User talk:WLRoss/Archive 5

CT Bazzzant

Wayne, some good work lately. Kudos.

Two questions:

1) What happened regarding this:

...I've brought up your editing on WP:AE. Please comment there. Jehochman Talk 15:09, 3 Ma

2) Is Bazant peer reviewed or not so? --Ihaveabutt (talk) 04:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Use email if you do. --Ihaveabutt (talk) 04:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

1)
I received a 1 week topic ban for "Disruptive Editing" for this edit on the grounds "Removing the (fact) tag, without adding a source is unacceptable". I requested clarification for why a ban was appropriate for a single edit and was told that it was also because this edit "indicates that you're unwilling to work within community norms". I then requested clarification of why I was banned for the above edits, both made before I was warned, contrary to the relevant WP policy which states "a ban can be imposed if, despite being warned the editor continues with the bad behaviour" but the Admin declined to answer. I point out that what the admins said was my warning was not actually one at all but I thought it pointless to argue that I was never warned.
2)
The Bazant paper was what is called a "rapid communication" and is described by it's own authors as "a simplified approximate analysis" so was not peer reviewed in the way we expect. The peer review was apparently limited to the mathematics Bazant used. The paper has been updated four times since it's publication (some of the conclusions were contradicted by NISTs findings). Here you will find a peer reviewed critique of Bazants modeling and analysis that you will often also find on conspiracy websites. Wayne (talk) 09:22, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

Thanks. --Ihaveabutt (talk) 03:20, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

I guess I vaguely recall Bazant being a source for the view that scientists reject the questions raised by truth researchers (or something). It would be ironic for an author deemed an authority on such a point to have to keep revising his analyses, perhaps due to problems in them. --Ihaveabutt (talk) 03:20, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

As I said, it was a "rapid communication" that was written and submitted for publishing on September 13 (within 48 hours of 911) which is why he himself said his findings may be in error by a level of magnitude. The revisions were due to problems other engineers had with his analysis. The only way to prove Bazant's theory was to document and analyse the debris field, but unfortunately NIST relied on Bazant instead of doing all of it's own research and allowed the debris to be cleared so it remains only a theory. A big problem is that NIST explains the beginning of the collapse but does not explain how or why the collapse continued. Floors have collapsed in other buildings but this was the first time it led to total collapse so the NIST report should have concentrated on the collapse mechanism that followed from where it's report actually ended instead of ignoring it. This in no way makes CD or any other conspiracy more likely as there are other mechanisms that could have been involved but without the steel from the towers there is no way to prove or disprove any theory. The only conspiracy theory I fully agree with is the incompetency of the investigation which should and probably would have definatively excluded conspiracy theories. Wayne (talk) 19:03, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

You could actually create a computer model that simulates processes that lead to the visible evidence that we have from the videos. Especially, the trajectories of debris at the outside of the clouds, and the clouds themselves should be analysed more thoroughly. The result is very likely that only a collapse associated with an increase in volume (i.e. expansion of gases through heating and/or creation of gases by explosives) can explain this visible evidence. The temperatures measured by satellite after heavy rainfall and the composition of the dust (iron spheres) are also available for further research. The steel would be quite helpful, of course, but it's not necessary to prove that more than jet fuel must have been involved in the collapse.

As for the Bazant paper discussion, I think that Gourley was not careful enough. By attacking Bazant head on, he gave him the excuse for the "Let me explain this to the layman" answer that Bazant wrote. It would have been more helpful to take Bazant's assumptions about the material constants etc. and then show how a calculation in 3-D that explicitly models the crushed zone of the building (a large part of which is actually thrown out, but you cannot model that in 1-D) would deviate from Bazant's results. It was a bit of a lost opportunity (and the ASCE probably wouldn't have published it if they would have seen it that way.)  Cs32en  23:21, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

