Wikipedia talk:Requests for arbitration/September 11 conspiracy theories/Workshop

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—AGK § 17:20, 20 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Are there no relevant experts?

I have seen often in these pages suggestions that there are no relevant experts that we can rely on in the case of the 911 Conspiracy or 911 Attacks. I would beg to differ. There are a host of experts on one aspect or another of the controversy. For example:

  • I have in the last few years run across books covered by investigative journalists or journalism professors that have dug into this matter to see if they can find evidence of a coverup or government conspiracy. Although I do not have the links at hand right now, several of these reported that they were not able to find any such evidence, although they each looked very hard, for several years each.
  • There are a host of experts in areas like physics and engineering and architecture and metallurgy and explosives and demolition that exist
  • Of course, there is an international team, headed by the group at NIST, investigating various aspects of the event.
  • Statements about timing and seismic records rely on geophysicists and other experts
  • Damage to the Pentagon was modulated by the reinforcements to the building that were partly completed at the time, including kevlar reinforced walls etc. These of course were installed on the basis of expert advice, to minimize damage from attack by explosives and projectiles. And guess what? The reinforcing actually worked! So someone knew what they were doing.
  • There are academic experts who study the intelligence community and their activities

If I thought a bit more, I could probably come up with more suggestions. --Filll (talk) 21:57, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

  • There are also historians. Like all historical events, there are history organizations, experts, and academics that analyze and scrutinize the available information. For example, the History Channel's documentary "9/11: Fact or Fiction" concludes that the 9/11 conspiracy theories are way off base and totally false. Okiefromokla questions? 22:24, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
  1. The fact that someone looked for *proof* of cover up and failed means nothing with respect of the possibility, the probability or legitimacy of cover up hypothesis
  2. Experts like NIST and physics can indeed rule out hypotesis which are physically impossible according to the evidences, but these are related just to few and extreem conspiracy theories. No scientist could say anything about the possibility that the government had advance-knowledge.
  3. The intelligence community as we know do not share knowledge about their activity so I don't understand how academics could know them.--Pokipsy76 (talk) 19:26, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Well if I am not mistaken, from listening to the 911 Commission testimony, the government DID have "advance knowledge" (well some parts of the government did). Now they might not have had very clear advance knowledge, as to time and place and so on. The advance knowledge they had might not have gone beyond a few low level employees of the FBI and other agencies. But it was all part of the testimony.
But the way bureaucracies work, is that they usually do not move very quickly or notice these sorts of threats very easily, very high up the tree. The FBI bureaucracy basically punished the low level employees for bringing the information to the attention of their supervisors. Look at the Challenger Disaster; lots of parts of the government knew ahead of time something like that was likely, but the way the government is organized, it is so hamstrung it cannot do anything with its foreknowledge. It is not set up to do it; if someone who knows about it tries to alert their superiors, they will be badly punished. It has always been thus. --Filll (talk) 21:42, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


We can't write articles around speculation and conjecture on whether or not the government is covering something up. If there are no reliable sources then Wikipedia stops there: We report the mainstream relevant views as told by independent reliable sources. There's a notable social movement surrounding a very diverse range of conspiracy theories and we have a corresponding article and section. But in the factual body of the article, we can include only views supported by the relevant experts, mentioning notable fringe theories with apropriate weight outside of that context — we can't insert the POV of every conspiracy theory and we wouldn't be much of an encyclopedia if we did. Okiefromokla questions? 21:15, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
One other thing. We have always been lacking one thing when it comes to these theories: independent reliable sources saying that at least one of the 9/11 conspiracy theories is considered viable by a significant minority of relevant experts in relevant fields. We have only polls that indicate there may be a certain percentage of the public that believes there is some kind of government cover up. This does not indicate the former: it indicates only sociological notability of the theories, like pseudoscience. We also have independent academics who debunk the theories, and that indicates sociological notability as well. What you are asking us to do is assume that the conspiracy theories are valid not only in a sociological context, but on equal footing with the mainstream theory, and you advocate that we do this without independent sources saying that a significant minority of people who "know what they are talking about" also consider them valid. That's original research. Okiefromokla questions? 21:27, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

As an outsider

I would like to see a list of the claimed "evidence" for something mysterious involved with the 911 event, such as the undamaged hijacker passport, with links to claims about this evidence, and counterclaims. However, it becomes increasingly difficult to do this kind of documentation when there is so much turmoil and agitation around these articles, and people are pushing for a FRINGE interpretation of the event, instead of an NPOV presentation.

