TCBronson, i think occam's razor in its everyday meaning is that the simplest explanation is usually correct, and therefore it is legitimate to use that explanation as a starting hypothesis. if new evidence -- and i emphasize, evidence, arises -- then the hypothesis should be adjusted accordingly, again based on the simplest interpretation of the facts at hand.

based on that, my hypothesis remains that the buildings fell down because planes hit them (building 7 being a follow-on effect). this is how i have reasoned my way through our first book, the age of autism. we use it as an epigram.

"Occam's Razor" does not mean that "the simplest theory is probably correct" or "what seems obvious is obvious." It means rather that any part of a theory, or belief system, that does not serve any empirically established purpose should be cut away. It was devised as a principle by which to dispense with pre-conceived notions. Highly qualified scientists and engineers claim unreservedly that the collapse of the three WTC towers on 9/11 is physcially impossible absent massive amounts of deliberately placed explosives; others equally qualified claim otherwise; those of us without that expertise must either educate ourselves or make a subjective decision as to who is trustworthy. Occam's Razor can't tell us that. A knowledge of the science can permit the use of Occam's Razor to determine which parts of the competing theories are or are not needed to explain what happened. In other words, Occam's Razor is really just the empirical method, if I understand Wikipedia correctly. Unfortunately Occam's Razor has been used in the former bogus sense in the internet era as a pseudo-intellectual means of stifling discussion. A little surprised to see it used that way here as it clearly can cut both ways.

Thumbs up for “http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2015/12/3/1456339/-The-Pharma-Bulls-are-Loose-and-it-s-the-End-of-American-Democracy”

This article memorably summarizes many of the points we've been discussing since 2012, and adds a few more to boot. My favorite line: "[Pharma promotes] ineffective drugs we do not need for conditions that do not exist." This from a well-published medical researcher.

I pre-ordered the Skyhorse book. The author is Dr. Lyons-Wilder. I'm amazed that KOS would publish this preview of his work.

I agree with Dan, applying Occam's razor, with the simpliest explanation usually correct, 911 did happen. The same reasoning establishes vaccines accounting for the autism epidemic. Yet, what I feel is more important is not sorting through conspiracies and facts per se, but not preventing any so-called 'conspiracies' from reaching the public domain where they can be debated. Let's have interest determine what 'conspiracies' are heard, not some 'vested' body deciding for us.
Only then do we stand a real shot at successfully separating the facts from conspiracies.

There is nothing "theoretical" about Poul Thornsen being a wanted felon, Merck being sued over the efficacy of the mumps component of the MMR, or the revelations of William Thompson.

I am not a conspiracy theorist. I'm a conspiracy realist.

Boy! Those in power sure are hot over Cap and Trade and global warming thing!

My guess is they got a greedy taste of how easy it was to fool us over the hole in the ozone lie.

Being in government one lesson they must learn is to get a bull dog grip on to whatever they want or doing and eventually it will come their way? My guess?? Theory ---??

This week they had some nut even claiming that the crisis in the Mid East is global warming related.

In the past decade Saudi Arabia by the way -- the incident of diabetes has been rapidly rising. You can bet if that disease is rising so is all the auto immune diseases with it, and if auto immune diseases are rising, so is mental illness. Cause mental illness is also related to brain inflammation. When you get mental illness it leads to drugs and distortions in reality, and religion is what often is the most distorted.

You see where I am going with this.

As far as the twin towers A jet plane full of religious nuts probably suffering from soft brain injuries due to vaccines crashed into that building tearing a big hole in it, breaking and tearing those steel supports - and lots of jet fuel that burned hot. IT later collapsed bringing the extra weight from the floors above down - and started a chain reaction that pancaked all the way down to the ground. What is amazing to me is that those towers stood as long as they did. Human beings really can build and do amazing things if they are not strapped to a mental illness.

So now we have religious nuts that are vaccine injuries is darn scary enough - don't you think?

And a government that can't stop thinking about all the money they could make off of cap and trade - and oh, yeah get those guns out of all our hands so the religious nuts can then pick us off with swords, knives and bombs instead of guns.

That is really scary, probably true -- the zombies have reached adulthood, oh dear!

I will throw my two cents into the storm: I believe a great deal of credit for my current views on the state of the world and the issues of this article I owe to my long following of the vaccine issue through AoA, Safe Minds, and others. I believe it is true that once the veil has fallen from your eyes for good reason, you begin to look at other, perhaps less personally devastating, less close to your very gut fears-- in a more critically assessing frame of mind. I think "waking up" to government corruption and collusion in one area makes it faster, at least, to wake up to other instances. If something is a true false flag, it does not mean that no one was maimed, killed, or injured. But it does mean that the corruption, collusion, and crimes against humanity are just that much worse. I don't like being called a conspiracy theorist. And because of that, I just want to urge everyone to go slow in casting any stones. Thank you, Dan and thank you, Bayareamom.

