The Dumbing Down of AE911Truth, Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth

Can you provide a photo or screen capture showing one of these multi-ton framing sections that is seen being ejected sideways at 45 to 70 mph up to 500' away? . . .

I think this is better suited for the main thread on debris ejections (https://www.metabunk.org/threads/debunked-wtc-multi-ton-steel-sections-ejected-laterally.1739/), which, unsurprisingly, @Christopher 7 has apparently been unable to address despite declaring his intention to do so two weeks ago.
 
The facade panels which landed on the Winter Garden which I believe were identified as coming from around the 90th floor (don't recall) is consistent with the motion of becoming detached and tipping. Aerial photos show most of the west facade laying on the ground up to the WFC and the the WFC damage was from the highest floors that toppled over. There was no energetic horizontal motion or force . Floor systems were collapsing top down leaving the facades unstable and the forces of the collapsing floor debris was all it took to initiate the facade "peel".
It's all on the video and stills. AE911T ignores facts when they are inconvenient.
 
I think this is better suited for the main thread on debris ejections (https://www.metabunk.org/threads/debunked-wtc-multi-ton-steel-sections-ejected-laterally.1739/), which, unsurprisingly, @Christopher 7 has apparently been unable to address despite declaring his intention to do so two weeks ago.
I wasn't able to address this because I was suspended and then had other things to attend to. But I will address it now on the debris ejection thread you suggested.
 
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That is considerably more than the 9/11 petition which is the point.
I'm talking about proportion. 144,000 Americans are what percentage of 330 million Americans? - vs 3,000 architects and engineers is what percentage of all the architects and engineers in the U.S.?
 
Bruno D. said:
1 - Can you provide a single video from any controlled demolitions around the world showing multi-ton framing sections being ejected laterally at speeds up to 70mph?
Of course not. The Trade Towers were not normal demolitions. They were designed to look like a gravity collapse.

Here is how I parse your post:
1. "multi-ton framing sections being ejected laterally at speeds up to 70mph" are emphatically ("of course") NOT ever part of the observations when "normal" controlled demolitions are done
2. The WTC towers were "controlled" demolitions, but not "normal" controlled demolitions - let's called it a "special" controlled demolition
3. The WTC towers "were designed to look like a gravity collapse"
4. Therefore, the lateral ejection of heavy debris is ...
...EITHER the (undesired?) collateral result of the "special" demolition method used for the WTC (which would that be?)
...OR it is expected from "normal" gravity-driven collapses that are not controlled demolitions and was thus deliberately "designed for" as an add-on gimmick to the special controlled demolition.

Can you please clarify which of the two it is?
Or is there a third possibility that I overlook?

If it is the former - ejections undesired side effect, AND such ejections would not be expected from gravity driven collapses - then this leaves another two options:
EITHER the "designers" of this "special" demolition knew ahead of time their explosive charges would laterally eject the totally unexpected heavy lateral ejections - in this case, the collapses would NOT be "designed" to look "like a gravity collapse" -
OR they failed to foresee that the charges they layed would eject multiton steel pieces laterally - in which case they would be somewhat incompetent in "collapse design".
So which of these two is it, Christopher?

If it is the latter - multi-ton ejections normal for gravity-driven collapse - then we are back to Square One: Such ejections would NOT be evidence for explosive demolition and against natural, gravity driven collapse, they would be evidence for the opposite: against explosive controlled demolition and for a gravity-driven, natural collapse.
And then, the AE911Truth Simple Memes pointing out such ejections would be shot in the foot.
 
I'm talking about proportion. 144,000 Americans are what percentage of 330 million Americans? - vs 3,000 architects and engineers is what percentage of all the architects and engineers in the U.S.?
The petitions i mentioned were about building a death star and unlocking cell phones. Things that are equally not important to the population.
 
I'm talking about proportion. 144,000 Americans are what percentage of 330 million Americans? - vs 3,000 architects and engineers is what percentage of all the architects and engineers in the U.S.?

According to the U.S. Bureau of Labour Statistics, in May 2017 there were more than 2.5 million people in Architecture and Engineering Occupations: https://www.bls.gov/oes/2017/may/oes170000.htm

Therefore these proportions are within the same order of magnitude: 0.044% v 0.12%.
 
I'm talking about proportion. 144,000 Americans are what percentage of 330 million Americans? - vs 3,000 architects and engineers is what percentage of all the architects and engineers in the U.S.?
Less than 0.16% of engineers and architects support the fantasy of CD. Does that included retired ones?

