The Science Forum

kojax wrote: We all remember Iran Contra. How many conspirators did it take to move missiles to Iran, and guns to the Contras in Columbia?

you're quoting things that went public, something that never seems to happen to claimed conspiracies

marnixR wrote:

kojax wrote: We all remember Iran Contra. How many conspirators did it take to move missiles to Iran, and guns to the Contras in Columbia?

you're quoting things that went public, something that never seems to happen to claimed conspiracies

The classic hindsight vs. foresight argument. Why is it unlikely that other similar scandals have been conducted successfully, absent public knowledge? Were the Iran Contra conspirators guaranteed to fail because of something?

All I was citing it for was to point out that military hardware can disappear without anyone noticing. Iran Contra was a matter of missiles going missing and nobody noticing. All I'm suggesting for 911 is that someone in Rumsfeld's position could procure some nano-thermite ordinance. Which do you think is harder to make disappear?

The problem with big conspiracies, about big topics, is that "too big to fail" kicks in. We collectively can't afford the outcome of letting it come to light.

You see it on the small scale all the time in religious communities, when some guy who's a "pillar of the community" decides to molest his daughter. The truth is so awful, and would tear the community so far apart, that she's unlikely to be believed, certainly unlikely to retain her reputation, if she comes forward, so all too often such people suffer in silence. Maybe come back ten years later after they've established a life elsewhere and tell their stories.

How much does it take for people to understand that the large scale and the small scale aren't really that much different?

the problem with big conspiracies is the inordinate amount of control that would be required to keep everything tightly under wraps, control that in everyday life just isn't there

Certainly the mind knows what the left and right hand are both doing, as it has told them what to do. But neither the left or right hand knows what the other does.

marnixR wrote:the problem with big conspiracies is the inordinate amount of control that would be required to keep everything tightly under wraps, control that in everyday life just isn't there

How is that? What control? How does a thing like 911 require more control than running a drug cartel? (Something which we know happens quite a lot.) People keep building this up like it's so much harder to do than it is.

You think it takes effort to convince your co conspirators not to come forward, admit to treason and spend the rest of their lives in prison? I'll tell you what takes control: convincing 19 people to commit suicide all on the same day at the same time. That's takes control. Convincing them to save their own necks is comparatively a lot easier.

His point becomes a lot more clear when considered in context of global warming. If that is really a "big conspiracy" like so many claim, then it does require an inordinate amount of control (control which isn't there) to keep things under wraps. The rest is just orders of magnitude. Nobody is saying it's impossible. The point is that it's unlikely.

So our options are "big conspiracy" and "Al Qaeda"? No third option for a small conspiracy?

You're willing to believe 19 people could pull this off by killing themselves, but you're not willing to believe a similarly small number of people could pull this off as a false flag op, without all the suicide? You know Mossad has fanatics too.

I don't know about the authenticity of the assertions, but there is also PNAC, Operation Northwoods, and alleged tie's between Al Qaeda and the CIA.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charlie_Wilson_(Texas_politician)

Hmm, some more Wiki stuff;
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PNAC
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Northwoods

I figured that things like PNAC, and Operation Northwoods were probably just conjecture. But here they are, written up in Wiki, with citations and references.

kojax wrote:... but you're not willing to believe a similarly small number of people could pull this off as a false flag op, without all the suicide?

i'm not saying that's unlikely - what i'm saying is that some evidence would have been uncovered by someone over the last 10 years if that had been the case
after all, a drug cartel is not totally leak-proof, and information does become publicly available over time