That said, much of the "evidence" is evidence of not much more than incompetence and confusion and standard "CYA" behavior of a bureaucracy. For example:

  • placing the NYC emergency command post at the WTC, after it had previously been attacked
  • ignoring the assorted alerts raised by FBI agents etc about mysterious behavior of young Arab men at flying schools
  • the lack of interest on the part of the US in the Jihadist threat because they were too busy enjoying their "peace dividend" while they disassembled their intelligence and military infrastructure at a frantic pace.

I would still be interested in a list of major "evidence", however with links to the "truth" movement claims and links to assorted mainstream discussions of the same points.

Some we just will not know much about, because of classification efforts, aside from a few drips of information that leak out, such as:

  • the aborted testimony about Able Danger
  • the hints of assorted financing links that lead back to countries that are US allies such as Pakistan and Saudi Arabia

There is not much Wikipedia can do when the official information is limited because of classification concerns. There are of course a host of speculations, some of it unlikely and some of it just completely irrational. Some of this is notable, but a lot of it is not. And there is too much of it. For example, I have had many conversations with people from the Middle East or Islamic countries who tell me that it is well known and widely reported in their media that the World Trade Center stills stands, and that it was never attacked, or that the World Trade Center never existed, and Americans just lied to the rest of the world that such a complex of buildings in New York City ever existed, or that the attack footage was produced using computer graphics and small models on Hollywood sets. One could easily fill many many kilobytes with similar kinds of claims and conjectures, but at some point, one has to ask if this is very encyclopedic material.

We will never be able to calm down the frenzy about the conspiracy however. There are still rumors about a hidden conspiracy involving Abraham Lincoln's assassination, for example.--Filll (talk) 22:14, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I will note that there are still rumors that the Spanish attacked the Jamestown settlement and poisoned their well in the early 1600s, leading to many of the deaths of the settlers. Only in the last couple of years, when the well was rediscovered, was the well tested, and with no evidence of poison being found, many historians decided this was an unfounded rumor.--Filll (talk) 22:37, 24 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Thank you for your very reasonable opinion. Obviously you can look most of the claims in 9/11 conspiracy theories and in particular 9/11 advance-knowledge debate however this is not the place to discuss about how *we* find reasonable this or that claim.--Pokipsy76 (talk) 19:32, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Filll, there are no sources independent of the 9/11 truth movement, or other similar websites, or of conspiracy theorists themselves, that support the conspiracy theories. There are reliable independent sources that say the 9/11 conspiracy theories exist, but the evidence for them lies only with non-independent sources and in original synthesis of facts, both sourced and unsourced, so there is no indication that they are accepted outside of rumors, conjecture, or theorists themselves. Does that help answer your question? Okiefromokla questions? 20:58, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Oh really? No media sources for any of this? Hmmm...I think about 99% of it or more is complete nonsense, but it would be nice to have a list of their main "claims" and then links to places like the state department website etc that demonstrate that they are nonsense.--Filll (talk) 21:35, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, there's an MSNBC article that talks about the conspiracy theories. There are also independent sources that debunk the theories, including the History Channel as I mentioned above. However, it's hard to logically debunk many conspiracy theory claims; they tend to be based on conjecture, wild speculation, or circumstantial evidence. That's all you can really say about many of the points. Okiefromokla questions? 22:15, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
There may not be anything about the theories overall - I haven't checked - but most of the individual cases of incompetence or problematic financing etc. that Filll mentions have been discussed in reliable sources. Relata refero (talk) 23:11, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Removed from main workshop page

I removed the following section below, as per requested by JzG. I apologized to both Aude and Kirill. In the same spirit, I would appreciate it if both JzG and Ice Cold Beer remove the incivility accusations from the evidence page and apologize to Ireneshusband. I will then remove my own section addressing this issue from the evidence page.

====Arbcom Kirill Lokshin recuses himself immediately====

From: User:Kirill Lokshin's user page: (L-R) Aude, Swatjester, and me at the 3rd DC Meetup (full version)

Arbcom User:Kirill Lokshin a personal friend of Aude, recuses himself immediately from this case because of a conflict of interest.