The A&E theory of CD has the tacit support of <0.12% of all engineers and architects. Fake claims of CD have 2.75 times more support from people who should know better than support by the general public who know it was a silly poll for a death star? What was the point? Does the general public support false ideas and claims less than architects and engineers?

If you want, you can say (if the numbers check), A&E have <2.75 times more support for CD fantasy, than the USA has for the Death Star.

How many A&E signers know they signed up for the CD claims, and that claim has no valid evidence (simile is not evidence).
 
According to the U.S. Bureau of Labour Statistics, in May 2017 there were more than 2.5 million people in Architecture and Engineering Occupations: https://www.bls.gov/oes/2017/may/oes170000.htm

Therefore these proportions are within the same order of magnitude: 0.044% v 0.12%.
Thank you for the info.
Three times as many A&Es signed AE911Truth's petition as Americans that signed the White House petitions mentioned above.

The WH petition with the most signatures demands that Trump release his tax records. It had 369,550 signatures as of 1/25/17.
That's 0.11%
 
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No. As I said before, most people don't sign petitions. There are many more A&Es that support the petition but have not signed it.
One of the petitions for AE911 is for the general public and the Architects and engineers petition is still available for signatures. The White House petitions are only open for a finite time.
 
4. Therefore, the lateral ejection of heavy debris is ...
...EITHER the (undesired?) collateral result of the "special" demolition method used for the WTC (which would that be?)
...OR it is expected from "normal" gravity-driven collapses that are not controlled demolitions and was thus deliberately "designed for" as an add-on gimmick to the special controlled demolition.
1, 2 and 3 are correct.
There is no way to know if the ejection of framework sections laterally at speeds up to 70 mph was undesired. I don't think the perpetrators cared. They were relying on shock and awe. The ejections were a result of massive explosions. It would be impossible for something falling down to tear loose and eject multi-ton sections of framework sideways at 70 mph. And to suggest that it was a gimmick is silly.
 
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The ejections were a result of massive explosions. It would be impossible for something falling down to tear loose and eject multi-ton sections of framework sideways at 70 mph. And to suggest that it was a gimmick is silly.
It's fascinating that you're going along with this AE911 line, and thinking this is obvious and absolutely true.

Do you actually think it's blindingly obvious, or is some scientific explanation needed?
 
-- are the "architects and engineers" verified to be architects an engineers? or are they "Internet engineers" that would turn out not to be engineers if checked?

-- comparing a petition from this group that formed around a multi-year effort to a petition from the general public that may have only ran publicity for a few weeks/months is apples to oranges. Are there special interest petitions that this is comparable to?

-- to support an organization, you don't have to convince everyone; you just need to find the people who are convincible. Compare to email scammers: their mails are unconvincing to most of us, but those who respond to them are the kind of suckers who might be made to give their money to the scammer. While I don't know that AE911 is trying to scam anyone, like all conspiracy theorists, they certainly would profit from having the support of people for whom critical thinking is hard and who enjoy seeing themselves as opposition to authority. The "meme"-type graphics work well to that end.
 
-- are the "architects and engineers" verified to be architects an engineers? or are they "Internet engineers" that would turn out not to be engineers if checked?

Or the wrong kind of engineer. I know lots of engineers. You ask them "are you an engineer?" and they say "yes." They are factually correct and can you show you their certifications.

They are electrical engineers, process engineers, and chemical engineers.
 
Or the wrong kind of engineer. I know lots of engineers. You ask them "are you an engineer?" and they say "yes." They are factually correct and can you show you their certifications.

They are electrical engineers, process engineers, and chemical engineers.

If even that.
 
-- are the "architects and engineers" verified to be architects an engineers? or are they "Internet engineers" that would turn out not to be engineers if checked?
I know that as of 2012ish, AE911Truth made a decent effort to check those who sign the petition as architects or engineers, by calling or mailing them and asking for copies of their college diploma and/or licenses. I did submit an online signature once as an engineer back then, and after a few days got an email asking me to scan or photograph my diploma. I responded, truthfully, that I was merely testing their verification process, and their response was that no feelings were hurt. At no time was my signature listed on their site, they only show up after verification.

