Dear Mr. Dentith,
I trust that I am addressing the correct Mr. Dentith, if not, full apologies to the recipient. (enjoy!)
With all respect Sir may I suggest that it is naive to believe the official “Bush believers conspiracy theory that 19 Arabs did 9/11 and fire brought down three steel high rise structures for the first time in history on the same site on the one dayâ€.
Your comments would have some credibility if you stated that you have examined and considered the scientific analysis and evidence now available. As with Galileo’s findings, many did not accept them because they would not look through the telescope. I trust that for the benefit of your students, that in regard to the 9/11 matter, you will at least have a peak through the lens.
In considering your doctorate on conspiracy theories perhaps you would wish to include in your studies the following points:
Prosecutors on behalf of Her Majesty the Queen present conspiracy theories to juries in the criminal jurisdictions every day in commonwealth countries. Until such time as a jury convicts then it is a conspiracy theory.
Juries consider the evidence presented in a balanced and impartial objective manner, as is their duty, during their deliberations.
There are many theories that do not stand up considering the evidence and an acquittal should follow.
I have been studying the 9/11 event for over 5 years and have formed the opinion that the twin towers and building No 7 were destroyed with explosives.
I find it offensive for you to infer that I have been naive in studying the ‘9/11 mass murders’ and/or meeting with Mr. Gage, for example. Actually, I have not only had him in my home in Sydney, but also; Frank Legge, Professor Steven Jones, Lt. Col. (ret) Bob Bowman and Yuki Fujita from the Japanese Parliament. Yuki is now in government with his party. Perhaps if you spent some time with some of these honourable people you would moderate your accusations.
I find it extraordinary and offensive that you would infer that; by my studying 9/11 and forming an opinion on it, it would add ‘credibility to groups with fringe and anti-Semitic agendas’. The last aspect is most offensive. What has anti-Semitism have to do with scientific investigation of mass murders? As for fringe groups: it would appear that your expected doctorate studies should be updated with a Time magazine article reporting the 9/11 truth is not a fringe group, considering the hundreds of millions of people who question the Bush Administrations account of 9/11.
Sir, you reference to anti-Semitism is, may I suggest is an attempt to smear respected persons and is an unlearned comment intended to somehow deride thinking people.
I will be sending a copy of this to The Honourable Ms Fitzsimmons (when I find an e-mail address)and I wish to congratulate her on the manner in which she has the courage to diligently carry out her duties to the people of New Zealand. I take it that she will not give any credence to uninformed criticism inferred by your suggestion that she is lacking; ethical standards and lacks the ability to judge things with reason.
Further, Sir in regard to your claim that all the 9/11 conspiracy theories collapse when ‘prodded’. No doubt you will substantiate that inane statement with a balanced critique of Mr. Gage’s address. I take it that if one of your students said; “Well Sir, your theories just collapse with a bit of proddingâ€, you will pass the student with honours in the light of your standards. I
In regards to Building No 7 may i suggest David Ray Griffin’s latest book; “The Mysterious Collapse of World Trade Center(sic) &. Why the final report about 9/11 is unscientific and falseâ€. [2009. Olive Press] May respectfully opine, that you are facing extreme embarrassment if you maintain your stated unsubstantiated opinion/s in front of those of your students who should happen to read Mr. Griffin’s book. (and the many other he has written on the subject) It will be in interesting to see you ‘prod’ Griffin’s book and see if his analysis collapses, try it!
There are many avenues for further study on 9.11. I suggest you start at http://www.patriotsquestion9/11.com and the architects and engineers site at AE911truth.org. Keep up to date by a few weekly peaks at 911.blogger.com.
I wish you well with your doctorate and trust that some of the above observations will make your thesis at least worth the outcome expected by you.
Yours Sincerely,
B Antcliffe.
Member: Lawyers for 911 truth. Political Leaders for 9/11 truth.
PS: John ((John Bursill, the organiser of the Richard Gage tour in Australia and New Zealand.)), Cannot locate Fitzsimons or NZ Herald, e-mail perhaps when this goes round someone will send it on, Ta.
—
Thank you for your interesting but just a little disjointed e-mail. A few points:
In considering your doctorate on conspiracy theories perhaps you would wish to include in your studies the following points:
Prosecutors on behalf of Her Majesty the Queen present conspiracy theories to juries in the criminal jurisdictions every day in commonwealth countries. Until such time as a jury convicts then it is a conspiracy theory.
Juries consider the evidence presented in a balanced and impartial objective manner, as is their duty, during their deliberations.