@Dan,

I'm no expert re what actually happened on 9/11, but I have to say that I know enough to know that the event did NOT happen in the manner in which we've been told.

Here are some links you may want to review:

This first link is to an interview of Sibel Edmonds, a former FBI translator, now whistle-blower re 9/11:

http://www.wanttoknow.info/911whistlebloweredmonds

SNIP:

"JH: Ms. Edmonds, what I'll do is invite you to tell us whatever you would like--your stint with the FBI--and what the brouhaha with Ashcroft and company is all about.

SE: I started working for the Bureau immediately after 9/11 and I was performing translations for several languages: Farsi, Turkish, and Azerbaijani. And I do have top-secret clearance. And after I started working for the Bureau, most of my translation duties included translations of documents and investigations that actually started way before 9/11.

During my work there I came across some very significant issues that I started reporting in December of 2001 to the mid-level management within the FBI. They said to basically leave it alone, because if they were to get into those issues it would end up being a can of worms. And after I didn't see any response from this mid-level bureaucratic management I took it to higher levels all the way up to [assistant director] Dale Watson and Director Mueller. And, again, I was asked not to take this any further and just let it be. And if I didn't do that they would retaliate against me.

In March 2002 I took this issue to the Senate Judiciary Committee and also I filed it with the Department of Justice Inspector General's office. And as per the Senate Judiciary Committee's request the IG started an expedited investigation on these serious issues; and they promised the Senate Judiciary Committee that their report for these investigations would be out by fall 2002 latest. And here we are in April 2004 and this report is not being made public, and they are citing "state privilege" and "national security" for not making this report public...

"On October 18th 2002 Attorney General Ashcroft came out personally, in public, asserted this rare "state secret privilege" on everything that had to do with my case. And they cited "diplomatic relations" and certain "foreign relations" that would be "at stake" if I were to take this issue and make it public. And, since then, this has been acting as a gag on my case.

I testified before the [9/11] commission on February 11th 2004. I have been waiting for this report that they [the Attorney General's office] have been blocking for a year and a half from becoming public. The information I requested under the Freedom of Information Act has been blocked for two years. And I have been campaigning for the past three months trying to get the Senate Judiciary Committee that has the oversight authority and responsibility to start its own public hearings. However, this request is again being blocked. Now they [AG] are citing this upcoming election as reason. And here I am."

Link to Sibel Edmonds' Deposition in Ohio re 9/11:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SCW9crAKEfA

Interview of Pilot Patrick Smith re 9/11:

http://undicisettembre.blogspot.it/2014/11/an-interview-with-airline-pilot-patrick.html

http://patriotsquestion911.com/pilots.html

http://pilotsfor911truth.org/

Re the scope of the conversations here...I think it's important to understanding to look at issues within a broad social context. AOA has done a good job of facilitating that, which is one of many reasons why AOA is such an excellent resource.
In order to solve a crime, one has to examine the whole crime scene. There is nothing the criminals would like more than for us to be ignorant of the big picture.

I like Linda1's comment that "it is more a case of carefully woven tangled webs meant to deceive, that of course, are never simple by design." The simplest explanation if, as you say and as the evidence seems to support, the damage at the Pentagon stands on its own without orchestration, is that none of the damage at the other sites was orchestrated. But, as Linda1 says, the tangled web of deception is never simple by design. Hey, if people actually orchestrated any of 911, they surely thought through all the best ways to hide the orchestration, including this supporting evidence that the Pentagon damage needs no other explanation than the plane crash. People like me who really don't want to believe anything nefarious about 911 other than horrible terrorism will jump at the opportunity to ignore people trying to elucidate what they think is the truth and what I absolutely hope is not the truth.

bayareamom -- what about the pentagon though? a plane flew into it and can account for all the damage there.

"I no longer consider mainstream media to be a proponent of truth - regarding anything.

If the government is willing to compromise the health of pregnant women and children, I would hazard to suggest that they are capable of similar atrocities with regards to any other of their mandates."

I quite agree. I have stated repeatedly via numerous comments at this forum that my own paradigm shift occurred several years ago - the year 2007, to be exact. And, again, I have also shared the three sentences (no, make that four) that my father used to say to me when I was a little girl:

1) This world is not as it seems;
2) There are deeper meanings behind every word spoken and with every deed performed;
3) People are not always who and what they seem.

