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Any published papers criticizing NIST?

Edx

Philosopher
Edx
Joined
Feb 1, 2008
Messages
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I know there are legitmite critics of the NIST but I can't remember any of their names, I remember some R.Mackey posts but can't figure out how I'd find them now. I think one of their names starts with a Q? Quin something maybe?

I don't know if there are entire papers on criticizing NIST, but I am trying to find any published paper that deals with any alternative view to anything in the NIST report, no matter how minor will do.

Many thanks!
 
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Edx said:
I know there are legitmite critics of the NIST but I can't remember any of their names, I remember some R.Mackey posts but can't figure out how I'd find them now. I think one of their names starts with a Q? Quin something maybe?

I don't know if there are entire papers on criticizing NIST, but I am trying to find any published paper that deals with any alternative view to anything in the NIST report, no matter how minor will do.

Many thanks!
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Quintiere - iirc
 
Quintere basically argued that the buildings would've fallen even if all of the fireproofing survived the impacts intact while NIST factored loss of fireproofing on certain crucial beams into their model. I don't think that he authored a full-scale paper on the subject but released a brief statement asking that that aspect of the NIST report be reviewed and explained why he thought a review was necessary.
 
As part of NIST's NCSTAR1 report and its laborious peer review process, they hosted a conference specifically to invite criticism. The agenda and links to the presentations are found here in the NIST archives. In particular, pay attention to the "Comments" sections, which contain full presentations and analyses from respected groups such as Arup and University of Sheffield.

There is quite a lot of criticism of NIST. I summarized some of the more interesting in my whitepaper, devoting probably the most useful section of it to contrasting and analyzing these claims. However, there has been no useful criticism at all, not from anywhere, that leads one to conclude ridiculous things like planted explosives. Not even if we allow the existence of silent "hush-a-boom" technology, or ascribe magical qualities to nanothermite. The differences between scientists on the issue are subtle, apparently too subtle for the Truth Movement to understand.
 
R.Mackey said:
As part of NIST's NCSTAR1 report and its laborious peer review process, they hosted a conference specifically to invite criticism. The agenda and links to the presentations are found here in the NIST archives. In particular, pay attention to the "Comments" sections, which contain full presentations and analyses from respected groups such as Arup and University of Sheffield.

There is quite a lot of criticism of NIST. I summarized some of the more interesting in my whitepaper, devoting probably the most useful section of it to contrasting and analyzing these claims. However, there has been no useful criticism at all, not from anywhere, that leads one to conclude ridiculous things like planted explosives. Not even if we allow the existence of silent "hush-a-boom" technology, or ascribe magical qualities to nanothermite. The differences between scientists on the issue are subtle, apparently too subtle for the Truth Movement to understand.
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Or not that subtle:

“I think the official conclusion that NIST arrived at is questionable,” explained Dr. Quintiere. “Let's look at real alternatives that might have been the cause of the collapse of the World Trade Towers and how that relates to the official cause and what's the significance of one cause versus another.”
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Dr. Quintiere also expressed his frustration at NIST’s failure to provide a report on the third skyscraper that collapsed on 9/11, World Trade Center Building 7. “And that building was not hit by anything,” noted Dr. Quintiere. “It’s more important to take a look at that. Maybe there was damage by the debris falling down that played a significant role. But other than that you had fires burning a long time without fire department intervention. And firefighters were in that building. I have yet to see any kind of story about what they saw. What was burning? Were photographs taken? Nothing!”
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http://www.opednews.com/articles/genera_alan_mil_070820_former_chief_of_nist.htm
 
Dr. Quintiere also expressed his frustration at NIST’s failure to provide a report on the third skyscraper that collapsed on 9/11, World Trade Center Building 7. “And that building was not hit by anything,” noted Dr. Quintiere. “It’s more important to take a look at that. Maybe there was damage by the debris falling down that played a significant role. But other than that you had fires burning a long time without fire department intervention. And firefighters were in that building. I have yet to see any kind of story about what they saw. What was burning? Were photographs taken? Nothing!”
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Sounds pretty clear to me. Do you think he suspects the Jones super-duper-super-secret nanothermite? What do you think he's saying other than fire brought down the building?
 
Red, you could as well have quoted this:
"I would really like to see someone else take a look at what they’ve done; both structurally and from a fire point of view.”
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Notably absent here: A call to take a look at the possibility of explosives.

Or
Dr. Quintiere, one of the world’s leading fire science researchers and safety engineers, also encouraged his audience of fellow researchers and engineers to scientifically re-examine the WTC collapses.
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...and ask yourself what the OP asked: Where are the papers criticizing NIST coming from anyone at all in the truth movement? There are none! Why??

Or
“I hope to convince you to perhaps become 'Conspiracy Theorists', but in a proper way,” he said.
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...implying that there is an improper way in the way. You wonder what Quintier considers improper? Hm!

Or
you had fires burning a long time without fire department intervention. And firefighters were in that building. I have yet to see any kind of story about what they saw. What was burning?
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Again: focussing on fires, not explosives
(Besides, you are quoting from a 4 year old article and pretend its information is still pertinent. Of cours you know your quote does not apply any longer, as the WTC7 report by NIST has been out for quite a while now. How dishinest is that?)

Or
But what I also thought they would do is to enlist the service of the ATF [Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives], which has an investigation force and a laboratory of their own for fire.
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Again, even though that agency is also dealing with explosives, Quintiere does NOT suggest the ATF use their expertise on explosives, no, he again focusses on fire investigation only.