I had for a while made an effort to check at least the "Professional Engineers" - those who have a license from at least one US state to practice their branch of engineering there - and found that the vast majority (95% or so) were legit, were what they claimed to be. There were a handful of exceptions where someone had a license that a non-professional might confuse for being an engineering license, but perhaps had to do with patents or something. There were about three individually who were listed twice (with different profiles) - those were corrected a while I after I wrote them an email.
The only thing one could have an issue with is that they allow professionals who are retired or changed careers and are no longer licensed, or never practiced architecture or engineering after finishing a college degree (Bachelor's or better) in either. But they do apply objective criteria, and apply them consistently.

I have no reason to think things have changed fundamentally since then. They still have an active Verification Team that continues to validate A&E. The most current team leader was (I assume still is) Xander Arena. Here is an interview with him on AE's own web radio show:
Source: https://soundcloud.com/user-989685163/verifications-team-leader-xander-arena


-- comparing a petition from this group that formed around a multi-year effort to a petition from the general public that may have only ran publicity for a few weeks/months is apples to oranges.
Indeed. The petition is more than 13 years old. They never followed up on whether signatories changed their minds in the intervening years - or died.
And 13 years is a very long time: The petition has been online for 4875 days (or a bit more). In that time, they averaged under 0.7 signatures per day from architects and engineers. In all these years, there was only one (2009/10) where they had more than 1 signature per day. So this has never really gone viral, it has never interested the professional communities. Gage has been toiling tirelessly to pick up the converts one by one.

-- to support an organization, you don't have to convince everyone; you just need to find the people who are convincible. Compare to email scammers: their mails are unconvincing to most of us, but those who respond to them are the kind of suckers who might be made to give their money to the scammer. While I don't know that AE911 is trying to scam anyone, like all conspiracy theorists, they certainly would profit from having the support of people for whom critical thinking is hard and who enjoy seeing themselves as opposition to authority. The "meme"-type graphics work well to that end.
The prevalence of some mental disorders is higher than the percentage of licensed engineers who signed up. Of you can find fools among supposedly well-qualified professionals. You find physicians who believe in this or that quackery. You find biologists who deny speciation by evolution. I once talked to an American graduate student with a BA in political sciences who swore that he voted for President/Vice President directly and denied that his vote actually went towards a slate of electors in the Electoral Collage.
 
I had for a while made an effort to check at least the "Professional Engineers" - those who have a license from at least one US state to practice their branch of engineering there - and found that the vast majority (95% or so) were legit, were what they claimed to be.
Thank you for correcting me!
 
Or the wrong kind of engineer. I know lots of engineers. You ask them "are you an engineer?" and they say "yes." They are factually correct and can you show you their certifications.

They are electrical engineers, process engineers, and chemical engineers.
Remember also that the primary test of any assertion is "Is the assertion true?" The qualification of the person making the assertion is secondary. As is the type of sub-specialty. As is the academic level of the qualification.

A false assertion by any person does not become true by magic because the person claims professinal status or has multiple post graduate degrees. And a true statment by a lay person is true despite the lack of "qualification".
 
It should be noted... that the vast percentage of the professionals who have signed AE911T's petition have done no study of the building or the collapse and are not INTERESTED in this. In a sense their "behavior" (signing the petition) is not more informed than the lay persons who have signed... after watching Loose Change or one of Gage's dog and pony shows.
 
Remember also that the Petition is quite "soft" - deliberately made easy to sign.


To the Members of the House of Representatives and of the Senate of the United States of America,
PLEASE TAKE NOTICE THAT:
On Behalf of the People of the United States of America, the undersigned Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth and affiliates hereby petition for, and demand, a truly independent investigation with subpoena power in order to uncover the full truth surrounding the events of 9/11/01 - specifically the collapses of the World Trade Center Towers and Building 7. We believe there is sufficient doubt about the official story and therefore the 9/11 investigation must be re-opened and must include a full inquiry into the possible use of explosives that might have been the actual cause of the destruction of the World Trade Center Twin Towers and Building 7.

Content from External Source
Many of us could probably have signed it back "in the day" when we did not understand the events. Especially the physics of WTC collapses which is AE911's main topic.
 
Remember also that the Petition is quite "soft" - deliberately made easy to sign.