There are many theories that do not stand up considering the evidence and an acquittal should follow.
I am well aware of charges, as well as successful convictions, for Criminal Conspiracies. Everyone knows that Conspiracies occur; the question, certainly salient here, is whether the charge of Conspiracy is true in this particular case.
I find it offensive for you to infer that I have been naive in studying the ‘9/11 mass murders’ and/or meeting with Mr. Gage, for example.
Actually, you are inferring that. I merely said Jeanette Fitzsimmons was naive in her endorsement.
Actually, I have not only had him in my home in Sydney, but also; Frank Legge, Professor Steven Jones, Lt. Col. (ret) Bob Bowman and Yuki Fujita from the Japanese Parliament. Yuki is now in government with his party. Perhaps if you spent some time with some of these honourable people you would moderate your accusations.
As an epistemologist I am concerned with whether people hold beliefs formed due to reliable processes; it matters not one whit whether they are good, honourable, et cetera; if they hold specious beliefs, then they can be called to account on that.
Sir, you reference to anti-Semitism is, may I suggest is an attempt to smear respected persons and is an unlearned comment intended to somehow deride thinking people.
As a lawyer I would expect you to read documents carefully and notice what is a direct quote, what is an associated comment and what is an inference. You have taken an associated comment and missed its relevance to the rest of the article.
Matthew
Comments
As an impartial observer, you just got caned there Matthew.
Also, you’ve been commenting on the Gage stuff favourably. You’re hardly an impartial observer, are you?
Yes that was tongue-in-cheek.
But he makes the exactly the same point as me:
The only way for you to contradict Richard Gage, is to prove that each of the scientific observations that he relies on are false.
That is the realm of science luckily, so “conspiracy philosphy” waffle, generalisations and assorted psychobabble will be pointless.
I repeat my suggestion for you to take Gage’s DVD to the science department at your “university” and ask them to pick it apart.
Ask someone there how molten steel was found at Ground Zero when there was mere hydrocarbon jet-fuel and office fire. Where did the extra hundreds of degrees Celsius come from?
Amazing stuff! Modern industry usually needs blast furnace technology to melt steel. Except on 911 when a bit of kerosene and office combustibles did the trick.
Please Matthew, explain how this magical, previously unknown phenomenon could occur.
Off course you can’t – because the laws of physical science cannot be bent.
That’s why all you will do is dishonestly skirt around the evidence.
And please don’t point me to anonymous debunker websites.
Please walk down the hall and get a written explanation from a science professor – that he/she is willing to put his/her name to.
Thanks Bro.
Actually, Fred, I’d like to know, given how keen you are on credentials, why it is that you uncritically accept the authority of Gage and co but ignore the much larger group of qualified people who disagree. It seems like authority and credentials only really matter to you guys when they’re on your side.
Who are the much larger group that disagree?
NIST doesn’t count as they are part of the cover-up.
Well, that’s unhelpful but it does somewhat show your true colours; so, any organisation that doesn’t agree with your theory is somehow part of the Conspiracy?
See, that might be something to do if it weren’t likely that if I did that you would then claim the physicist in question was obviously a) in the pay of ‘them’ or b) suddenly unqualified. The reason why I suspect you might do that is that, thus far in the Truther Movement, whenever a properly qualified scientist says something along the lines of ‘Actually, the official story is correct and you guys are showing a fundamental misunderstanding of physics and chemistry’ you either a) ignore them or b) attack them with ad hominems, et cetera.
As I’ve said before and will say again, the burden of proof says you have to do the work to persuade us. You are the ones making the controversial point and you’re not doing a particularly good job at persuading the rest of us, so up your game and come up with a good argument or stop, to use your own terms, being so cognitively dissonant and realise the gig is up.
Stephen and Matthew make excellent points Fred, and ones i’ve found myself saying to people who hold similarly unsubstantiated ideas about some sort of conspiracy. Perhaps, for once instead of demanding this and that from the rest of us (or even worse, attacking Matthew with ad hominems about your ill-informed, scientism-muddled views of philosophy), you might self-reflect and weigh your assertions – how sound your evidence really is, how reliable the source is, and just how authoritive your ‘experts’ are in the realm of physics and related disciplines? Architects don’t qualify in my books i’m afraid. Like Matthew, i’d rather take the tried and true opinion of trained academics with expertiese in a particular area than the spurious and bumbled misunderstandings of someone who is no more a physicist then I am an astronaut. But then I guess it’s up to you. I have a feeling when ideology gets in the way though, that critical thought often goes flying out the window.
