[ExI] trutherism: was RE: Social aim for Transhumanism: Betterthinking about issues

[spike]

> ...On Behalf Of Jeff Davis
...
> 
> On Tue, May 18, 2010 at 1:46 PM, spike <spike66 at att.net> wrote:
> 
> <Snip a whole bunch of nifty sciencey stuff about water, ice, 
> butter, and steel>
> 
> > So perhaps part of the reason trutherism got so much 
> mileage is due to the  rumor .....
> 
> Read the article, Spike.
> 
> http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20627606.100-living-in-d
> enial-why-sensible-people-reject-the-truth.html?full=true
> 
> The proposed explanation suggests it's an 
> emotional-need-driven-human-irrationality thing, not a 
> misunderstanding-of-fact thing.
> 
> Always good to hear from you, buddy.
> 
> Best, Jeff Davis

Ja, hi Jeff, actually I read the article, and I should have made it clear I
was not refuting it or even disagreeing, but rather offering an alternative
perspective in this case.  This is an area in which I take great interest,
for it is very closely linked to cognitive dissonance.  Michael Schermer
wrote an excellent book on cognitive dissonance called "Why People Believe
Weird Things."

I am interested in the phenomenon of cognitive dissonance because of my
observation of how some (almost all) people can tolerate it far better than
I can.  When I was religious, I saw evidence all around me of evolution.
Everywhere I looked was more and more and more evidence.  I marveled at how
my compatriots could ignore or dismiss it, yet still go on with their lives
as if they did not know they were seeing direct contradictory evidence to
their most fundamental belief superstructure.  I nearly went crazier because
of seeing knock-out clear evidence for evolution while I was still a
creationist.  Crazier!  I was holding two mutually exclusive beliefs
simultaneously and I knew it.  I cannot tolerate cognitive dissonance.

Regarding cognitive dissonance and the conspiracy notions on the WTC attack,
we have at least one really good example that I know of where there had to
be a conspiracy.  In 2004, apparently some non-quakers hid weapons in a
Beslan school while it was under construction.  Then later, the non-quakers
came into the school, retrieved the weapons, took hostages, slew many
children:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis

This is a perfectly clear example of a conspiracy, for it would have taken
several guys to do that, and it never leaked.  Oy.

Of course the simultaneous hijacking of four aircraft required a conspiracy.

Nowthen, if we wish to theorize a conspiracy on the WTC buildings, do let me
take it from an engineer's perspective.  I was as shocked as anyone that an
airplane could cause a fire hot enough to collapse a tall building.  I never
would have thought that possible.  If you ever get a chance to look at how
skyscrapers are built, you come away with the notion that god couldn't knock
one over.

A group of suspected non-Seventh Day Adventists attacked the WTC with
explosives in 1994, but of course the building was not impressed.  So we
could at least imagine these non-Methodists deciding to try to get access to
the internal structure of the building to set explosive charges mounted
directly to the superstructure.  But if they had done that, it isn't clear
to me why they needed the airplanes.

To extend the previous notion regarding the behavior of structural steel, on
April 29, 2007 a fuel truck crashed beneath a local freeway overpass, which
was constructed entirely of concrete and steel.  The heat from that fire
caused the structure to collapse:

http://articles.sfgate.com/2007-04-29/bay-area/17239903_1_tanker-truck-roadw
ay-firefighters
 
Other anecdotal evidence: in my misspent youth, I help rebuild an engine in
which a hole had developed in the radiator, causing the coolant to escape.
The silly prole kept driving until the engine seized.  The exhaust valves
were not *melted* exactly, but they were deformed under heat and stress.  So
I laboriously reseated the new valves, but the engine was still never worth
a damn because the valve seats were also deformed, and the seal was no good.

At the end of the day when the blacksmith goes home, the horseshoes have
changed shape considerably, but the hammer and the anvil have not.  All
three are made of the same material.

Again, take a piece of quarter inch rebar and a plumbers torch.  Hold both
ends and heat the rebar in the middle.  Bend.  Notice you get a tight bend
right at the hot spot, and no bend at all a short distance either side.

I have personally seen a campfire hot enough to deform steel cans, when a
strong steady wind blows and a bunch of yahoos brought more firewood than
any decent person should have ever owned, and they want to burn it all.

With those observations, I concluded that an airplane fire could indeed burn
hot enough to drop a skyscraper, and that the explosive charge conspiracy
and the airplane conspiracy were in a sense mutually exclusive: if you had
one you wouldn't need the other.

So the official explanation works for me.  At least five non-Mormon
man-caused disasterists agreed to a suicide attack, along with more than a
dozen others, who may or may not have known they were participating in their
very last non-Presbyterian overseas contingency operation.

spike