Or
he made it clear he was not a supporter of theories that the Twin Towers were brought down by pre-planted explosives
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Nuff said.

But
“I suggest that there’s an equally justifiable theory and that’s the trusses fail as they are heated by the fire with the insulation intact. These are two different conclusions and the accountability for each is dramatically different,” he said.
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So there we learn why he is so critical of the report: Not because it cover up any conspiracy and CD style demolition, but because he believes fires brought the towers down in a different way, warranting different recommendations for future action.


RedIbis, did you at least read all that and understand that your source refutes all your dearly held beliefs?
 
Arguing that the objections of Dr Quintiere somehow support the conclusion of truthers is idiotic.
 
The Quintire article was posted to support the notion that little to no evidence was collected for WTC 7. His criticisms are more oriented at the things that would affect building codes than actual efforts to look for thermite and explosives as RI or others with similar views might think, but it's among some of the crits that were made. Mackey has noted a number of criticisms related to the specific thermal expansion mechanisms where IIRC NIST focused primarily on the heating phase rather than looking into the cooling phase where the steel was contracting.

In short... yes there are many valid criticisms of the NIST report; just nothing that would lead to the controlled demolition conclusions...
 
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RedIbis said:
Thinking a conclusion is questionable is subtle to you?
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Of course it is subtle when you consider what he considers questionable about the NIST report compared to truthers, Mackey made that clear in his post.

In the same way as plenty of scientists question various aspects of evolution, sometimes quite strongly (eg. Steven J Gould) but he was always upset Creationists would act like his issues were at all comparable to what they were saying. In fact Quintiere's position is clearly even more radical and crazy, according to truthers logic, than NIST is when he said that without fireproofing the towers would have collapsed about 10 minutes. Yet they want to pretend he can support them?

Also an aside it looks like the second quote was made before the WTC7 report came out and is even less relevant to what you are talking about.
 
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Edx said:
Also an aside itlooks like the second quote was made before the WTC7 report came out and is even less relevant to what you are talking about.
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Probably both, as the article sourced was posted in 2007. The WTC 7 report came out several months after I joined the forum, long after this article unless maybe it dealt with the draft reports (I don't know when those were published)
 
We've talked about Quintiere before. If Red's bringing him up as an example of a legit scientist who's found legitimate issues with elements of the collapse description that NIST generated, then that's right. If Red's bringing him up as an example of a legit scientist who thinks that NIST's overall narrative is wrong, then he's misreading what Dr. Quintiere's saying. And if Red's bringing him up as an advocate for truther positions, then he's contradicting truther positions, given that Quintiere's criticisms actually depend on the same basic elements that NIST's explanation does:
Dr. Quintiere summarized the NIST conclusion about the cause of the collapses of the Twin Towers. “It says that the core columns, uninsulated due to the fact that the aircraft stripped off that insulation; they softened in the heat of the fire and shortened and that led to the collapse. They pulled in the external columns and it caused it to buckle. They went on further to say that there would be no collapse if the insulation remained in place.”...

Dr. Quintiere then presented his and his students’ research that contradicts the NIST report and points to a different cause for the collapses; the application of insufficient fire-proofing insulation on the truss rods in the Twin Towers. “I suggest that there’s an equally justifiable theory and that’s the trusses fail as they are heated by the fire with the insulation intact. These are two different conclusions and the accountability for each is dramatically different,” he said.
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That said, I don't think Red's actually going so far as to say that Quintiere is in agreement with truthers. He's been here long enough to have seen those arguments, and there's no way he doesn't know that that's not the case.
 
ElMondoHummus said:
That said, I don't think Red's actually going so far as to say that Quintiere is in agreement with truthers. He's been here long enough to have seen those arguments, and there's no way he doesn't know that that's not the case.
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Red still argues that "Pull it" was suspicious; he's not above slicing up Quintiere's words to try to instill "doubt" in the commonly-held narrative of 9-11
 
Maybe so, but we have Quintiere's exact quotes explaining directly and specifically what he was getting at. There's no interpretation required because there's no vagueness to his statements. In order to bend Quintiere's words into seeming to agree with truther claims, you'd have to deliberately lop off the specificity Quintiere himself provides. It's true most truthers do this - hell, it's done so often you can see it coming before the end of a post - but again, Red's been around too long. I really doubt he'd try a tactic that's burnt a ton of conspiracy advocates already. He'd have seen the results far too many times.
 
ElMondoHummus said:
[/INDENT]That said, I don't think Red's actually going so far as to say that Quintiere is in agreement with truthers. He's been here long enough to have seen those arguments, and there's no way he doesn't know that that's not the case.
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Correct. It's not hard to scroll up a few posts and see that I was only responding to Mackey's assertion that Quintiere's criticism of the NIST report are only on subtle points. Since Dr. Q says for himself that he questions the conclusions, I don't think that's a subtle point at all.
 
RedIbis said:
Correct. It's not hard to scroll up a few posts and see that I was only responding to Mackey's assertion that Quintiere's criticism of the NIST report are only on subtle points. Since Dr. Q says for himself that he questions the conclusions, I don't think that's a subtle point at all.
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And they ARE subtle, extremely subtle, extraordinarily subtle WHEN COMPARED WITH TRUTHERS .

What about that do you not understand?
 
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