There is a lot of trading on false authority that goes on in these circles (and it isn’t limited to the Truth Movement; Climate Change Denial uses it, Intelligent Design advocates use it and, importantly, most politicians use it); I was interested in the way that Richard gage shut down certain conversations with Kim Hill by saying he wasn’t a scientist and therefore not qualified to critically discuss certain aspects of his thesis. If he actually toed that line and said “Look, I’m not saying it is definitely controlled demolition, just that it might be” he’d have a much stronger case to argue.
Well Edward – some of the sources are pretty airtight.
The iron rich microspheres in the WTC dust were found by Professor Jones and 2 other independent studies – R.G. Lee company, and U.S. Geological Survey.
Molten steel at Ground Zero, more specifically under building 7 was documented by FEMA itself in Appendix C of their report. They conducted a metallurgical examination. What do you know:
“The results of the examination are striking. They reveal a phenomenon never before observed in building fires: eutectic reactions, which caused “intergranular melting capable of turning a solid steel girder into Swiss cheese.” The New York Times described this as “perhaps the deepest mystery uncovered in the investigation.””
You can’t hide from facts like these. If any of you can debunk this piece of evidence please let me know.
Then of course there are numerous videos showing
– Building 7’s straight down collapse at free fall speed.
– Lateral high speed ejections of steel girders from WTC 1 & 2
– Squibs popping out up to 60 metres below the collapse canopy.
– etc
The evidence is truly overwhelming.
I just read that section from Appendix C, which gives a fairly dense explanation of why they think the low temperature fire had that effect; can you tell me, on scientific grounds, why that explanation is wrong?
As has been pointed out before, finding iron rich microspheres is perfectly explicable without having needed a controlled demolition; they only become important if the thermite thesis is proven, which, at this stage, it has not.
“I just read that section from Appendix C, which gives a fairly dense explanation of why they think the low temperature fire had that effect; can you tell me, on scientific grounds, why that explanation is wrong?”
D+ for comprehension
Did you not read their conclusion where they admit there is no clear explanation?
“The severe corrosion and subsequent erosion of Samples 1 and 2 are a very unusual event. No clear explanation for the source of the sulfur has been identified. The rate of corrosion is also unknown. It is possible that this is the result of long-term heating in the ground following the collapse of the buildings. It is also possible that the phenomenon started prior to collapse and accelerated the weakening of the steel structure. A detailed study into the mechanisms of this phenomenon is needed to determine what risk, if any, is presented to existing steel structures exposed to severe and long-burning fires. ”
No way, another “very unusual event” on 9/11.
Anyway, that’s it from me. Although I will check on your response to the above. Your site is too limited without a forum.
Finally, I just read the comments in your “Hello Truthers” entry. Some very fine points made that you were having all sorts of trouble dodging.
Wake up Matthew and get your head out of the sand.
You’re obviously not reading the same words I am.
Given that you’re not going to respond, I’m not going to bother spending any more time on this comment. You’ll take this as proof positive you’ve won, but rest assured, you have not.
“Then of course there are numerous videos showing
– Building 7’s straight down collapse at free fall speed.
– Lateral high speed ejections of steel girders from WTC 1 & 2
– Squibs popping out up to 60 metres below the collapse canopy.
– etc”
All contestable; I mean, the squibs are the result of the wave of pressure preceding the collapse, for one thing. The buckling of the building as it fell sent out girders, et cetera. None of this debunks the official story. I know you want it to, but just asserting that it does doesn’t mean its true.
So just to repeat the challenge that was caught up in the larger post….
Please one of you explain:
How the molten steel documented by FEMA was melted, when office fires are not capable of reaching anywhere near the necessary temperature.
Can you give us clear documentation of that? Some of the photographic evidence, by Steven Jones has been shown to be photoshopped (one, in particular, is of a group of workers looking at what appears to be a pool of glowing metal but actually turns up to be the glare of their lamps) and a lot of the material Jones talks about obfuscates between the claim of ‘previously molten metal’ and ‘molten metal’ mentioned in the past tense, which means it is a little hard to check whether we’re working with the evidence of an actual bit of molten metal or the claim that it was suspect that some deposits were molten at some point.
“I will be sending a copy of this to The Honourable Ms Fitzsimmons (when I find an e-mail address)”
“PS: John1, Cannot locate Fitzsimons or NZ Herald, e-mail perhaps when this goes round someone will send it on, Ta.”
Am I the only one who finds it exquisitely hilarious that these so-called sleuthing knights who can analyse and piece together evidence so much butter than we mugs who “buy the official line…
…cannot find an e-mail address for a Member of Parliament.
hahahahaha
and this guys a *lawyer*! sheesh!
