The 9/11 Forum

Look again through Kurt Sonnenfeld's photos and tell me how many columns you can show me sliced by thermite or cut by shaped charges...

I couldn't find much if any, so a suspicion grew...

For me, the issue which stands out is the temperature gap. I suspect sabotage of the fireproofing, but I don't have proof.

By the way, I am of the opinion that conspiracy, coincidence and incompetence aren't mutually exclusive.

Heretic76 wrote:Snow
I cannot make a qualified statement regarding building demolition, but I do rely upon A&E911 and others to help me make an informed decision in that regard.

Heretic,

You, like so many others (we all do this) rely on others who we believe to be experts and competent. I do, every time I get on a plane... assume that the pilot is properly qualified to fly the plane.

However, I would assert that AE911T is not what you think it is. Yes it has signatures of numerous architects, licensed and unlicensed and engineers, licensed and unlicensed. Many of the engineers have degrees or licenses in disciplines which have nothing to do with structure... such as electrical engineers... or aviation. So the actual number of qualified building professionals is much lower that the alleged number bandied about. And then of course MOST have no experience with high rise structures and so that it like a ophthalmologist's opinion about podiatry. But we don't have to dwell on this. What is more important is that very few (to none) of the petition signers (including Gage) have studied the structural details of the buildings in question with only a few exceptions.

AE911T is a marketing operation not a professional association of technical experts. AE911T has done NO research inside the organization or sponsored any. It simply assembled what they deem *research* which supports their thesis of explosive controlled demolition in the classic *cherry picking* of (flawed) observations and presents them in their various dog and pony shows and DVDs.

I served on the board of AE911T and recommended to Gage that AE911T assemble a group of their engineer petition signers to model the structure of the the buildings, do and FEA and a building performance study to see how they could be brought down or collapse. He flat out refused to do this... saying it was unnecessary as they had the nano thermite smoking gun evidence.

I can't argue with Rob Balsamo about aviation or avionics or judge his statements because I not competent to. Likewise you, and most other Truthers are not competent to evaluate the presentations of AE911T which by the way has nothing about building performance and is all about the signs of explosive controlled demolition.

You can fool some of the people all of the time
and all of the people some of the time
but you can not fool all of the people all of the time

You've been fooled

SanderO wrote:AE911T is a marketing operation not a professional association of technical experts. AE911T has done NO research inside the organization or sponsored any. It simply assembled what they deem *research* which supports their thesis of explosive controlled demolition in the classic *cherry picking* of (flawed) observations and presents them in their various dog and pony shows and DVDs.

Well, that would seem to be belied by the fact that David Chandler is a board member and still publishing research. Besides, Justin Keogh is constantly accumulating research and gathering FOIA data. One could say Richard's presentation, whatever you think of it, is a product of research.

I get the gist of what you're saying but I think it's a bit hyperbolic, even though I think AE911Truth's evidence list leaves much to be desired and I flat out disagree with many of the arguments put forward.

SanderO wrote:I served on the board of AE911T and recommended to Gage that AE911T assemble a group of their engineer petition signers to model the structure of the the buildings, do and FEA and a building performance study to see how they could be brought down or collapse. He flat out refused to do this... saying it was unnecessary as they had the nano thermite smoking gun evidence.

That's pretty outrageous. They should have fielded a FEA study a long time ago.

SanderO wrote:I can't argue with Rob Balsamo about aviation or avionics or judge his statements because I not competent to.

I strongly disagree. I think you are competent to do so as soon as you make yourself competent to do so. Balsamo is obsessed with argument from authority even more than AE911Truth are.

I did lots of research (and I mean lots) into radio altimeters, only to conclude that Balsamo and Cimino's musings about the subject aren't merely erroneous, they are completely and utterly clueless! (Cimimo: "It gets behind") I have some idea why nobody in their own organization calls them on it: forum moderation at P4T is extremely heavy-handed. You have been able to participate only because you've mostly been discussing CD there, which isn't P4T's core business.

Look at the questions they have their new forum members who are deemed detractors answer... It's dehumanizing and vitriolic in the extreme.

