as raised.

I know...

We can assure readers that the certificate does bear a raised seal, and that it’s stamped on the back by Hawaii state registrar Alvin T. Onaka (who uses a signature stamp rather than signing individual birth certificates).

And yet you claim it isn't:

originally posted by: MotherMayEye
What appears on the back of Obama's short form COLB is a DEBOSSED seal. It is not raised, it is not the official seal embossment of the HDOH. The seal on the back of Obama's purported short form birth certificate was made by a fraudulent authentication device.

I think you're confused as to what you're claiming... Is the seal on the back raised or not?

Claiming that Factcheck somehow accidentally published every photo of the document upside down is not proof. It's stupid.

That's not my claim at all.

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic

originally posted by: MotherMayEye
Factcheck had the document in their hands and labeled the backside of the seal as raised.

I know... And yet you claim it isn't:

originally posted by: MotherMayEye
What appears on the back of Obama's short form COLB is a DEBOSSED seal. It is not raised, it is not the official seal embossment of the HDOH. The seal on the back of Obama's purported short form birth certificate was made by a fraudulent authentication device.

I think you're confused as to what you're claiming... Is the seal on the back raised or not?

Claiming that Factcheck somehow accidentally published every photo of the document upside down is not proof. It's stupid.

That's not my claim at all.

The seal on the BACK OF THE DOCUMENT IS NOT RAISED. The FRONT of the seal is DEBOSSED.

The BACKSIDE OF THE SEAL IS RAISED (which can be seen on the front of the document). The backside of the seal is in reverse and reads, “HTLAEH FO TNEMTRAPED” and “IIAWAH FO ETATS," not “DEPARTMENT OF HEALTH” and “STATE OF HAWAII.”

Below are numerous sources and statements from the Hawaii Department of Health stating their official seal is raised/embossed and applied on the back of certified copies issued by their agency:

• The Administrative Rules describe the official HDOH seal and require that it be “embossed” when used by the Director of Health in an official capacity. The rules give the Director exclusive control over the reproduction and use of the seal, but the discretion to deviate from the stated description of the official seal is restricted to size changes only:

HAR§11-1-2 – Seal of the department of health.
(b) The official seal of the department of health shall be embossed near the signature of the director of health to verify commissions of appointment of deputy directors and notaries public, certificates, and other formal official documents on which the official seal has been customarily used or is appropriate to be used, as the director of health may determine on a case-by-case basis.

gen.doh.hawaii.gov/sites/har/AdmRules1/11-1.pdf

• The Hawaii Department of Health vital records regulations promulgated by the Director of Health state the seal used by their agency and the Office of Health Status Monitoring (OHSM) to issue certified copies of vital records must be a “raised” seal:

Hawaii Public Health Regulations, Chapter 8b
2.4 Issuance of Certified Copies of Vital Records
B. Standards for Copies of Vital Records
(1) Standard Copy
(b) Form of certification. Standard certified copies shall contain an appropriate certification statement over the signature of the registrar having custody of the record and be impressed with the raised seal of the issuing office. The signature may be photographed or entered by mechanical means. The paper shall display the official seal of the Department of Health or the seal of the State.

[AND]

(2) Abbreviated Copy
(b) Form of certification. This will be the same as for a standard certified copy.

gen.doh.hawaii.gov/sites/har/AdmRules1/8 8A B VR Admin Rules.pdf

• Janice Okubo, Director of Communications for the Hawaii Department of Health stated on multiple occasions, in 2008, that the seal used to certify copies of birth records in Hawaii is embossed on the back of those type copies. Politifact reported the following about the ‘invisible seal’ in the initial images released of Obama’s alleged COLB:

“The Hawaii Department of Health receives about a dozen e-mail inquiries a day about Obama’s birth certificate, spokesman Okubo said.

“I guess the big issue that’s being raised is the lack of an embossed seal and a signature,” Okubo said, pointing out that in Hawaii, both those things are on the back of the document. “Because they scanned the front … you wouldn’t see those things.”

Okubo says she got a copy of her own birth certificate last year and it is identical to the Obama one we received.

And about the copy we e-mailed her for verification? “When we looked at that image you guys sent us, our registrar, he thought he could see pieces of the embossed image through it.“

Still, she acknowledges: “I don’t know that it’s possible for us to even say beyond a doubt what the image on the site represents."

www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2008/jun/27/obamas-birth-certificate-part-ii/

• In June 2008, Ms. Okubo told the Israel Insider that “all” certified copies of COLBs are certified the same way: with an embossed seal. In an article that featured a photo of the reverse side of an embossed HDOH seal, Ms. Okubo was quoted, as follows:.

“In the State of Hawaii all certified copies of certificates of live birth have the embossed seal and registrar signature on the back of the document.”

israelstreams.com/?israelinsider.html?israelinsider.com...

• Before FactCheck.org published their photographs of the document, in August 2008, Janice Okubo indicated that if we were to ever see the seal with any clarity, we should expect to see it embossed on the back of the record. On June 26, 2008, Jim Geraghty of the National Review Online referred to the same photo of an embossed HDOH seal, in reverse, and wrote the following when he questioned Ms. Okubo about the seal’s visibility on Obama’s alleged COLB:

"I spoke to Ms. Okubo late Wednesday afternoon, and she said she had seen the version of Obama’s certificate of live birth posted on the sites. While her office cannot verify the information on a form without the permission of the certificate holder (Obama), she said “the form is exactly the same” and it has “all the components of a birth certificate” record issued by the state. In other words, she sees no reason to think the version posted on Obama’s web site and Daily Kos is not genuine.

