Ryan Byrd’s Ramblings

While watching “Conspiracy Moon Landing” (National Geographic Channel) last night (TiVod, of course), I came to realize there are only two things I hate in this world: people who are intolerant of other people’s cultures and the Dutch. Just kidding. What I hate are uneducated, loudmouthed people. Seriously, if you really don’t believe that we landed on the moon back in 1969, well, then I hope Darwin’s natural selection takes its toll on you before you manage to reproduce.

A problem of perhaps greater proportion is this: the assumption that a general education gives one license to make judgments and conclusions universally. Generally-educated people are helpful for a stable and productive society, however, such broad-based (and by extension, shallow) learning is insufficient for many arenas. While the “does it make sense” litmus test is essential for most of life’s questions, it is wholly inadequate for speculation in specialties. Unless you have a degree in physics or astronomy, I really don’t care what you think about the moon landing. Your inane ramblings about the effects of the Van Allen radiation belt are as welcome as a rain shower of anvils. I’d rather slide down a razor blade into a pool of alcohol, than listen to a “self-taught” conspiracy nut lecture me on the intricacies of space photography or the properties of shadows on the lunar surface. Go to school, earn a degree, and then get back to me.

Recently overheard conversation:
“So if (pointing to a cross-sectional sketch of the World Trade Towers) the airplane hit here and fires broke out here, here, and here, does it make sense that the building would have collapsed in on itself?”
…
“Look at the picture of the Pentagon during 9/11. Does that hole look like a hole that an airplane would make it if hit the building?”

The answer to both of these questions is “I don’t know” (and, likely, neither do you). I don’t have the required background or expertise to even begin such an analysis. I know nothing about the properties of steel, high-rise construction, the effect of burning jet fuel on structures, let alone even the faintest clue about impact and explosions of such a degree. I think it best to defer to experts in such situations. It’s what they’re there for.

A little Learning is a dang’rous Thing;
Drink deep, or taste not the Pierian Spring:
There shallow Draughts intoxicate the Brain,
And drinking largely sobers us again.

– Alexander Pope’s “An Essay on Criticism.”

UPDATE: 9/11 conspiracies debunked point-by-point

UPDATE: another 9/11 conspiracy debunking, this time by NIST

UPDATE: a response to the irresponsible film “Loose Change”

UPDATE: a site devoted to disproving 9/11 conspiracies

UPDATE: 9/11 myths dot com

I’ve been listening to books on CD as I drive the entire 5 minutes to work and back each day. Lately, I’ve very much enjoyed Don’t Know Much About History by Kenneth Davis.

Besides a wealth of interesting trivia (which I’ll likely list later), Kenneth explores American history in a way that would make mad, (in the extreme) traditionalists and revisionists alike. (You should know, however, Kenneth leans closer towards the revisionists). Perhaps a bit of summary is in order:

The very traditionalists would have us believe that the Founding Fathers were infallible, perfect giants-of-men who lived with courage, honor and class in the halcyon days of yore. Benjamin Franklin, to them, was a kindly old gentleman who spent his strength tinkering with inventions in his cellar and dishing out words of wisdom in his Almanac. Washington was a heroic figure who couldn’t lie, who, while standing up, crossed the Delaware in a boat and who prayed by his horse in forests before battles.

In the other camp, staunch revisionism, we have those who paint these same men as hedonistic, degenerate knaves, hell-bent on exploitation, improprieties and power. To them, scant and inconclusive DNA evidence unequivocally proves an illicit sexual relationship between Thomas Jefferson and his slave Sally Hemings. They’d have you believe that ‘ol Ben Franklin was but a clever cad and that bumbling General Washington never won a battle. They view the early Americans as a widely self concerned, corrupt group of rich white men, who accidentally stumbled on a few good ideas.

To be sure, that the Founding Fathers were as brilliant and as talented a group as the world has ever seen is not under review. That such Herculean results came from their efforts, no one can deny. The controversy is this — what kind of men were they, privately? (and how should they be depicted?)

And so we must look at motives. The old school might argue that glossing over of the infrequent improper acts only serves to better inspire humankind to greatness. They likely question, “Why focus on the negative?”

Recent, modern thought takes a different perspective. Some would claim that, as they magnify the defects of great men, to “show their humanity,” they demonstrate that good men can do bad things and thereby encourage all of us equally imperfect beings on to great deeds.

“So who is right and who is dead?” (Vizzini)

You have the topic, now “talk amongst yourselves”. I’ll chime in when I get a spare moment.