The ACARS debacle is another example: a participant at the Unexplained Mysteries forum (and a layman) actually went out and bought the ACARS specifications, and subsequently proved P4T's analysis wrong.

I am no Feynman, but I take his statement to heart:

"Science is the belief in the ignorance of experts"

Which is why this forum rightly challenged both AE911Truth and NIST!

If somebody challenges me on IT issues, I have a strong inclination to act pedantic. Perhaps I should resist that urge for the same reasons Balsamo and company should.

And P4T could have been one hell of an organization had it not become obsessed with CIT and Northwoods, and had it not been lured into the falsification-speculation trap.

The fact that UA 175 had to be diverted by ATC from its course to avoid AA 11, is that not an eye-opener?

SnowCrash wrote:Well, that would seem to be belied by the fact that David Chandler is a board member and still publishing research. Besides, Justin Keogh is constantly accumulating research and gathering FOIA data. One could say Richard's presentation, whatever you think of it, is a product of research.

When I served on the AE911T board it consisted of:

Richard Gage
Tom Spellman who was the *CFO*
Dwain Deets
John Cole PE (does sanitary engineering in FL)
Max Ayers (retired ME. HVAC if I recall correctly)
Justin Keogh (studying IT in college... don't think he had a degree at the time)
Jeffrey Orling (NYS lic architect, "SanderO")

Most of the material of the AE911T was created by independent *researchers* such as Chandler, Jones, Harrit, Hoffman... Chris Sarns, Tony Szamboti, Gorden Ross and others and none of it was formally vetted by AE911T's engineer petition signers or outside peer review aside from the nano thermite paper. All of the *research* was accepted at face value as far as I could tell and formatted into the Blueprint for Truth by Ken Jenkins (psychologist and videographer).

Much of the AE911T story was created by the anonymous Arabesque.

Lots of smoke and mirrors.

SnowCrash wrote:...I was a member. SanderO was. What's wrong with our opinions?
...

Hey Snow,

not going to distract you too much from your debate with Heretic, just a quick Q: Are you saying you and SanderO used to be members of AE911T? What does that mean, exactly? Did you sign the petition, but had your signature later deleted? Or participated actively in whatever capacity, but don't any longer?

You see I am looking closely at the membership development over there. Just trying to figure out how they manage the list of signers.


ETA:

SanderO wrote:...
I served on the board of AE911T ...

Ahh read that just now. I guess that answers 50% of my question

Oystein wrote:

SnowCrash wrote:...I was a member. SanderO was. What's wrong with our opinions?
...

Hey Snow,

not going to distract you too much from your debate with Heretic, just a quick Q: Are you saying you and SanderO used to be members of AE911T? What does that mean, exactly? Did you sign the petition, but had your signature later deleted? Or participated actively in whatever capacity, but don't any longer?

The latter. I was a member of the web development team, but frankly, I was more interested in doing actual 9/11 research. Last thing I remember doing not too long ago, while not being on the mailing list anymore, was proof reading a book. (They wanted a skeptic's eye)

Oystein wrote:You see I am looking closely at the membership development over there. Just trying to figure out how they manage the list of signers.

The integrity of the petition list due to the constant barrage of attacks and pranksters was a constant cause of concern. They have an entire verification team composed of multiple sub teams which deals exclusively with the verification of petition signers.

Team leader is Nor Cal Truth (Brian Romanoff) from 911blogger.

Believe it or not, they all work extremely hard and sacrifice a whole lot. I know that doesn't jive with the general perception from JREF and elsewhere, but that's what I saw.

Besides, there are multiple infiltrators from the no plane camp and JREF inside the mailing list right now, so why ask me? They got past the process... Ask them.

Biggest skeptic on the team is Gregg Roberts, and he does provide healthy counterbalance.

SanderO wrote:
Much of the AE911T story was created by the anonymous Arabesque.

Lots of smoke and mirrors.

Ha ha ha. I still don't know who Arabesque is but I have come to understand the necessity of anonymity due to harassment.

Arabesque was genuinely interested in countering disinfo while genuinely seeking answers about those collapses. I disagree with some of his methods (regarding the Pentagon), but all in all, I think he (or she) did a good job.