The “embossed seal” in question is, she said, probably on the back of the document provided to Daily Kos, but not visible (as in another certificate posted on Israel Insider for contrast). She thinks the difference in visibility can be attributed to the pressure used when applying the seal."

www.nationalreview.com/campaign-spot/9400/forget-birth-certificate-there-are-more-relevant-records

Below comparison images of an embossment and debossment as a visual aid:

originally posted by: DelMarvel
Well, this witness wasn't even there. But I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.

The best we can say then is that Carson was fooled by a satirical publication into showing up for a fake test and might have been one of the last one to figure out it was a joke.

And there is nothing in any of these new reports about the purpose of this hoax being to find out who was honest which is a crucial element of the story as Carson has been telling it.

And Carson has conceded that his ghostwriter made up elements of the story to "add some meat."

Having said all that it's ridiculous that this trivial incident has gotten all this media attention when there is so much else about Carson that needs serious reporting.

Unfortunately, Carson got punkd will be the take away for many. Sad.

a reply to: Benevolent Heretic

I feel like I have to say that I believe you are being dishonest in pretending I have not demonstrated fully that the seal factcheck photographed is debossed on the back of Obama's purported short form COLB, and that Factcheck wrongly captioned a photo of the backside of the seal.

These are facts.

After I reported this information on my blog in early 2011, I have had people attack my motives in even thinking about such a thing, let alone put effort into researching it. Not long after I wrote that blog post, someone emailed me to wish me a happy belated birthday and said they bet *insert my very young child's name* was growing like a weed. It was just a few days after my birthday.

It makes my stomach queasy even talking about this information and yet I feel compelled to make it known.

It's not my place to insist you regard the fact that the seal is debossed with any significance. I do think it is significant, and it's been a difficult journey for me.

The seal is debossed, what you think about that is another matter. But it is debossed and I wish you would just say so if you do, in fact, feel I demonstrated that.

a reply to: MotherMayEye

How do you explain this picture of the front of the document?



I'm not being dishonest. I don't have the form in my hand, and therefore cannot tell. These two-dimensional pictures cannot be trusted. I'm not saying you're wrong or I'm right. I'm saying we can't know.

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
a reply to: MotherMayEye

How do you explain this picture of the front of the document?

You have it turned upside down. Yes, you can create optical illusions by turning photos of embossments/debossments. But the illusion is the upside down photo.

You can verify it is an illusion by looking at the fold in the upside down version. The paper isn't folded in that direction when you can see the whole image:



The backside of the seal is raised. You are inverting the images by process of optical illusion.

a reply to: MotherMayEye

This is from a birther website, Here. We're looking at the front of the document with an edge-detector filter and the lettering is backwards (Department of Health and State of Hawaii) meaning the seal was applied from the back.

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
a reply to: MotherMayEye

This is from a birther website, Here. We're looking at the front of the document with an edge-detector filter and the lettering is backwards (Department of Health and State of Hawaii) meaning the seal was applied from the back.

Correct. And on the back of the document, the seal is debossed . It's not raised on the back. The backside of the seal is raised on the front of the document.

a reply to: Benevolent Heretic



Now you can rotate this image all you want, but one direction reflects reality and the other is an illusion.

In looking at all the photos, it's clear that the upside down versions you posted are the illusions. I have demonstrated that several times now.

a reply to: MotherMayEye

If you're convinced that you can tell that from a two-dimensional picture, then you're going to believe that. But I stand by my assertion that you can't tell, I can't tell. No one can tell.

a reply to: IAMTAT

Ben Carson is destroying himself, he doesn't need any help with that.
Scan through this set of videos

and then there is this video

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
a reply to: MotherMayEye

If you're convinced that you can tell that from a two-dimensional picture, then you're going to believe that. But I stand by my assertion that you can't tell, I can't tell. No one can tell.

I can tell. I have a bachelor's in fine art with a concentration in graphic design and 20 years of professional design experience. I understand how light and shadow work. I understand that you are rotating photos to create an optical illusion. I have ordered many embossed materials and a few debossed materials, too.

It's a neat trick to be able to cause a debossment/embossment to appear inverted when rotating a photo, but that's all you have demonstrated.

originally posted by: reldra

originally posted by: peskyhumans

originally posted by: Benevolent Heretic
He said he's already been vetted more heavily than Obama was in the 7 years of his presidency. HA! That's INSANE. If he thinks it's over, he's got another thing coming! Carson's looking like a big cry baby to me.

It is insane. it's also the truth. When Obama was running for president his past was off-limits to anyone who asked. The media never confronted him on it. I have to ask the same thing Carson did: Where is the equivalency? Why is the media going to no end to dig up 50 year old dirt on him and dismiss every one of his explanations when they never confronted Obama about his sealed school record?

Carson has done a great job addressing all of the questions so far. However at every one of these conferences the journalists look like a bunch of fools.

Obama was questioned and vetted to death. Anyone who says he wasn't was in a coma at the time.

Obama may have been asked the questions, but as far as answers are concerned, the ones he did give we've now found to be lies. And, the same press let him slide on every one of them.

originally posted by: BestinShow
a reply to: IAMTAT

Ben Carson was telling the truth.

Looks like it.

So, we'll just call even-Steven with the West Point story...

The West Point story was true and accurate. Sure there maybe was a communicative barrier with the scholarship versus no tuition, but he wasn't lying.