NIST did create that computor model. In the NIST report it says that they could not get the building to collapse using the "more extreme" scenario so "adjusted the input" until collapse occurred "to the extent that the simulations deviated from the photographic evidence and eyewitness reports" (see NIST NCSTAR 1, p. 142). Not only is this the reverse scientific method that conspiracy theorists are often accused of using but NIST has never released data on what input was "adjusted" or by how much although they did say the adjustments were not outside the range of physical possibility. I'm not actually discounting any theory as solid evidence for any is lacking but CD is low on my possibility scale so will assume NIST is largely correct as a starting point, but this is also why I push NPOV so much for the articles...I don't care what the evidence supports, it needs to be in the article. As for Gourley, if I remember correctly he admitted he could have done better but the word limit was a big problem. A lot of Bazants closure paper snows the reader with maths. His maths do work but he uses the wrong equations. For example he uses load safety parameters for a standard highrise in 1968 (1.75X design load) rather than the over engineered specs the WTC used (up to 2.8X for core columns and 5.7X for perimeter columns) which can result in significant errors (not to mention that the live load of the buildings was 75% lower than designed for). Gourley said he will reply to Bazants closure but as it would be over the peer review word limit would need to be on a 911 website. I'm not aware if he has written it yet as I don't read the conspiracy sites unless a page turns up in a search for something specific. BTW, Gourley did request the opportunity to rewrite his discussion paper after finding out Bazant had no word limit but the ASCE declined. Wayne (talk) 14:12, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

I see a preponderance of evidence pointing to the presence of materials that expanded during the collapse. The "explosive" visible evidence is the most important as there is no doubt about it's authenticity. Thank you for your further explanation on the Bazant discussion in the ASCE journal! (Bazant used questionable simplifications, Gourley didn't point them out as specifically as would have been necessary, and Bazant moved the goalposts in his reply - which is basically okay, just that he should have acknowledged the deficiencies of his initial paper, should have given 3-D or at least 2-D equations and should have used more realistic parameters.)  Cs32en  15:33, 9 July 2009 (UTC)

Ok, I see that the link goes to a Bazant paper. Is the Bazant paper the one you have in mind when you refer to a critique of Banant's modelling (he critiques himself?)? --Ihaveabutt (talk) 03:30, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

My mistake I linked to the wrong paper lol. I'll look for the correct one when I get some time. Wayne (talk) 19:03, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

Here's a link for the peer reviewed critique of Bazant (starting bottom of page 3) and Bazant's reply (top of page 5). You must keep in mind that peer reviewed Discussion papers are limited to a maximum of 2,000 words by the American Society of Civil Engineers as is the authors reply (called a Closure paper) to the discussion. This means the mathematics are usually left out to keep to the limit. However in this case Bazant was given permission to exceed the limit and wrote more than 7,000. Wayne (talk) 19:33, 8 July 2009 (UTC)

A Quest For Knowledge's Edit War

Hi,

I've reported User:A Quest For Knowledge on the edit war noticeboard. [1]

Since he repeatedly ignored your requests to use the talk page, I'd appreciate if you would add your comment.

ArXivist (talk) 02:28, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

Hello WLRoss. Regarding your comment at WP:AN3:

1. Why do you think the report was closed after only three hours? The report was filed at 01:24, 8 August 2009 (UTC) and I closed it at 14:44, 8 August 2009 (UTC), 13 hours later.
2. The first two edits by AQFK that you listed are consecutive, so they count as at most one revert.
3. The original report was submitted by an apparent sock (five days old, with great knowledge of policy), and sock filings at noticeboards are inherently dubious per WP:SOCK and per Arbcom.
4. Please consider using the article's Talk page more. EdJohnston (talk) 20:51, 8 August 2009 (UTC)

My apologies. I misread the time as 04:44, 8 August. Why does it matter that two of the edits were consecutive? I was recently blocked for 3RR when my three reverts in 24 hours were each for a different edit. Regardless of whether a sock submitted the report the fact remains that AQFK is being disruptive. The edits he is reverting are all minor and supported by the refs and additionally were originally long standing in the article (usually after much discussion) until recent work deleted them. I try to use the talk page for grey area edits but you should see how long it took and the abuse I suffered to get "WTC7 is adjacent to WTC1" replaced with "WTC7 is near WTC1". Blind freddie can see that between the two is WTC6 and a road. Can you believe the only arguement against my edit was that "by New York standards they are adjacent". For minor relevant common sense edits supported by refs I should not need to use talk. Those who oppose should do so if they feel there is a problem and I am happy to discuss it and modify the edit if needed. AQFK should have been reported to ARBCOM but I prefered he simply be told to refrain from edit warring rather than go through that and be blocked as I want no part of the games some are playing. Wayne (talk) 15:39, 9 August 2009 (UTC)

