For any given phenomenon, I tend to believe in the truth of the explanation that is generally best supported by the evidence.

I have no idea why you're claiming that that the towers were not flaming but rather only smoking; such an assessment is straightforwardly at odds with the photographic, video and witness testimony evidence.

World Trade Center 7 did not collapse before the impact of World Trade Center 1; it collapsed some eight hours after the event. Further, as I've said a number of times now, World Trade Center 7 didn't collapse into a "tidy pile". The collapse caused significant damage to 30 West Broadway and The Verizon Building and minor damage to several others; the debris spanned the width of Barcley Street. The list of tenants of World Trade Center 7 does not provide any evidence of a conspiracy surrounding 9/11.

Unless your "personal sensibilities" include preferring explanations which lack any compelling evidence and are in the face of overwhelming counterevidence, it's difficult to see quite how I've managed to insult them.

Indeed, World Trade Center 7 wasn't hit by a plane. However, as I've already said, it suffered severe structural damage from the impact of a collapsing 110-storey skyscraper; it also suffered eight hours of widespread, unfought fires. Further, World Trade Center 7's collapse wasn't particularly "graceful". The collapse caused significant damage to 30 West Broadway and The Verizon Building and minor damage to several others; the debris spanned the width of Barcley Street. The substructure of the east mechanical penthouse began sinking into the main superstructure due to an internal collapse appreciably before the main superstructure -- including the visible facades, etc. -- of the building collapsed. (Incidentally, controlled demolitions simply do not exhibit this kind of behaviour -- yet more evidence against the controlled demolition theory.)

The towers were indeed designed to withstand the impact of a plane -- a Boeing 707 carrying a minimal fuel load and travelling at approach speed. On 9/11, however, the towers were hit by appreciably larger Boeing 767s carrying abundant fuel and travelling at ~500 and ~600 mph. Further, if you hadn't noticed, the towers did withstand the initial impact of the planes -- which is why, thankfully, so many people were able to evacuate before they collapsed. The cores of the buildings did not "explode." Dust is a perfectly natural phenomenon given the collapse of a skyscraper. There is no compelling evidence of molten steel; the molten metal was mostly likely aluminium.

The McCormick example serves to illustrate that fire can significantly affect structural steel and ultimately bring about a global collapse. The World Trade Center buildings had sprinkler systems and fireproofing -- both of which were stripped and destroyed by the impact of the airliner.

The sites of planes crashes, building collapses and suchlike are routinely cordoned-off and assigned to investigators for very obvious reasons. There is nothing suspicious about that.

So, I leave a fairly reasoned and polite post and I get a lot of rude and sarcastic sneering in reply to it. Well, that's conspiracy theorists for you.

Thirdly, he states that the fire at the Windsor Tower serves as a compelling example of the fact that fires cannot significantly affect structural steel. However, the construction of the Windsor tower differed significantly from that of the World Trade Center buildings. The Windsor tower had a concrete as well as a steel supporting structure. In fact, (and this is why Jones' example is such a poor one) the unprotected steel sections of the Windsor tower did collapse:

Case Studies: Madrid Windsor Tower Fire:

It was believed that the multiple floor fire, along with the simultaneous buckling of the unprotected steel perimeter columns at several floors, triggered the collapse of the floor slabs above the 17th floor. The reduced damage below the 17th floor might provide a clue...

On the other hand, the reinforced concrete central core, columns, waffle slabs and transfer structures performed very well in such a severe fire. It is clear that the structural integrity and redundancy of the remaining parts of the building provided the overall stability of the building.

Secondly, he suggests that there are no examples of fires significantly affecting structural steel. Purely from a common-sense approach, if fire cannot significantly affect structural steel, then it seems very odd that structural engineers would waste valuable time and money on fire-proofing it. Further, his claim is simply false.

A Tale of Fire & Steel:

Bill Moore, of Brandenburg Industrial Service Co., and former president of the National Demolition Association from 2003-2005:

"As an example of the damaging effect of fire on steel, in 1967, the original heavy steel-constructed McCormick Place exhibition hall in Chicago collapsed only 30 minutes after the start of a small electrical fire."

I have no particular desire to sit through yet another hour of fantasist nonsense, but I can make a few comments on Jones' very first claims (the first in the whole "documentary") that should give you some idea of his (and its) credibility.

Firstly, he rather dishonestly presents a false version of the official account of the collapse of the World Trade Center buildings; he suggests that it states that they collapsed due to fire. This is not true. The World Trade Center buildings collapsed due to a combination of the damage suffered from the high-speed impact of a commercial airliner and the ensuing, unfought, multiple-floor, jet-fuel-accelerated fires (in the cases of buildings 1 and 2) or due to a combination of the damage suffered from the impact of a collapsing 110-storey skyscraper and eight hours of widespread, unfought fires (in the case of building 7). They were indeed the first buildings in history to collapse as a result of these factors, but, then again, they were the first buildings in history to have been subjected to these factors.

Well, let me express myself a little more clearly. Asking Gorgonheap to provide evidence for his claim is a perfectly noble request; in principle, I support it. However, I wasn't suggesting that you should "give a toss" whether I think it's relevant to "anything at all" or not. I was merely pointing out that where this issue is concerned, it is objectively irrelevant.

I refer you to the evidence offered by Sageous and later expanded upon by myself above. Clearly and straightforwardly, Bush is simply not referring to 9/11 when he mentions explosives; in light of this, "Bush Tells the Public Explosives Were Used on 9-11" is a blatantly misleading and deceitful title. So, do you not think this means that you have an intellectual and moral responsibility to have the video removed or relabelled as per my request?

I'm so glad. So, do you have any proof to "back up" your "absurdly ridiculous claim" that it is relevant?

eric3579:

I've just noticed that you were the original poster of this video. Given that we now know it to be fraudulent and intended to deceive, do you not think that it's your intellectual and moral responsibility to either have it removed or relabelled or to appeal to the relevant moderators to do so?

In brief, it's very hard to say, but I think Bertrand Russell was right when he said, and I paraphrase, "It is a trivial task to convince a man of what he wants to believe"; it seems that many of those who buy into the conspiracy theories are, ideologically, extremely hard-left or hard-right. Further, many (especially the younger contingent) wish to conflate fantasy and reality so that they can feel that they're somehow special or modern-day revolutionaries or freedom-fighters or something of that kind. In short, they want to believe they're "like Neo from the Matrix." So, all these factors combine to make this alternate reality extremely attractive. That assessment, however, at best, only skims the surface.

The "dare" (and other emblems of adolescent posturing) aside, the issue, as I've already pointed out, is irrelevant.

I should probably point out that the discussion between Gorgonheap and Gluonium is an entirely unnecessary one.

Consider the following thought experiment: A suicidal man jumps from a high bridge. Now, his journey down to the water may closely resemble that of a man who has been pushed, but that fact is certainly not a good reason to think that he actually has been pushed.