To the Members of the House of Representatives and of the Senate of the United States of America,
PLEASE TAKE NOTICE THAT:
On Behalf of the People of the United States of America, the undersigned Architects and Engineers for 9/11 Truth and affiliates hereby petition for, and demand, a truly independent investigation with subpoena power in order to uncover the full truth surrounding the events of 9/11/01 - specifically the collapses of the World Trade Center Towers and Building 7. We believe there is sufficient doubt about the official story and therefore the 9/11 investigation must be re-opened and must include a full inquiry into the possible use of explosives that might have been the actual cause of the destruction of the World Trade Center Twin Towers and Building 7.

Content from External Source
Many of us could probably have signed it back "in the day" when we did not understand the events. Especially the physics of WTC collapses which is AE911's main topic.
I base my comment from my close contact with AE back in Fall - Winter 2009 when I asked Gage for the group to reach out the the engineers and do a building performance study and FEA. He flat out refused. That was a signal loud and clear that AE was a marketing operation to raise money to sustain Gage... in a "ego massaging" job.
 
I base my comment from my close contact with AE back in Fall - Winter 2009 when I asked Gage for the group to reach out the the engineers and do a building performance study and FEA. He flat out refused. That was a signal loud and clear that AE was a marketing operation to raise money to sustain Gage... in a "ego massaging" job.
Agreed and your unique experience appreciated Jeffrey.
 
Many years ago, AE would report on Gage's presentations and publish the number of attendees and the pre- and post-presentation poll results, where by show of hands he inquired whether attendees believed there were intentional demolitions. Typically, the overwhelming majority (like 90%) already was convinced before, a handful undecided, few individuals thought fire and gravity did it. After the presentation, the unconvinced would mostly have switched to the "yes" crowd.
Small wonder, given that even previously undecided folks would not be representative of the vast majority of people; that they got fed wholly one-sided information; and that they faced tremendous peer pressure from the majority of Truthers in attendance.
Small wonder: this goes both ways and is even more applicable in the global forum of public opinion - would-be truthers face tremendously greater peer pressure to conform to the official story.
 
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Small wonder: this goes both ways and is even more applicable in the global forum of public opinion - would-be truthers face tremendously greater peer pressure to conform to the official story.
True but beware of an implied equality of "balance". The "global forum" is not mostly those pre-set to pro conspiracy belief. The sub-set of "would be truthers" historically included those who were genuinely ignorant and seeking to learn and those whose motivation was driven more by conspiracy obsession bias. The understanding of the technical issues which are the main focus of truth movement concern has progressed - the number of "genuinely ignorant but seeking to learn" is these days far less than it was in (say) the historical era of 2006-2010.

Remember that the main focus is on technical claims - most prominently the AE911 strategy which is based on claims for CD at WTC. In 2006 few persons understood the WTC collapse physics in lay person understandable terms. Most active members of both the emerging and polarising "two sides" did not understand the physics. 2010 was near enough the time when correct and lay person understandable explanations were presented into active debate. Increasingly since about that time it has become not viable to honestly claim there was CD at WTC. et simile for the other main echncal claims affecting Pentagon (variants of "no planes") and Shanksville ("shoot down" and related claims)

More recently - since about 2015 - the emphasis of much on-line discussion has switched to repetitive trolling of claims which are now well known to be false and have been conprehensively explained.

And - sadly IMO - you are correct - that anyone coming new to the debate and who has genuine concerns to be resolved - will have a hard time getting heard. Many active "debunkers" these days will take immediate "pre-emptive attack" action including ridicule and insult against any would be "genuine" truthers. The standard of debate very low and strongly polarised. This forum one exception but still a hard place for total newbies to start. Most will gravitate to FaceBook which is very much hostile territory and polarised into two camps.
 
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Small wonder: this goes both ways and is even more applicable in the global forum of public opinion - would-be truthers face tremendously greater peer pressure to conform to the official story.
Can you direct me please to this global forum? Where are the mechanics of 9/11 still debated, outside the small echo bubbles that are 9/11 Truth (on social media groups, obscure blogs, YT) and the even smaller bubbles of 9/11 Debunking (Metabunk, smaller social media groups, more obscure blogs)?

As Truthers do not tire to applaud and link and praise, all sorts of traditional media, whether mainstream or alternative, frequently carry stories from the 9/11 fringe. Mainstream media articles touching upon 9/11 events are frequently dominated by Truthers, as the "global forum of public opinion" frankly doesn't give a damn.