I once speculated openly about his/her identity on 911blogger and that got me in a big row with YT/Cosmos. I apologized later and we have been friends since.

Jon Gold and YT know who he is. I don't want to know. (I have an idea, but I won't say) They have all been harassed beyond belief.

SnowCrash wrote:

Oystein wrote:You see I am looking closely at the membership development over there. Just trying to figure out how they manage the list of signers.

The integrity of the petition list due to the constant barrage of attacks and pranksters was a constant cause of concern. They have an entire verification team composed of multiple sub teams which deals exclusively with the verification of petition signers.

Team leader is Nor Cal Truth (Brian Romanoff) from 911blogger.

Believe it or not, they all work extremely hard and sacrifice a whole lot. I know that doesn't jive with the general perception from JREF and elsewhere, but that's what I saw.

Besides, there are multiple infiltrators from the no plane camp and JREF inside the mailing list right now, so why ask me? They got past the process... Ask them.

Oh, I believe it alright! Sometime last year I signed the Petition, using my real name and everything, but revealed in the bio freetext, or personal statenment, that I actually think their claims are wrong and am only testing the signature process. It took a little while, but finally got a reply from Brian that my signature was not accepted. And quite cordial he was, too.

Last year I have also taken a very close look at the licensed professional engineers from several states, checking license numbers on the pages of the states' PE boards, and found that they were almost all legit (I found one patent layer among them who apparently was not an engineer; I am not worried about such a slip).


Recently I researched the number of signatures at various points in time since 2007. I found that "membership" of A&E (currently at 1,663) had grown roughly linearly between the end of 2008 and the 10th anniversary last year at a rate of about 1 signature per day, and since then has tended to slow. This seems to indicate that those who sign do not spread the word and/or fail to convince any peers. If they did, linear growth rate should be expected to increase as membership increases; there should be a component of exponential growth. The recent decline of even the linear grwoth rate may indicate that either AE911T has ceased to target professionals, or they are creeping closer to their maximum potential of those professional on the fringe ready to believe their crap.
The "Other Supporters" on the other hand are increasing at a faster pace (instant exponential growth rate is abou 2-3 times that of the professionals), and linear growth rate is also increasing over time, which seems to indicate that some of the non-professionals are spreading the word among the non-professionals; or perhaps AE911T is more and more targeting non-professionals with their message.
Taken together, I see evidence that the claims of AE911T are plausible to only a very tiny fringe of building professionals and fail to gain any momentum at all in the professional community. They only have a measurable impact and success among non-experts.

SnowCrash wrote:Biggest skeptic on the team is Gregg Roberts, and he does provide healthy counterbalance.

Is he still on? Haven't read anything new from or about him in a while. I'd expect him to drop out soon. His work on Judy Woody is unsurpassed and among the most fun contributions fron the movement.

I believe the rise to the number you see now was a result of a campaign to reach 1000. That provided impetus and enthusiasm, and some of that impetus and enthusiasm has waned. The additional 600 are, imo, merely an after-effect of the campaign to reach 1000.

Then again, you could be right. If, however, their stated mission was to bring light to the blatant malpractice by NIST and related investigatory authorities, I would gladly sign that petition today.

As an IT expert, (I won't go into specifics or details that risk identifying me personally) I take umbrage with their treatment of the computer simulations.

I know what I'm looking at. A big clue is the lack of transparency.

I want to see (1) the input, (2) the source code and (3) the output, not just the output.

I know they used commercial products to do the simulation, so chances of seeing source code are next to nil. That still doesn't make it right. I have very distinct reasons for supporting Free Software. Those reasons converge with 9/11 research here.

Oystein wrote:Is he still on? Haven't read anything new from or about him in a while. I'd expect him to drop out soon. His work on Judy Woody is unsurpassed and among the most fun contributions fron the movement.

I think you might have him confused with Greg Jenkins...

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid ... 0694803017

Ken Jenkins is the psychologist and video editor, Greg Jenkins is the physicist and Gregg Roberts is the technical writer and maintainer of wtc7.net

Hey wait, weren't we talking about a passport ... I have vague memories of this thread being on-topic...