Comment by Arbitrators:
Comment by parties:
  • Do you have any evidence to back up this serious accusation? Ireneshusband never presented any — the only thing approaching "evidence" is a picture of them together at a public gathering related to Wikipedia. As others have pointed out, that's far from evidence that they are "personal friends" — not even evidence that they have a relationship which would be sufficient to require Kirill to recuse himself. --Haemo (talk) 01:36, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


Comment by others:

Nonsense. Based on a picture at a meetup? — Arthur Rubin (talk) 13:50, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I don't really need to respond to this, it's silly. It's not a great picture of myself or User:Swatjester, and was not aware it was on Kirill's user page. Kirill could have picked another one, but not a big deal. :) Having been to a few meetups and Wikimania, I have met some Wikipedians including other arbcom members. If you consider me a "personal friend" of all Wikipedians I have met and demand they recuse, than not much would be left of arbcom. --Aude (talk) 14:15, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well, are you saying that this photo doesn't imply any friendship or that you are actually NOT a friend of him/her?--Pokipsy76 (talk) 15:16, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

This is just throwing stuff on the wall to see what sticks. Have you now, or ever have been etc...RxS (talk) 15:42, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Woo! I have a picture of me and Matt Pinsent, so obviously he's a personal friend! How cool is that? Guy (Help!) 18:34, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I have pictures of me with Reagan, and met Clinton and the first Bush, so does that mean we are all chums? I'd say no.--MONGO 22:20, 25 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

You simply don't post a picture of anyone on your user page. You know, there are years of edit history, just waiting to be mined. Any bets that Aude and Kirill are lock step here on wikipedia? Anyone, anyone. 3 to 1 odds. Trav (talk) 02:32, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Kirill already addressed this on your talk page before your latest comment here [1]. I'm not seeing how we are to take your accusations of incivility seriously when you are failing to abide to the standards you have accused several others here of violating. ~ S0CO(talk|contribs) 03:47, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Kirill wasted no time in proposing a lot of drastic measures on this page, based on the accusations made by your lot without waiting to hear the other side's point of view. It is pretty plain that Kirill arrived with his mind already made up and the knives out. Kirill's "answer" on travb's talk is pretty inadequate. It completely ignores the fact that he and Aude had just been at a dinner party together. While there are no certainties about where people will stand for a photo after a dinner party, it's more than likely that they will stick with the people they have spent the evening with.
The first two arbitrators who responded to the arbitration request recused themselves because they felt that they would be both biased against and personally hostile to 9/11 truthers. That is appropriate behaviour where there is a perception of conflict of interest, even if that perception were not very well founded. That Kirill is so reluctant to do so suggests very strongly that he has an agenda of his own. ireneshusband (talk) 09:09, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


File:Ac.maostalin.jpg
User:JVStalin and User:TheChairman at the Beijing Meetup
For heaven's sake... she's standing just one person away from Kirill in a picture! How can he possibly be objective about anything pertaining to this case? Just look at this picture of Joseph Stalin standing next to his "personal friend", Chairman Mao, if you doubt this line of reasoning... MastCell Talk 03:29, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Trav (talk) 18:50, 26 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Some useful terminology

  • LIHOP - those who let it happen by believing MIHOPS. Says it isn't, doesn't know it is. More plentiful than MIHOPS, but dwindling.
  • MIHOP - those who make it happen. Says is isn't, but knows it is. Fewer than LIHOPS, but more vocal.
  • Truther - Says it is, knows it is. Can often tell a LIHOP from a MIHOP.

Jethro Walrusditty (talk) 14:53, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

The political correctness police probably would want to ban or block anyone who used those terms.--Filll (talk) 15:05, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
Oh well - even if I'm blocked, I'll still have my MIHOP-dar! Jethro Walrusditty (talk) 18:15, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Proposed final decision doesn't fix much

I'm not sure if we can comment on that talk page, so I'll do it here. The proposed principles are good, as they are simply summarized policy. However, the "discretionary sanctions" seems to leave interpretation up for grabs. It's conceivable that there will continue being repetitious, uncivil, and tendentious editing while editors will be free to accuse the other side of violating the principles established here — which is what goes on already, with policy substituted for the principles.