He also used to say at times that "timing is everything."

I have learned, especially after these past several years, to take each and every one of those quotes as deep as it gets.

I think I understand (I said I THINK), Dan, why you may be hesitant re speaking of certain so-called conspiracy theories. I, for one, am on board with you re Sandy Hook. While there may be a bit more to that story than meets the eye, I do believe Sandy Hook occurred as it has been reported for the most part.

On the other hand, Dan, don't be quite so certain you know what happened on 9/11.

On the day that 9/11 occurred, I found myself on the phone with my cousin. He lives in upstate New York. At the time 9/11 occurred, he was working as an architect for a major architectural firm in NYC. I called him immediately, because I knew that during the week he stayed in the city while working before making the long commute back home.

Fortunately, I was able to reach him by phone; he was okay, thank goodness, but then he told me something that just sent chills down my spine. He explained that he and his co-workers actually saw the Towers go down. He explained that the way those towers fell could not have happened via the way the MSM was reporting.

He explained that he understood as an architect how those structures were built and knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that no building made of steel had EVER gone down like that, even if a plane were to fly directly into it. He explained that the fuel's temperature from those jets could not have taken down those buildings in the manner in which they fell.

My cousin is about as mainstream and as conservative a guy as you'd want to find. He is not into conspiracy theories. Just last year, I spent a bit of time sending him emails about the whole vaccine issue and he was willing to give me a bit of an open ear, but he would only go so far. To be fair, he maintained an open mind and eventually, had to admit that he never knew some of the facts I presented to him re the 'other side' to vaccines.

I come from a VERY, VERY conservative family background. I know in my heart that I just cannot speak about some of these events my family has witnessed, to most of my immediate family members.

There are people out there, Dan, that know certain truths; that know beyond a shadow of a doubt that most things in and of this world, are not as they seem. For various reasons, most people who have had what I would call, certain highly traumatic events occur, would never dare to speak openly about those things, for fear of ridicule. Some are willing and courageous enough to dare to speak out; some, such as myself, will only share what I've seen with a few others of whom I know will be open to what I have to share.

I do know and fully comprehend the plethora of reasons so many individuals do not want to accept certain so called conspiracy theories. I am not a conspiracy theorist. Unfortunately, there are those individuals who will take ANY event and spin it into some sort of wild conspiracy theory, when the truth is far, far from that wildly spun tale.

But on the other hand, there are other events which are not as they appear, such as the issue with vaccines. People have been so wildly indoctrinated into this false belief that vaccines are the savior of humanity, when nothing could be further from the truth.

You're a journalist, correct, Dan? To ME, a journalist learns, or should be trained to learn, to keep one's bias from any story, unless and/or until, he/she has delved sufficiently into any particular story and uncovers the whole truth (as much as is possible).

It's not easy to have to SEE and FEEL that the world you once believed existed, never really existed!

I agree with the comment, "I applaud your work, but don't be too quick to dismiss the work of others."

There's a saying that goes something like, "Your mind is only as good as an open umbrella - it's only good when it stays open."

Lessons to be learned by all...

Thanks for the feedback. I will look at the material you cite and anything else you want to point out. It is a crazy world out there. As to the comment that we "raise other debates" at AOA, to the detriment of our common interests, i would say that we try to stay focused on the rise of autism and related disorders, and their environmental roots -- on "the age of autism." Sometimes comment threads or a post here and there does bring in issues that the writer believes to be analogous or related But I do think if you scroll back for a month or two you will see us stay pretty clearly on message. -- dan

While I would agree not to sign up for "false flag" theories that "lack good evidence", several of them, including the video I referenced were enough to illicit a paradigm change on my part.

Once again: 9/11:

Explosive Evidence - Experts Speak Out (Free 1-hour version) AE911Truth.org

http://rethink911.org/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ddz2mw2vaEg#t=2093

Again, I'm not talking about some person with a youtube account expounding on their theories. This is a full length documentary examining experts' reactions to the implausibility of the government/media reporting of the events of that day.

I no longer consider mainstream media to be a proponent of truth - regarding anything.

If the government is willing to compromise the health of pregnant women and children, I would hazard to suggest that they are capable of similar atrocities with regards to any other of their mandates.

