on logic and reasonable evidence

dr. elsewhere here

Ok, I did not ask to get involved in this little flurry of fury, but I am insinuating myself into the fray to make a point, a point I think is exceedingly important.

First, the caveat. Of course, I have to acknowledge that I do have something of a relationship with Joe, and have developed a personal affection for him in addition to an immense amount of respect. What can I tell you? He is just a really good guy. That may be interpreted as bias, but so be it; many of you have made it abundantly clear that you also have such an affection in addition to your respect and admiration for him, so we are not so different. However, please know that Joe and I have never met, and what relationship we have developed during this relatively short time of working together has been completely electronic.

That being said, I’m going to pull the professional card here in order to address some flamingly obvious misconceptions flying around out there about what counts for logic and what counts for reasonable evidence. Some of you may not even attempt to understand what I am about to say; hell, some of you may not read this because you’ve already decided that not only is any argument against the 9/11 Truth Movement automatically suspect, but anything claiming to be professional is automatically suspect. Unless, of course, it supports the claims of said movement.
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If that last statement applies to you, you are the very individuals who need to be reading what I am about to share, and read it with as much of an open mind as you can muster, because you are failing yourselves more than anyone by putting up walls against the very idea of changing your mind. It’s that open mind part that is utterly, absolutely crucial, not just in reading my drivel, but in every matter discussed here, or any matter at all, for that matter.

Consider the personae you are creating of and for yourself with an attitude of absolutism that risks arrogance and ultimately, ignorance. Several characters come to mind with this personae, such as Cheney, Bush, Condi, Rummy, Rove, the whole lot of ‘em. They have made up their minds and will not be swayed from their agenda. Their rigidity is no different, no worse and no better, than someone who has made up their mind that every datapoint in the 9/11 case must support a governmental conspiracy. Well, of course, they’re worse because their rigidity has killed thousands of people, and continues to do so. But it is their rigidity that justifies, in their eyes, their actions and the consequences of them.

The point I’m trying to make here is simply that all of us must be extremely careful to avoid contracting the very disease we rail against if we do not at least attempt some prophylactics in the form of respect for logic and reasonable evidence.

I am speaking here as a trained scientist. In training to do science, one learns what counts as reasonable evidence. One cannot prove the existence of unicorns based on the fact that their child drew one they claimed to have seen. One must actually see the unicorn.

No one can actually see many things researched in science, such as depression or quarks or black holes or intelligence, but we can see reasonable evidence of it. I am not going to sit here and try to make the case that science has in every way every day done the right or the appropriate thing with regard to research; far from that. But – and this is key – built into the very process is the capacity to correct for those mistakes. This capacity must be accepted as fundamental to the very pursuit of science, and that is the willingness to first accept that no evidence proves any hypothesis (we only deal in likelihoods, knowing that something can always be proven wrong; otherwise, it’s just tautology, which is most uninteresting), and second to accept evidence that refutes one’s hypothesis.

If these two priorities are not accepted, you are not doing science. Nor, I would submit, are you a true liberal. Here’s why.

This process is not limited to science. It has a very lengthy history. It existed and was demonstrated as a valued approach to decision making long before the scientific method was ever introduced formally. This process is logic, and the most pervasive ways we have seen it work are in philosophy (All men are mortal, Socrates is a man, therefore Socrates is mortal.), but the other, more accessible one, is in the law.

What counts as evidence and what counts as reasonable evidence have been nurtured for millennia in the courts. And the evolution of this process is precisely what led to the development of a sense of democracy, where a court could not adjust logic or ignore evidence depending on the wealth or position of a defendant.

Those of you who would dismiss evidence counter to your bias against this very undemocratic government are actually joining their ranks, precisely because you are committing their same crime.

What Joe is appealing to here, and now what I am appealing to here, is simply that we keep our heads about us, that we not throw out the baby with the bath water, that we actually consider that the truth is in these, as in all matters, of the utmost importance. Who would it serve were we to convict these criminal leaders for arranging an attack on the US, if the real truth is that it was orchestrated not by Cheney and his US hegemonists but by international bankers or drug lords? If we insist on our hypothesis of US government control of the 9/11 crimes, then we have left the real criminals to their wily devices and agendas, which are likely even more dreadful than what we fear from Bush et al.