Please report me more. The more false claims we have and the more experienced admins we have addressing the situation, the better the result. As Jimbo himself has stated, Wikipedia is not a place to be promoting fringe theories. Please explain why this fringe theory is different from all the other fringe theories and why editors should be banned for agreeing with WP:RS, WP:NPOV and WP:Fringe. I look forward to your responses. A Quest For Knowledge (talk) 05:05, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Despite you having repeatedly violated 911 ARBCOM I have not reported you. What Jimbo said is irrelevant as none of my edits have promoted a fringe theory. I have no problem with WP:RS, WP:NPOV and WP:Fringe. The problem is that you refuse to explain how an edit you revert violates these. Without an explanation they are just random letters to justify a personal POV. I use RS yet still get the edit reverted. I delete WP:OR and you revert. I make an edit that debunks a conspiracy theory and you revert it. I make a simple grammatical correction and you even revert that. Worst of all you often mass revert and delete the revert text in the comments and simply state "fix". Your apparent "ownership of the page" and refusal to work with other editors to improve the article is making it difficult to assume WP:AGF on your part. The whole idea of small edits is so that it can be discussed in detail if you have a problem. The page is a mess that would be unacceptable if it were an academic paper. Wayne (talk) 13:59, 13 August 2009 (UTC)

Private email sent.

This is to let you know that a private email has been sent to you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Sphenry (talk • contribs) 16:38, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Wayne Madsen

Thanks much for your help with this article. It is much improved. / edg ☺ ☭ 17:59, 20 August 2009 (UTC)

Albert Fish

I was wondering if you could possibly please add references to the content you added to the Albert Fish article? There are some partial and full quotes with no attribution and some other facts that really could stand sourcing. Thanks. Wildhartlivie (talk) 03:21, 28 August 2009 (UTC)

Done. I did add the ref to the end of the two paragraphs in question after making the edits but have now added it to each of the direct quotes. Wayne (talk) 08:45, 29 August 2009 (UTC)

apology for deletion of your changes

i accidentally undid 3 changes of yours instead of editing one. I see that you've since caught them. But I think I am doing right by letting you know my intention. I'll watch the sloppy editing. Carry on. --Abie the Fish Peddler (talk) 23:57, 6 October 2009 (UTC)

Thank you for your honesty. As your comment only concerned one edit and was a reasonable reason for reversion I assumed you had tried to sneak the other two reverts in so I wouldn't notice. I apologise for not assuming GF. Wayne (talk) 02:20, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

3rr vio

WLRoss, it looks to me like you may have violated 3rr on Mahmoud Ahmadinejad (keeping in mind that reversions of different material each count towards a revert). Would you mind self-reverting? Thanks. IronDuke 00:17, 7 October 2009 (UTC)

If you check above you will notice an editor admitted accidentally reverting 3 consective edits I made instead of the one he/she actually intended. I reverted the reverts he/she did in error and the one intended I accepted but modified slightly for accuracy instead of restoring my original edit. The other revert I did was to correct a false wikilink. I believe none of these count as reverts for 3RR. Cheers. Wayne (talk) 02:14, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

I'm not sure you're entirely right about that, but I appreciate and accept your explanation. Cheers. IronDuke 22:44, 8 October 2009 (UTC)

New Ned Kelly Information

If you are still interested in the Ned Kelly article you might be interested in this new information: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/13/farmer-ned-kelly-skull-claim and I'll send you a private e-mail as well. grifterlake (talk) 04:16, 14 November 2009 (UTC)grifterlake (talk) 04:14, 14 November 2009 (UTC)

NIST

Can you add the specific reference to the NIST report at the AE911Truth article? (I would find some, of course, but I don't know whether I'd find the best one.) Thank you! Regards.  Cs32en  09:18, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

NIST Chapter 3.3 pages 22-23 covers their investigation of CD. NIST explained it's failure to test for evidence of CD by stating that testing for evidence of explosives would not necessarily have been conclusive. NIST did use a computor to simulate a single cutter charge which would probably make it irrelevant anyway as no one claims a single charge was used. They found that the sound of the actual collapse differed from the sound produced in the simulation. NIST also found that the CD simulation resulted in a different window breakage as was witnessed at 4:00pm on Building 7. From these and only these two points of "evidence" they concluded CD was not possible so never investigated further. An interesting aside is that if you read Controlled Demolition Inc's website (they supplied the computor simulation), it boasts that they can drop a building without blowing surrounding windows out at all as it depends on the placement of charges lol. Wayne (talk) 15:31, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

