Creative Speculation
In reply to the discussion: OK then. Just the facts. 9-11 [View all]William Seger
(11,042 posts)... by the "truth movement," and furthermore that you appear to have put no effort whatsoever into finding out what's seriously wrong with the "scientific" claims it makes. Since I would have expected a truly rational and objective person to have already done that research before posting this nonsense on a public board, I predict that you will resist any effort to change your mind now and that this thread will follow the same pattern we've seen dozens of times. But, hey, nothing else going on around here, so....
> 1. Jet fuel doesn't burn hot enough to melt structural steel. Especially when encased by fireproofing. Proven by NIST doing gov. tests.
Answered by zappaman; no "melting" required. Structural steel loses approximately half its strength at 600 degrees C, and when it's under load it's subject to "plastic creep," slowly deforming at even lower temperatures, which is apparently the main story in the collapses. That was a particularly bad place to start your "scientific" discussion.
> 2. Timing does show some free fall throughout collapse of towers. And in fact the upper block of tower one accelerated during collapse.
Contrary to imaginary "truther physics" which seems to expect failing structures to just slowly slump down, "some free fall throughout the collapse" is exactly what should be expected. A steel column can only be compressed a few inches before it starts to buckle and rapidly lose strength. By the time it's buckled just a couple of feet, it is not capable of offering any significant resistance, so the debris that crushed it will proceed to fall at "near freefall acceleration" to the next floor. If, instead of the column buckling, the floor structure is simply ripped away from the column, then that debris is immediately free to fall down to the next floor. When we watch the towers fall, the accelerating collapse front we see is simply the average of thousands of individual events of local failure followed by local freefall. Instead of falling victim to imaginary physics and hand-waving, think about it: What could realistically slow the collapse down, regardless of what initiated the collapse?
> 3.Tower one's upper block shows effect of having fallen due to lack of support underneath it. Not the tower falling because of upper block collapse onto the lower block. Physics suggest it could have supported the upper collapse, and arrested the further collapse of the tower.
The collapse initiation obviously "shows effect of having fallen due to lack of support underneath it," but after that the collapse shows no such thing; it shows the effects of transfer of momentum. Your statement that "physics suggest it could have supported the upper collapse, and arrested the further collapse of the tower" is exactly 180-degrees out of phase with reality. Every independent analysis done by competent structural experts shows that the collapse could not have been halted after it started, whereas every attempt by pretend-expert "truthers" to prove what you claim has been found to be laughably flawed. Don't expect "truther" sites to tell you this.
> 4. No steel skyscraper has ever collapsed due to an airplane strike. One day we have three. Oops two. WTC 7 never hit.
If the subject is science, this one is too irrelevant to even comment on, but I will anyway: Since no structures like the towers have ever been hit by 767s before and then suffered unfought fires, it's absurd to claim mere surprise at the unique results as "evidence" of foul play.
> 5. Floor pancaking postulation slows collapse much more than evidenced.
> 6. FP theory doesn't explain core structure failure. As admitted by NIST (gov. lab). NIST investigation proves FP theory impossible.
Many "truthers" are very confused about the "floor pancaking postulation." What the NIST study concluded was that the collapse was not initiated by "floor pancaking" -- i.e. it did not start with a floor falling away from the perimeter columns and crashing on floors below -- it was initiated by perimeter column buckling when sagging floors pulled them inward. After the collapse started, however, there was considerable "pancaking," and in fact that seems to be the dominant failure mode, with the floors being striped away from the columns and then the columns either being pushed aside immediately or collapsing somewhat later due to lack of lateral support. The evidence for that is the abundance of failed joist and beam seats and the fact that most columns were not buckled. But anyway, your statement that "floor pancaking postulation slows collapse much more than evidenced" makes no sense at all. As mentioned above, once floors were stripped away from their supporting columns, which would happen within a few milliseconds if struck with sufficient force, they were completely free to fall.
> 7. WTC 7 so close to free fall that physics suggest support severing.
Again, another completely empty claim that "physics suggest" something which has never been demonstrated with valid physics. When examined in detail, the NIST collapse hypothesis completely explains what we see, whereas the controlled demolition hypothesis not only requires magical silent explosives, it still leaves unexplained details such as the slow initiation and the fact that the freefall was not seen until after the building was already irrevocably headed down. There is no contest between the the two hypotheses, really.
If I thought it would make a difference, I can point you to references for everything I've said. Would it make a difference? Seems to me, you would have already found them if you were really interested in having your beliefs challenged rather than reinforced.