It's important to investigate the current vaccine madness as a piece of a global agenda to dumb-down, disable or outright kill via vaccines, GMO food, pesticides, fluoride in the water supply, biological as well as conventional warfare in a bid to depopulate the world. Rational thinking people have great difficulty fathoming or explaining such an unspeakable evil. Evil by its nature is not logical. As a side note, the book "Nobody Died at Sandy Hook" by Jim Fetzer was banned by Amazon. Why? The CDC Whistleblower's revelations were effectively banned by the MSM. Why?

Dan, Linda1 is right. My vaccine injury happened sixty-two years ago, and the UK authorities have indulged in a litany of targeted violence against me and my family to cover up that fact, because even the contributors to this blog don't know that 'They' have KNOWN VACCINES CAUSE AUTISM FOR AT LEAST 62 YEARS! And doesn't that make it look like a conspiracy?

I somehow woke up thinking it was Sunday, but when I clicked for my morning reading, before AOA came up, I realized, no, I didn't read Dan's Weekly Wrap yet, it must be Saturday :o).

I looked up "false flag". It's just what I thought it was - a covert operation done by a government or other entity to manipulate the public, sometimes to go to war. The perpetrators pose as an enemy, using the enemy's flag. Many examples throughout history.

Ten years ago I would have thought such a thing impossible. But after seeing our Congress lie repeatedly, after seeing Thompson's confession and attempt at whistleblowing ignored, knowing that our government is allowing millions of children to be injected with the MMR when their own research showed that the drug is linked to autism, knowing that they tried to discard and hide that research, knowing that the FDA's own research concluded that the Dtap causes recipients to be silent carriers and then went along with the "cocooning" deception, knowing how they are now trying to deny that DTAP ever caused any deaths and disability, knowing that they knew about thimerosal and fought to keep it in vaccines and are sending thimerosal loaded vaccines to innocents in Africa and other developing countries and are giving it in flu shots to American babies and pregnant women while at the same time promoting the lie that thimerosal has been "removed" from childhood vaccines, knowing that the CDC has been behind the seedy "professionals" on street corners across America pushing vaccines on pregnant women for what? 10 years now? when the FDA has never approved even one vaccine for use during pregnancy, knowing that vaccines interfere with genetic expression in deleterious ways that they know full well can lead to death, knowing about all the other definite plotting and planning they're doing to drug people worldwide for power and profit (and who knows what else), seeing how they deliberately lied repeatedly about good people like Dr. Wakefield and Jenny McCarthy, knowing that they lied to the world to get us into at least 2 wars where millions of people were killed and we are still witnessing the fallout from destabilization of regions that we had no business bombing, knowing that there are secret prisons where people are held for years, knowing that our government has engaged in torture, knowing that ongoing drone attacks in countries around the globe have killed countless innocents...

There is no doubt in my mind as to whether our government is capable of staging any kind of covert operation and lying through its collective teeth to anyone about anything. No doubt whatsoever because there is abundant evidence that they already do. Let's not forget that Dr. Jeff Bradstreet was found floating in a North Carolina river with a bullet wound in his chest and the authorities ruled his death a suicide and there has been no reporting about that since. That ought to be enough to make us question what we're told about any crime going forward.

The only question that remains with these events, including the one in California this week, that have been subsequently used to propel political agendas - did they do it? Or did someone else stage this to frame the supposed perpetrators?

As a Canadian with a vaccine injured child (oral apraxia, loss of motor skills after the 15 months MMR, Tourette's after the 7 year MMR booster) I have to agree with most of your posts; your articles are very enlightening to say the least.

AOA is a wonderful group of people trying to shed light on a subject that government/CDC/pharmaceutical companies want to remain hidden. In my opinion this could be called a conspiracy.

The fact that one such conspiracy exists, does not preclude the existence of others. We all need to wake up about government/industry control of the medical system for financial gain of industry, the agricultural system (with the ever increasing use of pesticides that poison us) for financial gain of industry and, yes, terrorism, for whomever's gain I am not sure.

Just as I was once a vaccine-injury skeptic, I was once a 911 skeptic. The video "9/11 Explosive Evidence Experts Speak Out" changed my mind.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ddz2mw2vaEg

Here, a group of highly trained physicists and architects (including some involved in the initial build of the Twin Towers) reveal that the buildings all collapsed in obvious planned-demolition fashion; straight down from gravity induced free-fall, not in the disordered pattern that would be expected from the asymmetrical damage of plane impact. The third tower that fell later in the day, officially the result of "office furniture fires", fell straight down, in place, in a matter of seconds. Planes were involved, but didn't bring the buildings down.

The conspiracy to hide autism is only one of many.

Dismissal of opposing views without personal and individual investigation will only maintain the status quo.

I applaud your work. Don't be quick to dismiss the work of others.