As an aside, the temperature issue is also quite interesting. NIST shows some figures of simulations in which the fire first heats up to 1.000 °C in parts of the northern side, then the fire moves to the south, heats up there, while the northern side is cooling down. The northern side did not collapse, but the southern side did (with minimal differences in simulated temperatures). At the same time, the buildings are supposed to have collapsed symmetrically due to a fire which was, according to NIST's own report, very asymmetric at the time of collapse. NIST also apparently overestimated the oxygen consumption of the fire by assuming that available oxygen would be burnt instantly (i.e. gaseous products of the fire would have to move away instantly etc.) It was a rather calm (i.e. not windy day), however, and there is no evidence of any "chimney" effect, i.e. much of the smoke is exiting the tower through the (broken) windows, which are also the entry point for the oxygen.  Cs32en  17:51, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

Some info on the "you could not see the hot fire through the black smoke" myth:

"The visible part of fire smoke consists of small soot particles whose formation is favored by the incomplete combustion associated with oxygen-depleted burning. Once formed, the soot from the tower fires was rapidly pushed away from the fires into less hot regions of the building or directly to broken windows and breaks in the building exterior. At these lower temperatures, the soot could no longer burn away. Thus, people saw the thick dark smoke characteristic of burning under oxygen-depleted conditions." (http://wtc.nist.gov/pubs/factsheets/faqs_8_2006.htm)

"in general, the size and movement of the fires in WTC 1 were limited by the supply of air from the exterior windows" (NCSTAR 1, p. 129)

  Cs32en  18:39, 2 December 2009 (UTC)

NIST's reporting of the fires confuses me. They estimated the maximum temperatures at around 250/300C with localised spots at higher temperatures (the highest temp NIST found evidence of was less than 600C) yet their simulation assumes much larger temperatures globally to explain the collapse (Quote page 125:"The near-ceiling temperatures varied between 800C and 1,100C) and the report makes no attempt to explain the contradiction. Likewise their computor model assumed for it's calculations that any steel that lost at least 10% of it's strength automatically suffered a 100% failure which is rediculous. Then you have the fact that firemen actually reached the lower impact floors of the south tower and reported a large number of survivors and only two small isolated fires. If there were survivors on the impact floors then the temperature could not have been between 800C and 1,100C as NIST implied. You don't need to believe in CD to recognise that the NIST report is rubbish and any academic that accepts it without question is incompetent to put it kindly. Unfortunately too many mental midgets edit WP to allow legitimate critism of the NIST report, you don't dare point out mistakes unless you want to get banned because these idiots assume dissent means a belief in CD. Wayne (talk) 16:37, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Hm, the lower temperatures are for the samples, and the samples are a small percentage of all steel elements. I have not heard about the 10%/100% assumption above. But NIST said that the oxygen had to reach the fire through the windows, and as the smoke also exited through the windows, so there was no or very little chimney effect. And it reported that the northern areas cooled off again, after having been heated to 1.000 °C (apparently without deformations). And of course, how could the firemen reach the areas if there were temperatures of 1.000 °C around (even with 200-300 °C, the reported lower temperature for the whole duration of the fire, it's very unlikely that they said the fires could be put out easily).  Cs32en  19:16, 3 December 2009 (UTC)

Check the published responder transcripts. Firemen reached the impact floor of the south tower (they only reached the 50th floor on the north tower) and the captain stated that he only needed two firemen with a line each to put all the fires out as they were isolated and small. The tower collapsed around 15 minutes after that call. Wayne (talk) 14:16, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

(Some references, for your convenience)

• New York Times
• Scribd, see 2:46:48

I don't recall seeing these observations covered anywhere among Wikipedia's articles. Wildbear (talk) 19:52, 5 December 2009 (UTC)

And you likely wont. Anything that contradicts the official theory is pretty much out of bounds no matter how reliably sourced. I have actually had edits reverted as POV pushing where my edits were a direct copy/paste from the NIST report itself. Most of these official theory warriors are not even familiar with what is actually in NIST apart from the conclusions. Wayne (talk) 17:06, 6 December 2009 (UTC)