There are mountains of talk archives and much evidence to support the claim that certain editors are already disruptive and have received multiple warnings. While both sides have accused the other of being disruptive in their evidence, Arbcom should be able to sort through it all (ie. single purpose accounts, strong POVs, obvious incivility and tendentious editing driven by deliberate, or non-deliberate, disregard for policy). Other forms of dispute resolution failed to take a stance, but I had hoped Arbcom would be able to make a definitive decision here. I am unfamiliar with Arbcom proceedings — is this a preliminary step, or is the current proposed decision likely to be the only action taken? Okiefromokla questions? 21:43, 28 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Arbcomm might very well do several things. One or more editors could easily be sanctioned if they feel it is appropriate. Discretionary sanctions, which I have never experienced but I understand are sort of like "super double secret probation" might be imposed as well, and basically give an admin or two the right to take out trouble makers with less fuss and less worry about repercussions. They might make a few pronouncements to strengthen or clarify or verify the WP principles involved like WP.--Filll (talk) 01:13, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I agree. There's more than enough evidence to justify specific sanctions against at least a couple editors. Their behavior during the case should crystallize and clearly illustrate the problems. For an Arbcom case, there was very little involvement by the members of Arbcom. The proposed remedy doesn't seem to be very effective or really very enforceable, and with all due respect this seems to have been a waste of time. RxS (talk) 02:53, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]


Well it might end up being a waste of time. But it is quite early in the process, clearly, so I would wait to see how it goes before passing judgement.--Filll (talk) 13:51, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

It's not that early in the process, we have Arbcom members voting on a proposed decision and very little involvement from the Arbs in general. There's still time for sure, but given the lack of participation from Arbcom as a whole I can't see the general direction changing.
I might be wrong, but there's no real indication that any Arbs have even read the case. And it's not like there's a heavy load of cases at the moment. Besides Krill, they've pretty much been a non-presence. But it's not over so I guess we'll wait and see how it all shakes out. RxS (talk) 15:17, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

My understanding is that there is an immense amount that goes on behind the scenes out of public view. Arbcomm is extremely busy with all kinds of matters, not just what you observe. Also some of this steps into areas that Arbcomm has traditionally been loathe to tred in, such as content discussions.--16:49, 29 March 2008 (UTC)

Personally, I agree that this isn't as much as Arbcom could be doing. There are obvious cases of disruptive editing going on that merit a stern warning, at the very least. In the past, when editors didn't receive that after an Arbcom, they've taken it as a vindication of their actions, which is the last thing we want here. Perhaps, though, Arbcom is simply hoping that once sanctions are in place, an admin will take it upon themselves to clear out the disruptive editors. --Infophile (Talk) (Contribs) 16:58, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]
I'm sure they are busy, but these cases are the reason they exist and if they can't attend to them I'm not sure why they agreed to take it on. And this isn't about content disputes, my main point is behavioral concerns. RxS (talk) 17:08, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

Well I would not complain too much until after the case is finished. It probably doesnt hurt to nudge them a bit or express concern, but I think that this case is far from over.--Filll (talk) 17:34, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I hope so. A mild blanket warning doesn't solve the problem of longtime disruptive behavior by specific editors, for which there is plenty of evidence. An "uninvolved administrator" will probably be reluctant to enforce any sanctions, such as a topic ban, without personally seeing tendentious editing over long periods of time, so such disruption will probably continue for another several months, at least. Okiefromokla questions? 20:02, 29 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

I believe that one of the biggest things this process has failed to address is the definition of what constitutes a reliable source. Most of the problem stems from the firm belief held by some of the more tendentious editors here that what most consider reputable sources is the actual propaganda; that they hold a "systematic bias" against their ideas, or that such sources have been manipulated by corporations or government to promote what has on several occasions been called the "official conspiracy theory". I know that ArbCom does not rule on content disputes, and I am not asking them to do so. But at some point, this will have to be addressed: the definition of what constitutes a reliable source must be nailed down. Because as it stands, the proposed wording for neutrality (particularly that which states "the promotion of propaganda is prohibited") could easily serve only to fan the flames. ~ S0CO(talk|contribs) 16:58, 31 March 2008 (UTC)[reply]

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