2+2=5

Any explanation for the collapses of the World Trade Center Twin Towers seems to necessarily involve a complex interaction of events, the evaluation of these intracacies best being left to the expertise of physicists and engineers. When all is said and done, we must respect their judgement on the subject because after all who are we, as laypersons, to question the conclusions derived by these learned professionals.

The title of this blog is 2+2=5, which you all recognize as a very basic mathematical statement. Is it a true statement? I possess a degree in mathematics, and I contend that it is. For those of you who do not possess advanced degrees in mathematics, I ask you—Who are you to challenge my assertion?

Well, I hope you simply would respond to me along these lines: "Because 2+2=4 is such a basic mathematical fact that one doesn't need advanced study to understand this simple concept, and so it is easy to refute your absurd 2+2=5 statement."

And you would be perfectly justified in your response. Now let's take this a step further. If I develop an intricate, mathematically-complex theory that has as its very foundation the statement 2+2=5, then you would be justified in discounting my entire theory, regardless of if you are qualified or not to understand all the subtleties therein, because it is based upon a simple assumption that anyone who is willing to exercise any type of critical thinking can identify as blatantly false.

The gravitational collapse theory—the official theory—claims that damage to the Towers from the airplane collisions and subsequent fires began a gravity-only powered collapse which then proceeded to rapidly demolish each Tower. But what if the complex gravitational collapse theory, with all its interacting variables involving fireproofing, jet fuel, impact damage, fire temperatures, weakened steel, truss-pulling, etc.—what if all that sound and fury is completely irrelevant because it is based on a simple, false assumption that is akin to the absurdity of 2+2=5?

I ask you to consider the following thought experiment:

A 30-story building hangs suspended from a crane so that the bottom of the building is 10 feet directly above a 80-story building. Right next to this first 30-story building is another identical 30-story building suspended from another crane at an identical height above the ground, but with no building underneath it. All three buildings are of identical construction. Both cranes let go of their respective 30-story buildings at the same time. Which one hits the ground first?

Does anyone really, honestly, and truly believe that both of these 30-story buildings will reach the ground at the same time, or even close to the same time? I have yet to find anyone who doesn't believe that it is obvious that the building falling without obstruction will reach the ground way before the other, that is, if they even believe that the other will even reach the ground at all.

So this is our 2+2=4 statement: Buildings fall faster through the atmosphere than they do when they have to burrow their way through another building. Beyond common sense, there are at least a couple of very basic physics equations that define the laws of conservation of energy and conservation of momentum that can be used to back this statement up. These basic physical laws are immutable. We can have great confidence that our 2+2=4 statement is quite solid.

But wait. The NIST report, which provides the basis for the official gravitational collapse theory, states that the towers took 11 and 9 seconds to fall. Freefall speed in a vacuum (no atmosphere to push out of the way) for buildings the height of the Twin Towers is 9.2 seconds. How does NIST explain this unabashed contradiction to our 2+2=4 statement from the previous paragraph?

From the NIST website (http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/factsheets/faqs_8_2006.htm):

6. How could the WTC towers collapse in only 11 seconds (WTC 1) and 9 seconds (WTC 2)—speeds that approximate that of a ball dropped from similar height in a vacuum (with no air resistance)?

NIST estimated the elapsed times for the first exterior panels to strike the ground after the collapse initiated in each of the towers to be approximately 11 seconds for WTC 1 and approximately 9 seconds for WTC 2. These elapsed times were based on: (1) precise timing of the initiation of collapse from video evidence, and (2) ground motion (seismic) signals recorded at Palisades, N.Y., that also were precisely time-calibrated for wave transmission times from lower Manhattan (see NCSTAR 1-5A).

As documented in Section 6.14.4 of NIST NCSTAR 1, these collapse times show that:

“… the structure below the level of collapse initiation offered minimal resistance to the falling building mass at and above the impact zone. The potential energy released by the downward movement of the large building mass far exceeded the capacity of the intact structure below to absorb that energy through energy of deformation.

Since the stories below the level of collapse initiation provided little resistance to the tremendous energy released by the falling building mass, the building section above came down essentially in free fall, as seen in videos. As the stories below sequentially failed, the falling mass increased, further increasing the demand on the floors below, which were unable to arrest the moving mass.”

In other words, the momentum (which equals mass times velocity) of the 12 to 28 stories (WTC 1 and WTC 2, respectively) falling on the supporting structure below (which was designed to support only the static weight of the floors above and not any dynamic effects due to the downward momentum) so greatly exceeded the strength capacity of the structure below that it (the structure below) was unable to stop or even to slow the falling mass. The downward momentum felt by each successive lower floor was even larger due to the increasing mass.

All that language is just a heavy coating of bright red lipstick on a very ugly pig, and that pig is saying that 2+2=5. The pig exclaims Buildings do not fall faster through the atmosphere than they do when they have to burrow their way through another building. All gravitational collapse theory is based upon this flawed premise. Forget about all the details involving damage, fire, and all the rest. Doesn't matter. Why? Because gravity alone could not have possibly been the sole source of energy fueling the observed collapses after they initiated.

NIST has stated above quite clearly that they believe that buildings fall at the same speed regardless of if they are falling through air or are burrowing their way through another building. NIST has stated quite clearly that they believe that pulverizing 90,000 tons of concrete and shattering thousands of steel beams requires roughly the same energy expenditure as moving air molecules out of the way. Do you believe 2+2=5 just because NIST says so?