What I see is that the relevant professions and academic communities have worked out widely accepted consensus on what happened, and what didn't happen - many years ago - and simply and successfully work from there.
Yes, the scientific consensus is being taught in schools and universities where applicable.
9/11 Truth does not really happen there - too little and too obvious a fringe to make an impression.
 
...
Yes, the scientific consensus is being taught in schools and universities where applicable.
9/11 Truth does not really happen there - too little and too obvious a fringe to make an impression.
Sorry for dragging up another old thread (I'm new and catching up), but this comment begs the questions: does anyone know if Hulsey is actively teaching 9/11 "Truth" at UAF now? Has UAF gone to any length to distance themselves from his "analysis"? Is Hulsey even in a teaching role there?

I only recently learned of the Hulsey report when a truther tried to use it as objective proof of CD in WTC7. I was unfamiliar with it but I eagerly read it, and didn't get very far before realizing what a worthless piece of research it actually was. By page 5, he was dismissing Weidlinger's analysis off hand, because office fires reaching 750C was "extraordinary" in his eyes. As a fire protection engineer, I found this to be an absurd statement. Flashover occurs at around 600C and is usually reached on the scale of (single digit) minutes in an unchecked fire... the fires in WTC7 burned for what, 4 hours plus? Hell, a good campfire can hit 900-ish C!

I live in the Philadelphia metropolitan area and am VERY familiar with One Meridian, and have seen the pictures of severely sagging steel (in a building that was built much more robustly than WTC7 [still with many shortcomings in hindsight, of course]) as a direct result of an "ordinary office fire".

But, I digress. The point here is the "dumbing down of AE911T", and my question is: is UAF actively dumbing down their student structural engineers that will theoretically go on to hold positions of great responsibility? One of his research assistants is now employed by the state of South Carolina as a bridge engineer, for example.

I know it's hard to remove an established professor in academia, but how influential is he in their structural engineering program? It's somewhat alarming.
 
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED that the University of Alaska Fairbanks, in further recognition of the invaluable services rendered by Dr. Hulsey and as evidence of the University’s desire that his identification with the University be maintained, hereby confers upon Dr. J. Leroy Hulsey the title of Professor of Structural Engineering, Emeritus; and
Ooof... I guess that answers my question (in no uncertain terms) about whether or not they are distancing themselves from his work.
 
I live in the Philadelphia metropolitan area and am VERY familiar with One Meridian, and have seen the pictures of severely sagging steel (in a building that was built much more robustly than WTC7 [still with many shortcomings in hindsight, of course]) as a direct result of an "ordinary office fire".
This would need to be a different thread, but I'm very interested to hear in what sense One Meridian was "built much more robustly" than WTC7.
 
I know it's hard to remove an established professor in academia, but how influential is he in their structural engineering program? It's somewhat alarming.
If there's anything alarmingly wrong with the Hulsey report, I would expect his peers in the engineering community to publish a critique in a major journal. It's not like these are views he's been developing in secret. I've looked at quite a bit of the scientific literature on the WTC and the range of opinion is quite wide without, it seems, "alarming" anyone in the profession.
Well, he was made Professor Emeritus in May 2020, which (in the US) usually indicates they have retired in good standing.
Hulsey is probably wrong about a lot of things, but I'm sure he deserves his good standing, all things considered. He just did something a little kooky near the end of his career. Given that NIST discovered what Shyam Sunder described as "a new kind of progressive collapse", it wouldn't be suprising for there to be disagreements about it going forward. Where there's disagreement, someone must be wrong. That doesn't make them incompetent or dangerous. It just makes them "academic".
 
Seems like Hulsey was a "hired hit man"... His work was a conclusion in search of a "rationale"... not to mention he set out to prove a negative... fires can't destroy steel high rise structures. But of course they can and why engineers and building departments have adopted "fire codes" related to steel frames and the entire building sprinkler industry to provide that protection.
 
If there's anything alarmingly wrong with the Hulsey report, I would expect his peers in the engineering community to publish a critique in a major journal.
I'd only expect that to happen if the report itself was published in a reputable journal. Was it?
 
I'd only expect that to happen if the report itself was published in a reputable journal. Was it?
You hit the nail on the head. If his work merited the attention of the engineering community he would have published (if he could) in a (reputable) engineering journal. He did not. And it's like because he was hired for his "credentials" to lend credibility to the AE911T wrong headed notion that steel buildings don't collapse from fire.... ergo (in their world) the collapse was a controlled demolition by "bad guys" (deep state et al)
 
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