That again? Thermate residue was *found* - How do you want to falsify the thermite theory now?
I'll return to this in a moment. Actually, it's part of the only line of argument worth continuing at this point. You've said nothing that adds any credibility to your opinion of the temperature of the molten material. You keep trying to throw confusion at (without actually contradicting) the simple fact that a dense molten liquid at a given temperature in the 800C range is a much brighter source of IR light than an open-fire flame at the same temperature. You continue to equate published average fire temperatures with the maximum temperatures reached anywhere in the fire. You fantasize about what we might determine
if general-purpose video cameras were pyrometers. You cannot imagine any way that a room-sized battery power supply capable of delivering tens of thousands of amps of current in a short-circuit condition (easily created by mechanical damage and/or by fire damage to cable insulation) could heat things up to very high temperatures very quickly, which doesn't seem commensurate with your reasoning abilities in other areas. You have resorted to absurd analogies and equivocation (e.g. a camera recording color-distorted images of something known to cause color-distorted images in cameras = "malfunction" = a camera recording false images of people being strangled, sure). You have also resorted to juxtaposing out of context quotes of mine (e.g. see "It doesn't" above) to make it appear that I've said something other than what I actually said (apparently forgetting that people have already read my original statements that you're quoting). This makes it appear that you have played out your limited hand of rational arguments and are moving on to much less interesting modes of discourse.
Now, to Jones' thermite residue. Here's how forensic science, as I understand it, would support the hypothesis of an introduced foreign agent (such as alleles of a different blood sample) into a setting (such as a blood sample):
1. Establish what substances would naturally be present in the setting were the foreign agent not introduced. Call this set A.
2. Establish all of the substances that the foreign agent would introduce. Call this set B. Call the subset of B that consists of non-members of A, set C. Note that if C is empty, the hypothesis of B will not be supportable by this method; you have to hope that a quantitative analysis might be useful instead.
3. Show that the substances in the setting (call this set D) include all of C.
Jones has not done step 1, so really, we can stop paying attention to his analysis right there. Nor has he done step 2, as far as anyone knows. He went straight to step 3, then made unsupported claims that whatever unusual stuff he found
couldn't be in set A and
must be characteristics of set B.
Here's a fun but accurate analogy of my own: Imagine a coroner is examining the stomach contents of a body. He finds traces of beef, lettuce, cheese, pickles, onions, sesame seeds, and bread. From this he concludes that the deceased must have been eating omelets.
When questioned on this conclusion, he points out that cheese and onions are common omelet ingredients.
When it's pointed out that beef, lettuce, and pickles are not common ingredients in omelets he argues that there's no reason why any of these things could not be added to omelets if the chef wanted to, and that most likely these ingredients were parts of a secret "omelate" recipe.
When it's pointed out that omelets by definition contain eggs, and that no eggs were found, he ignores the point and instead insists "omelate residues were *found!*" and wonders how you dare question his forensic expertise and why you are trying to argue against the
obvious conclusion that the deceased was eating omelets and can you really live with yourself knowing for a fact that you're letting the evil breakfast-vendors of the world get away with murder?
At what point in this process do you begin to suspect that this coroner is, not to put too fine a point on it, insane?
But even if we assumed that Prof. Jones were unreliable, and thus his evidence and analysis were worthless, we'd still have to explain the molten metal.
We'd still, first, have to establish the existence and magnitude of the phenomenon we wish to explain. How much molten metal, of what kind, when, and where? Otherwise we're in the same boat as people trying to explain the floral pattern on the teacup orbiting Pluto.
If you find me a probable mechanism that would have produced tons of molten metal WITHOUT thermite, that would be a start.
If you find me tons of molten metal, or any evidence of same, that would be an even better start. Have you done any calculations of the approximate volume of the flowing liquid in the video, to determine whether (if it were metal) it would be "tons" or not?
Respectfully,
Myriad
