Jones Beene wrote:
Ed,
Jones, my question is, at what point do suggested events become so
implausible to be deemed impossible? At what point does an active
imagination lose contact with reality and how can this point be
identified?
Like beauty, "plausibility" is in the eye of each beholder, but please...
... do not be so naive as to think that the more-implausible and the
more-insane of the associated conspiracy theories which you and I have
been hearing with regards to 9/11 - were not themselves planted or
promoted by those whose interests involve keeping secret, one
"less-implausible" event.
In other words, how can we define sanity and identify insanity?
Yes, we can... but it is a shifting target... somewhat like defining
"pornography" ... where the late Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart
famoulsy exclaimed, "I know it when I see it" ... the so-called
Potty-test.
For a start, can we agree that invading a soverign country under false
pretenses - is itself insane, correct?
NO, absolutely NOT correct.
It's dishonest, it's self-serving, it's icky, but it's absolutely NOT
"insane" for any reasonable definition of the word. "Insanity" has to
do with a breakdown in reasoning power and a loss of grasp on reality;
it doesn't have anything to do with "honesty". (Ed Storms isn't
accusing you of being dishonest and self-serving -- rather, he's
accusing you of losing your grip, I think...)
When Hitler invaded Poland that was arguably not an "insane" act. It
could have been a major win for Germany and could have resulted in a
large expansion of Hitler's power. It could also have been a major
miscalculation but that doesn't make it "insane".
When Hitler invaded Russia it arguably _was_ an "insane" act because no
reasonable set of assumptions would lead to the conclusion that the
result could be anything but a disaster for Germany and, by extension,
for Hitler himself.
An "insane act" could, perhaps, be defined as doing something with the
expectation of achieving a result which your own knowledge combined with
ordinary logic would rule out. Playing the nickle slot machines with
the expectation of winning $1000 would be insane for anyone who
understood probabilities and who read the commonly available information
on payoff rates for small-value slots. For someone who didn't know
anything about probability theory and who hadn't read the available
information (published by the casinos themselves, IIRC) it would be
foolish but it would probably not be correct to call it "insane".
Invading Iraq may have been stupid as well as dishonest, but as far as I
can see Bush's knowledge, combined with whatever reasoning power he
could bring to bear on the problem, would not necessarily have led him
to the conclusion that the result would be a fiasco. So I wouldn't call
it "insane".
Again, miscalculation != insane.
Now that we have established that underlying fact, we can move on to
lesser instances of risk vs. rewards in governmental activity. With
this Iraq invasion as a standard for insanity,
Since there's no justification for such a standard, you've put yourself
in the classic position of
A & ^A => B
From your assumption, you should be able to prove anything you like.
one can not totally rule-out certain other activities - even if they
are to some degree - implausible.
Without such an understanding, we can never interpret another
person's claims or even the action of our government.
As sane individuals, most of us have great difficulty in discounting
enough, the level of ingrained insanity in government,
You again mistake self-serving individuals who are dishonest and who may
be stupid for lunatics. There is a large difference.
Bureaucracy isn't typically a breeding ground for lunatics. As to the
other sorts mentioned above, you may draw what conclusions you like.
In the prisoner's dilemma, the convict who rats on his friends is
self-serving and cowardly but not insane. Sane reasoning from
incomplete information frequently leads people to conclusions that are
not in anyone's long-term best interest.
issuing out of the "red-scare" and "cold-war" years - when such was
actively encouraged - and indeed promotions within the agency depended
to a degree on who was the most extreme.
Should we believe the people who claim the government has placed
thought controlling devices in their homes?
No, not unless they can produce the actual device
Bah -- this one falls on pure logic. The government's first use for a
thought control device would obviously include ruling out the
possibility that one might think ones thoughts were being controlled.
Ergo, anyone who thinks their thoughts are being controlled, is wrong.
(It's the _rest_ of us who should worry.)
Should we believed claims that chemicals are being rained down upon
us from secret airplanes in order to achieve an unknown objective?
No. Not without trace evidence of such chemicals
Should we believe that the weather is being controlled to increase
the profits of the oil companies?
Not for that particular end (profits), in-and-of-itself - but as to
the braoder issue of influencing "weather control," as a plausible
goal of high-level intervention... hmmm... now that you mention it...
...one hopes that you did not miss the latest news on Haarp ;-) Again
this is something that is within the range of plausibility (for
weather control) just based on the enormous amount of power being used.
HAARP (the High frequency Active Auroral Research Program) will be
adding 132 more transmitters to bring their total number of
transmitters to 180. The installation began in 1993 with 18
transmitters, expanded to 48 in 1998 and will grow to 180
transmitters. The final expansion will bring the HAARP array to full
power, with ERP increasing to about 4 billion Watts!!
There is speculation that the project is an "effort to develop ways to
jam the electronics of incoming missiles from Russia and/or China".
4 billion Watts oughtta be overkill for radio jamming but as for
weahter control, who knows ??
Incoming ICBMs don't communicate with using radio. In fact, they don't
communicate, period. (That's where the "B" comes from, you may recall.
Surely you remember Reagan and the "we'd just recall them" gaff?) So,
to jam their "electronics" takes energy on the order of an EMP, because
you need to actually scramble their brains, not just boost the noise
background so they can't hear the commands coming down the channel from
home base. 4 GW might very well be inadequate for the job.
Using the Potty-test, this amount of power for the stated aim is
"insane" but is it insane enoguh to be related to an attmept at
weather control?
Doubtful, but plausible ...
Where does it end?
Regards, Ed
Not with 4 billion watts, nor with contructing a new building number 7
- that much is for sure...
Regards,
Jones