I’m not suggesting that this scenario is my position at all; that point is only made to draw attention to one danger that emerges from a biased review of the evidence. Another danger is that innocent people get erroneously charged. Not to say that this criminal cabal is innocent, but there are so very many other, real crimes we can charge them with, we don’t need to charge them with planning 9/11; their heinous negligence is quite enough, on top of their insistence on secrecy. Unless, or course, you can build an air-tight case based on logic and reasonable evidence.

Just as a brief aside, this has been my take for a good while. Lots of agendas were met by the tragedy of 9/11, from the individual level of those folks who sold their United stocks short, to the ideological level of radical Islamist jihad. It also met the agenda of PNAC, but this fact does not mean they orchestrated it. My inheritance of a small sum served my agenda to purchase a new car, but that does not mean I caused my mother’s death. Ultimately, my feeling – and it is not unique to me (thanks to my pal, SB) – about 9/11 is that this particular Keystone Kabal most certainly could NOT have orchestrated it; it went way too smoothly. If watching these mobsters as long as we have has taught us anything in addition to their unparalleled evil intent is that everything they touch just goes to hell in a handbasket. They are the exact opposite of Midas. This does not rule out some sort of conspiracy, and certainly suggests a conspiracy to cloak their incompetence in secrecy and cover-up. That is just way easy for me to buy.

And shifting from sinister intent to sinister incompetence/cover-up does not diminish the tragedy or our need to discover the truth. But it should temper our pursuit of that truth to some degree.

The upshot of my own harangue here is merely to suggest that those of you who feel strongly about this 9/11 story, please consider every piece of evidence as if you were in a medical lab or in a court of law; then consider it again as if you were the patient or defendant in the hot seat. How strong is this evidence? Can you explain this datapoint in another way (that one is quite key, and rarely considered)? Is there conflicting evidence? How coherent is the overall story, including all these details that have accrued? Are you willing to drop evidence that does not hold up, or are you finding you’re more interested in the sensationalism (replete with fluttering tummy and tittering heartbeats) of it? Would your presentation of the case hold up in court or in a laboratory? Can you forget about how your presentation gets others all sucked in with ooh’s and aah’s, and instead go for the reasoned, albeit plodding, debate? Who might get hurt if you’re sloppy or self-serving or just too sensational in your thinking? And who might get away?

That’s my schtick. If this makes sense to you – and I know that it does to virtually all of you out there ‘cause it shows in your reasoned comments – then sorry to have bothered you and please forgive if this seems condescending. If it does not, then I honestly do not know what else to say, except that you will likely not find what you are looking for on this blog, nor will you likely find your input terribly welcome. So, kindly, ask yourself just why you would bother to come ‘round, if you please. I suppose I should direct this question toward anon601 who commented to my previous post on vote integrity that we had “caved” on 9/11 and now were trying to promote voting as the solution to our problems. He then bid us “buh bye,” which is perfect. Thanks for leaving, as we really would like to elevate the discourse here beyond battles between what Joe so astutely called “gonzo epistemologies.”

Joe only mentioned this problem in passing on to his specific points about the 9/11 Truthiness Movement. However, after reading all the comments, some of them (anon601, for instance) suggested to me that his points on this matter were not always understood, so I thought I’d drive them home. Also not meaning to insult Joe by jumping into his battle, but this problem – the inability to discern logical and reasonable evidence in the face of impassioned ideology – this is actually the biggest and deadliest problem we face. Make no mistake about that.

Over the weekend I will revisit this problem in my review of John Dean’s new book, and where his arguments took me.

Till then, huge kudos to Joe for exposing yet again his remarkable skills in discerning logical and reasonable evidence, as well as for presenting them with such ease and skill, and for caring enough to do this for all of us. What a treasure.