Greg Palast - On 9/11 [10 May 2007]

[moonoodoo]

BBC and Guardian reporter Greg Palast, gives his opinion on the use of controlled explosives being used in the destruction of the World Trade Center buildings on 9/11.

Palast refers to occam's razor - the scientific principle that in explaining a thing, no more assumptions should be made than are necessary - very wise.

Palast describes Prof. Steven E Jones as a fruitcake and complete utter fraud who believes that Christ visited America. Jones was also a faithful supporter of George W Bush until recently. With all this garbage about thermate, you could argue that he still supports Bush, and is helping to muddy the waters around the events of 9/11.

What sort of scientist even believes in a god in the first place? Science and religion are incompatible. One relies on logic, observation and evidence, the other on blind faith.

More info: http://www.indybay.org/newsitems/2007/08/25/18443229.php

[ryans53]

Occam's Razor is arguably the most asserted philosophical maxim in the mainstream, yet at the same time the least understood.

First of all, it is not a definitive method. It's a heuristic method that is best used when two or more hypotheses are strongly competing for acceptance; it is not used at the point of hypothesis generation--at that point, no neutral investigator has any idea how many assumptions will be necessary.

Second, the official story makes more than enough assumptions to at least put it in the same league as Inside Job theories, but even more likely it exceeds them. I think what official story advocates try to do to avoid the assumption problem is lump a whole host of assumptions into one blanket assumption they call "incompetence". This way, they disguise the fairly complex issue of human behavior and cognition as a ridiculously simplistic phenomenon of global stupidity and ignorance. In reality, each time they invoke the incompetence assumption for a human being in the 9/11 story, those assumptions ought to count as numerically distinct, since all human beings are not the same.

Third, even if a theory were to posit more assumptions than a competing theory, Occam's Razor is not sufficient, by itself, to choose between the theories. The stipulation in the maxim is that the hypotheses being considered must already be independently valid. Ironically, if an official story supporter attempts to invoke the maxim on an Inside Job theory, they are implicitly accepting the Inside Job theory as a valid argument...something I don't think they would candidly say.

So science and religion are incompatible too eh? Well, I suppose until the official story apologists, like Mr. Palast, start using logic, observation and evidence to generate a coherent theory of 9/11, they'll just have to remain content with their chosen religion.

[matrixcutter]

Occam's Razor is arguably the most asserted philosophical maxim in the mainstream, yet at the same time the least understood.

First of all, it is not a definitive method. It's a heuristic method that is best used when two or more hypotheses are strongly competing for acceptance; it is not used at the point of hypothesis generation--at that point, no neutral investigator has any idea how many assumptions will be necessary.

Second, the official story makes more than enough assumptions to at least put it in the same league as Inside Job theories, but even more likely it exceeds them. I think what official story advocates try to do to avoid the assumption problem is lump a whole host of assumptions into one blanket assumption they call "incompetence". This way, they disguise the fairly complex issue of human behavior and cognition as a ridiculously simplistic phenomenon of global stupidity and ignorance. In reality, each time they invoke the incompetence assumption for a human being in the 9/11 story, those assumptions ought to count as numerically distinct, since all human beings are not the same.

Third, even if a theory were to posit more assumptions than a competing theory, Occam's Razor is not sufficient, by itself, to choose between the theories. The stipulation in the maxim is that the hypotheses being considered must already be independently valid. Ironically, if an official story supporter attempts to invoke the maxim on an Inside Job theory, they are implicitly accepting the Inside Job theory as a valid argument...something I don't think they would candidly say.

So science and religion are incompatible too eh? Well, I suppose until the official story apologists, like Mr. Palast, start using logic, observation and evidence to generate a coherent theory of 9/11, they'll just have to remain content with their chosen religion.
Excellent post.

[moonoodoo]

After digging into this a little more it looks like Mr Jones and Mr Palast kissed and made up.... well nearly

See: http://www.911blogger.com/node/10606

It's a shame that Greg Palast made this outburst in a public arena. Given that he started the interview well by basing his judgements on researched material then ending with a school yard attack on Steve Jones for his religious beliefs.

Although the situation was resolved, it has not done Palast any favours as this shows that when faced with hard eveidence he shys away and prefers to report on his own theories rather than listen to what other specialised researchers have to say. He could have gone further and acknowledge Steve Jones research at least, but he declined.

The overall impression that I am left with is that Palast is wearing his company (BBC) hat, which results in childish behaviour