I know. I was expounding that point to Paul last night. Was half tempted to give them the e-mail address in my reply.
Really? Have you read the article this letter was sent as a response to? Because if you have, you will realise that Brae is alleging a whole bunch of things I have not said or done.
Your attempt to smear Richard Gage as an anti-Semite was absolutely disgraceful.
Except that I didn’t. If you actually bothered to read the article rather than just assume its contents, you would note that all I did was called Jeanette Fitzsimmons naive for her endorsement and noted that such an endorsement could lead to fringe groups, like anti-semites, gaining credibility in New Zealand.
“I did mention how the 9/11 Truth Conspiracy Theories sometimes dovetail with Anti-semiticism; I brought this up because of a few comments Richard Gage made about Larry Silverstein.”
Yes, I did say that. That isn’t calling Gage an anti-semite. At best all you can get me for is Gage playing his audience well with tropes they might be sympathetic to.
It’s strange how so many of the ‘Lawyers’ and ‘Scholars’ for ‘9/11 Truth’ don’t seem to be able to write a coherent e mail, let alone form a coherent argument.
Aye. It’s very ‘English as a Second Language’ as well, which makes me think that Brae, if she isn’t a lawyer in training, is devoting herself full time to the cause.
He’s actually a distinguished Sydney barrister.
Really? Because he can’t draft a letter and he can’t even find the e-mail address of a member of the New Zealand Parliament, despite the fact that a search for “Jeanette Fitzsimmons e-mail” will provide it as the first Google listing.
The rest of “Sydney barristers” must really be rubbish if someone as sub-standard if this chap managed to become “distinguished”
I actually found this email rather funny and ironic. It basically is a shining example of many of the things wrong with the 9/11 movement and provides a case study to contextualise why Matthew makes some of the arguments he does. The writer seems very confused.
Are you going to comment at some point on Gage’s argument specifically – his reasons for believing that it’s a cover up? Alternatively, can you recommend a good 9/11 conspiracy debunking website?
I plan to, yes. There was meant to be a ‘Dentith Files’ segment this weekend on bFM but José, the host with the most, is away and wants to do it next weekend. That works out well, because I might well be going to Auckland engagement of Gage’s talk (yes, I’m a glutton for this kind of thing; I spent so much of the last one taking notes that I didn’t have time to ‘enjoy the atmosphere’) and so I’ll have even more to say after listening to the presentation for the second time.
Until Matthew gets around to it, here’s a few for you:
http://www.earlham.edu/~peters/fos/2009/06/bentham-editors-resign.html (the journal that published the nanothermite paper is dodgy as hell)
http://11-settembre.blogspot.com/2009/04/active-thermitic-material-claimed-in.html (the famous flakes are… paint).
http://www.ae911truth.info/tiki-index.php?page=Top+10+Boneheaded+Mistakes General debunkage of the AE 911 crew.
Gee let’s have a look at the author of that last debunking site.
Very funny stuff – a “BA in Bible” and an ex-actor with various “day jobs” as the profession requires. See full CV below.
I wonder how his scientific qualifications stack up against Dwain Deets ex-Director of NASA’s Dryden Flight Research Centre?
————————–
Joseph Nobles
The author of this website.
I am currently a live voice writer, which means I produce captions for live television using voice recognition software. I used to be an working actor with the various “day jobs” such a profession requires. I also graduated from International Bible College (now Heritage Christian University) with a BA in Bible, and attended Harding Graduate School of Religion for two years pursuing a Masters in Christian Theology. I am now an agnostic on all matters religious.
I see you are engaging in the same activity you accuse me of doing; not engaging with the person’s arguments but just acting their character. Double standard?
To be honest this Noble guy’s arguments are as weak as his CV would suggest.
What does he say about the molten steel documented at Ground Zero? Nothing.
btw just heard the panel mention the so-called ‘naive’ “controversy” about Fitzsimons and the 9/11 truth movement in general on National Radio on my way home from work. It appears you’ve sparked some controversy over what really isn’t an overly controvesial issue, at least not in the realm of critical thinking. Anyway, they had Vicky from the NZ skeptics on, and were quite supportive of the idea that this particular conspiracy really is rather silly once all is said and done. (also of note is Gage’s apparent financial interest in the merchandise and marketing of his ‘truth’ talks – must make himself a tidy sum?). Good o.
The financial angle was something I suspected, given the leaflet about how to become a sustaining member but it would be good to get a primary source for that.