The situation has already improved during the last few months. In part, this is due to some coverage that AE911Truth got from various media outlets. The problem here is that the responder transcripts are not mentioned in WP:RS in the context of "conspiracy theories", and they are considered WP:UNDUE in the September 11 attacks article. (This view may in fact be correct, but there is a lot of stuff in that article that is much more undue than that.) What would be needed would be an article "Fires in the World Trade Center towers". Alternatively, this information can be added to Rescue and recovery effort after the September 11 attacks. Don't forget that WP article do not just provide information, but provide guidance for further reading (anyone who can use google will quickly find non-official information about 9/11 on the web). It's not useful to cram articles with various bits of information, if it's not possible to put the information in the appropriate context and structure.  Cs32en  01:20, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree with what is stated above. Random bits of information are not helpful in an encyclopedia article; it needs the appropriate context and structure to be informative. There's still plenty of room for improvement, in presenting a view which is neutral, comprehensive, and informative. In general, I think that the articles, particularly the September 11 attacks article, possess a greater bias in favor of the official story than a person would gather by reading or viewing "reliable sources". Wikipedia editors have been cherrypicking content to prop up the official story, while meticulously excluding material from the same sources which illustrate problems with that story. Obvious and well-documented problems like hindrance of investigation by the Bush Administration are routinely dismissed as "conspiracy theory", even when it comes from "reliable sources". But... from a scientific standpoint, I don't think that the official story is going to withstand the test of time. Ten years from now, the typical kid's toy computer will probably have greater processing power than the computers which NIST and its subcontractors used for their finite-element analyses. There will be no excuse for not modeling the entire event sequence with great accuracy and detail, all the way to the ground; and somebody's going to do it. (I've tried myself, having acquired NIST's models of the towers and plugged one into the SAP2000 modeling program. Not surprisingly, I found that my computer isn't powerful enough to perform a practical analysis for this complex set of conditions.) Modeling only to the point of "initiation of collapse", and leaving out important parameters like the thermal conductivity of materials won't be (and shouldn't be) acceptable. And as the official story gets chewed away scientifically, Wikipedia will be compelled to document the changes, if it is to have any greater credibility than a dusty old book of religion. Wildbear (talk) 12:10, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

I agree with Wildbear's assessment of the September 11 attacks article. Most of the improvements have occured in the sub-articles and related articles. I'm not so sure whether more powerful computers will really help us. What we need to simulate what has happened is a multi-phase, finite-volume model, not a finite element model. In the end, it's about where the significant overpressure within the building (i.e. production of gases or thermal expansion of existing gases) came from, and why the concrete has been pulverized to an extent that seems very difficult to explain, even assuming the use of explosives to sever the columns.  Cs32en  20:57, 7 December 2009 (UTC)

The following is a good example of a direct quote from the NIST report being rejected because it causes problems with the official theory. This was in the article for a few days but was deleted by the usual suspects who would not even allow a modified version.

New Civil Engineer magazine criticized the data used for the NIST computer models. NIST defined three cases for each building by combining the middle, less severe, and more severe values of the influential variables. The middle and less severe were discarded after it became clear that the towers would likely remain standing. "The more severe case was used for the global analysis of each tower... To the extent that the (computer) simulations deviated from the photographic evidence and eyewitness reports. Thus, for instance… the pulling forces on the perimeter columns by the sagging floors were adjusted until collapse was achieved" (NIST, 2005, p. 142).

Heres a RS criticising the investigation and it also has an interesting interview with Richard Gage plus an article on WTC7. It then follows up with all the major high rise fires for comparison. It also makes a good point in regards to conspiracy theorists ie: To label anyone a conspiracy theorist is an ad hominem argument and has no factual value...It is amazing how often this chicanery is used to refute the cause of truth and those sincerely interested in a factual, legitimate, independent investigation of 9/11. Wayne (talk) 15:22, 8 December 2009 (UTC)

WikiBirthday

I saw from here that it's been exactly three years since you joined the project. Happy WikiBirthday! Keep up the good work, rʨanaɢ ^talk/_contribs 15:26, 3 December 2009 (UTC)