Originally posted by jthomas
Epistemological confusion and the illusion of validity.

Exponent is to be complemented for his succinct and rational illustration of bsbray11's convoluted and contradictory thinking.

Bsbray11 illustrated one of the characteristics of 9/11 TruthThink that should be evident to all on both sides. In his OP, Bsbray11 set up the rules and constraints under which the discussion would take place about the supposed 20 "unanswered questions." He was very clear:

"Let me stress that personal speculation regarding any of these questions is not going to settle any of them definitely, so they will continue to be unanswered until addressed by proper investigation."
www.abovetopsecret.com...

Bsbray11's statement is based on several premises which none of us should accept as given:

1. The "questions" are automatically legitimate because bsbray11 says so. Any objectives standards are ruled out by fiat.
2. There is no legitimate answer to any of bsbray11's questions since "they will continue to be unanswered until addressed by proper investigation." So, is there is any reason to attempt to answer them?
3. Answering his "questions" violates stipulation #2. Any legitimate answer by rational standards can be dismissed as "personal speculation."
4. We are required, according to bsbray11, to accept his "conditions" of evidence and proof and his stipulation that he is sole arbiter.

In other words, bsbray11 has constructed his own rules by which everyone else has to play. He wrote the law, he is the judge, and he is the jury.

But bsbray11 cheerfully doesn't play by his own rules. Why should he have to? He can do anything he wants. He does so by stating:

"I just realize that the only way to accomplish this is with a controlled demolition. You know, literally pushing everything out of the way with some type of explosion. For which I can provide witness testimonies (from a police officer no less), seismic data, etc."
www.abovetopsecret.com...

So while none of us can use evidence since bsbray11's questions "...will continue to be unanswered until addressed by proper investigation," he applies no such restrictions to himself. As I have repeatedly demonstrated, bsbray11 will claim his "questions" have not been answered -- and cannot be answered until and unless there is another investigation -- HE allows himself to "answer" them by making claims he doesn't have to support.

Bsbray11 reveals the fraudulent nature of his self-appointment as lawmaker, judge, and jury, the very assault on the scientific method he claims to champion but tries to crush under his boots, and the true nature of 9/11 TruthThink, in this response to exponent:

Exponent:
You clearly believe in some sort of alternate theory, and so you should have a vested interest in developing this theory and showing it to be correct.

BB11:
No, that's someone else's job, and I don't know why you can't understand this. All I have to do is find problems with the government reports. I don't have to wipe their butts too and change their diapers, ie write a whole new report to replace their trash. I only come here and ask rhetorical questions that I know have no answers just to remind hard-headed people that they don't know everything already.

But we haven't let bsbray11 get away with it. He doesn't get to play by his rules. No way. He doesn't get to claim his "questions" are valid or that they have no answers. In the reality that he avoids and rejects at all costs, bsbray11 still has to play by the same rules we all do. No matter how much he whines and hand-waves, he does not get to exempt himself from the rules.

Has bsbray11 "found problems" with the NIST report as he claims? No. He just claimed there were problems but could not articulate any reason to reject the NIST report on WTC 7. He flew into a fury at the admonition that he has to support his own claims and refute NIST. Of course, bsbray11 cannot refute NIST, so he runs and retreats to his own rules: "Nobody can answer my questions. I don't have to do anything!" In turn, we do the obvious: we reject his unsupported claims. Is bsbray11 too dumb to understand that? YOU decide.

Has bsbray11 demonstrated "...the only way to accomplish this is with a controlled demolition?" No. He just claimed it. And he did so by violating his own rules that he requires everyone else to follow.

Our little dictatorial emperor indeed wears no clothes. Bsbray11 ducks and dodges but he fell victim to the illusion of validity and it's come back to bite him.

Exponent has done the best job here in exposing through reason, logic, and patience the inane irrationality of a 9/11 "Truther." It's high time bsbray11 recognize that his own game is up and concede his intellectual defeat graciously - if that's possible for a "Truther."

The simple fact that they are unanswered casts doubt.

Sorry, this is supposed to read, "I apologize for twisting Jennings' testimony to fit to my own pre-conceived ideas."

And I asked, what the hell difference would it make in terms of failing structure within the building? It would still be failed. The difference is small-minded people (cough) now can give themselves an excuse to say the explosions weren't part of an obvious demolition sequence as if they had all gone off in regular intervals just seconds before the building dropped. But even if that happened I have a feeling you would be here saying it was a series of transformer explosions.

You may as well give up here bsbray, you're not fooling anyone any more.

Despite this, you refuse to even look at any of the answers I gave in more depth, because apparently unless I do it for you, the 'official story' is in doubt. Another completely illogical leap.