To further illustrate our thought experiment, consider the fact that after the 10-foot freefall through the atmosphere before the 30-story building meets the 80-story building below it, it has acquired a velocity of 18 or 19 miles per hour. It seems more accurate to describe the collision between these two buildings as one bumping, rather than smashing, into another. Yet according to NIST and the GC theory, this less-than-20mph headstart turns the 30-story building into an indestructible, piledriving sledgehammer that cannot even be slowed by the now suddenly brittle, fragile, nay—inconsequential mirage—that used to be an intact 80-story building below it.

All you have to do is refuse to believe the blatantly false ideas that form the keystone of the official collapse theory and it completely falls apart. Repeat after me: 2+2 does not equal 5. Ever.

Isn't that beautifully simple?

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As for the diehards who persist in believing NIST's ideas about intact building floors being unable to provide the slightest resistance to floors falling from above, I have bad news for you. Even granted this impossible assumption, the gravitational collapse theory still fails to stand up to scrutiny.

Imagine a ceramic tile laying on a concrete floor, and a large concrete block being dropped on the tile. Imagine the tile is crushed, with dust and small pieces flying out in all directions. This occurs because the concrete floor provides resistance from below the tile as the falling block provides the force from above. The flying ceramic rubble has no choice but to take trajectories more or less parallel to the force of gravity.

Now imagine a tower built of ceramic tiles with the bare minimum of support between "floors". The concrete block is dropped on the tower. What happens?

clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack-clack

The tiles are swept along by the falling block through its near-resistanceless downward path. Without any resistance from below, there can be no crushing and spraying outward of the ceramic tiles. Why am I interested in crushing and spraying? Because observations of the Towers' collapses show concrete being pulverized and ejected outward from the very earliest stages of the collapses. If you doubt the veracity of this statement, then check out this link: http://911research.wtc7.net/wtc/evidence/videos/index.html

A freefall-speed collapse requires no resistance from below, while the pulverizing and ejecting of materials requires firm resistance from below. The gravitational collapse theory requires both of these mutually-exclusive conditions to occur simultaneously. This is a physical impossibility, therefore the gravitational collapse theory, even granted the possibility of resistanceless collapse (a physical impossibility), must be false. Q.E.D.

How many more nails would you like to drive into this coffin?

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I have an interesting newspaper clipping in front of me as I type this. Four photos of the Trojan Nuclear Power Plant being demolished by controlled demolition. The caption states that the 499-foot cooling tower was brought down by 2,800 pounds of explosives.

The caption also states that the structure took 10 seconds to collapse.

Excuse me, NIST? Why did a building that was approximately 36.5% the height of the WTC2 take longer than WTC2 to collapse, even though it had the help of 2,800 pounds of explosives? Where was the expected freefall collapse speed? I'm confused.

Excuse me, NIST? It's me again. Why do people pay a small, elite group of demolition companies large amounts of money to professionally demolish buildings when all one has to do is blow out one floor and the building is guaranteed to collapse straight down on itself at freefall speed, according to your laws of physics? Why do these demolition companies pretend to study the blueprints of these buildings for months, and then place explosives in locations that supposedly are strategic in assuring the controlled collapse of those buildings? What a scam! I think the Better Business Bureau needs to get involved, don't you?

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Critical thinking is the examination and test of propositions of any kind which are offered for acceptance, in order to find out whether they correspond to reality or not. The critical faculty is a product of education and training. It is a mental habit and power. It is a prime condition of human welfare that men and women should be trained in it. It is our only guarantee against delusion, deception, superstition, and misapprehension of ourselves and our earthly circumstances.
—William Graham Sumner

If you have gotten this far, you probably have engaged in at least some critical thinking on this subject. Congratulations—you are in the minority. Somehow we as a people have lost, or perhaps we never had, the confidence to trust our cognitive processes and follow them through to their logical conclusions. We look to other people to tell us how the world is, and how we should behave and think within that world. Eventually, it appears that those who tell us things can tell us anything, and we will go along with it.

Does what they say make sense?

No, but the alternative is ... [stopthink] ... Well, never mind, of course they're right.

Fear is the mind-killer.

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Finally, if you don't recognize that 2+2=5 is a literary reference (as well as stopthink), they are both from George Orwell's book, 1984. This book is reportedly a work of fiction.

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I read your whole post...... and I missed the part about the Space Beams and also there was no reference to Chaos??

=)

2+2=3 also necromancy

2+2=3 also

necromancy

Fantastic blog -- I think it needed a catchier title.

I overlooked this completely until tonight and this is a great exposition of something I've been trying to get some people to grasp -- those who think "physical evidence" arguments are always going to go in circles because they can be "easily debunked" by people with more (apparent) expertise.

But remember, the Trojan tower wasn't hit by a plane! So it's not a valid comparison! ...snort...

Good post, could use more work

As someone with a math degree, I got a little distracted at first thinking how we know that 2+2=4, and going back the the Peano Axioms. I was not aware of the George Orwell reference.

Anyway, I like the description of two cranes dropping two buildings, one in the air and one on a building. It's a concept that could be better delivered with an illustration.

(There are four lights! - Captain Picard)