Sorry, you don't get to pick what "groups" I'm in, except in your biased head, which doesn't amount to anything.

You're a truther

There is no way around this bsbray, it's akin to saying you believe that Jesus died for our sins, that he was resurrected and forms part of a holy trinity with God the Father and God the Holy Spirit, but how dare I suggest you are a christian.

Trying to force me into a group I myself don't claim to be a part of, that you think of derogatively, is trying to discriminate against me.

No, it isn't. Not in any way.

Yes, I have. I have repeatedly explained to you exactly the mechanism behind this free fall collapse. I have shown you the facts and figures from the NIST report on this matter and laid out a clear mechanism and timescale.

If you spent a little more time investigating rather than posting about how you're so good nobody can answer your questions, perhaps you would find some answers.

The simple fact that they are unanswered casts doubt.

No, it doesn't. You have not found Vout in the challenge I set you. Does that mean that I lied about it and there is no Vout?

Sorry, this is supposed to read, "I apologize for twisting Jennings' testimony to fit to my own pre-conceived ideas."

Sorry this quote is supposed to read "Oh he never actually identified anything and I am unable to support my claim so I am reverting to posting insults instead"?

Ah so once again you have invoked a nonexistent hypothesis to explain things with no logic whatsoever other than "Loud noise = possible explosion = maybe demolition".

EVIDENCE. You have been crowing about it for 30 pages, but once again you feel justified in accepting something without any backing because it supports your position.

Originally posted by bsbray11
You said you don't think NIST could have done a better job with their investigation.
All I said: prove it.
You are having such a hard time with this.

A formal proof or derivation is
...
The notion of theorem is not in general effective, therefore there may be no method by which we can always find a proof of a given sentence or determine that none exists. The concept of natural deduction is a generalization of the concept of proof.

Backing up your claims would be the sensible thing to do. Posting crap like this, like jthomas always does, is just going to result in 60 more pages of thread.

Not at all. You haven't resolved any of the questions. All you've done is post conjecture, crap like, "the eutectic that ate through the steel must have somehow formed in the debris pile," which is total speculation to begin with and not proven in the least, but then from there, you can't even explain how all the right ingredients could have just coincidentally came together in just the right proportions and right particle sizes, and how the sulfur was separated from all the other components of drywall. When you can't answer questions like that, guess what? Not only did you not provide a legitimate answer to begin with, those answers don't even make a damned bit of sense short of some miracle happening, unless you have a better idea you haven't posted yet.

You already admitted once that your answers were just speculation. Why do you change your tune now?

Because you finally realize you have no case and you want to back track to cling tighter onto things that you now realize make no sense?

Do you even WANT to know what really happened,

or do you just want a case that you can argue with people over the internet with?

If I'm a Truther, then you're a Nazi. If you get to make up your own rules, so do I.

Right, none of that makes any sense to me either but I have no more faith in your competence just because you realize something I figured out on my own when I was 10. No offense to Christians, believe what you want.

Bull. The only people using the word "truther" are you "debunkers" and you use it in a derogative way.

If moderators hadn't called off the use of the word "twoofer" in this thread you'd probably be using it, too.

I never joined such a group, ignorant people like you force the name upon me simply because tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands of people entertain different ideas than you about 9/11 and you need some psychological crutch to make up for the cognitive dissonance of knowing that fact.

No, you haven't. The timescale does not make a rat's ass difference and I've already explained that a ridiculous number of times. It just goes right through your head without you processing it. But I'll say it again. Any period of free-fall during the "collapse" means no work is being done when the building is SUPPOSED to be doing work. There. Maybe this time it will sink in? No?

Okay, didn't think so. What were you saying about Christians believing something stupid?

Now you take your inability to answer my questions as me putting on like I'm better than everybody else I guess. No, my understanding of 9/11 is just better than yours.

You said yourself the output could be pinned within a single volt or two. The "official story" can't even be pinned between that few possibilities.

Way to weasel out of defending what you were originally saying. We have been here before. You will later claim there were no loud explosions indicative of a demolition. When I keep telling you these explosions are just that.

And that it does not matter if they set a "charge" off 5 hours before the total collapse ensues, or only 5 seconds, that building is still going to fall. The only effect is to confuse simple-minded people, or people with an attention span of only 30 seconds. Ie your typical American.

I have not accepted anything specific. I am working with ideas I myself consider very vague and am unhappy with. However, they still make a much better case in the end than what NIST has offered, simply because NIST also didn't prove anything in their report.

And I keep asking questions related to this and not getting straightforward answers, or any answer at all really. Just repeatedly misconstruing the question or telling me it doesn't need an answer. I have seen both numerous times on this thread. But not an answer.