9/11 was an inside job.

My opponent starts off by stating that I was too vague with the subject being 9/11. He then supposes that I mean the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and Pennsylvania. Of course this is what I am talking about, I don't think the audience would be confused and think I was looking to debate September 11th, 1744. He then says that his case is easy to prove since I stated there is not one shred of evidence that proves and inside job. Then he goes on to say that all he has to do is leave doubt in the audience's mind that there are at least some unanswered questions. Well, which is it? Proof or unanswered questions? I asked for up to 3 topics. This is for the benefit of the audience. For example, if the Pro side were to just list 40 claims/questions it would not allow us to delve into each topic in detail. He has a list of 7 with 5 "unanswered questions", I will cover the first three "questions". If he thinks I am dodging the other ones we can cover them at another time. I will now show that his claims of 9/11 being an inside job are unfounded. I will use logic and actual facts. I noticed he has not used any citations, this does not benefit the audience, please correct this in the next round. #1 < > First, lets clear something up. There is no "official story", there is however a general consensus of what happened that day by the public and experts. If you are just using this term to imply that, then I will do the same but I just want the audience to know that the government has not released an "official story". Second, I don't know anyone who thinks that the reason the towers collapsed is because they "got so hot that it melted the steel causing a structural failure". The NIST report is 10,000 pages long so I don't expect most people to read it but here is a link to the FAQ - http://wtc.nist.gov... - you can read here what they believe the mechanism of collapse was. Here are some quotes that pertain to this topic: "NIST concluded that the WTC towers collapsed because: (1) the impact of the planes severed and damaged support columns, dislodged fireproofing insulation coating the steel floor trusses and steel columns, and widely dispersed jet fuel over multiple floors; and (2) the subsequent unusually large jet-fuel ignited multi-floor fires (which reached temperatures as high as 1,000 degrees Celsius) significantly weakened the floors and columns with dislodged fireproofing to the point where floors sagged and pulled inward on the perimeter columns. This led to the inward bowing of the perimeter columns and failure of the south face of WTC 1 and the east face of WTC 2, initiating the collapse of each of the towers." "NIST's findings do not support the "pancake theory" of collapse, which is premised on a progressive failure of the floor systems in the WTC towers (the composite floor system—that connected the core columns and the perimeter columns—consisted of a grid of steel "trusses" integrated with a concrete slab; see diagram below). Instead, the NIST investigation showed conclusively that the failure of the inwardly bowed perimeter columns initiated collapse and that the occurrence of this inward bowing required the sagging floors to remain connected to the columns and pull the columns inwards. Thus, the floors did not fail progressively to cause a pancaking phenomenon." This in no way mirrors what you claimed the "official story" states. < > Who said it does? < > First, we should let the audience know if we are using Celsius or Fahrenheit. From here on I will use Fahrenheit. NIST reported temperatures as high as 1800 degrees. You just say "evidence" points to.... please cite this evidence. My citation is within the same page I provided above, the NIST FAQ. The steel did not have to melt, it just had to be weakened to initiate collapse. At 1800 degrees steel only holds 10% of its room temperature strength. #2 I already showed that NIST for one does not subscribe to the pancake theory as a cause of initiating collapse. However I will point out how illogical it is to expect the towers to have taken a minute and thirty seconds to collapse. Even if it was a pancake collapse it would not stop at each floor for over a second, that is ridiculous. Also, don't just say "lab tests and computer simulations", you should actually cite these. #3 < > Free fall speed from the top of a WTC tower would be 9.23 seconds. According to Dr. Frank Greening's paper ( http://www.911myths.com... )the maximum time to strip off a floor is .110 seconds. No one knows the exact time it took each tower to collapse as it was covered in dust. Some estimate 10 to 16 seconds. The purpose of Greening's paper is to show that the time it took to collapse is not out of the ordinary. Your flawed logic is that it would take around a second on each floor. Where did you get these numbers and how do they calculate them? Also, I would like to add that an easy way to see that the towers did not collapse at free fall speed is to watch a collapse video and see that debris falls at a faster rate than the rest of the collapsing tower. What we shouldn't do is just assume how something should happen but actually delve into that assumption and do the appropriate research/calculations. < > Answer: A 110 story skyscraper collapsing. Not all of the concrete was pulverized like you say, but yes a lot was, is this not expected? Each towers mass is estimated at 990 million lbs. ( http://hypertextbook.com... ), how much energy might that produce during collapse? Some estimate near as much energy as a small nuclear weapon (or 272 tons of TNT) ( http://www.debunking911.com...). After knowing this, is it any wonder that a lot of concrete was pulverized during the collapse? < > Or similar kinetic energy such as the collapse itself. Controlled demolitions are not intended to destroy the building they are used to initiate collapse, gravity is what actually brings it down. The majority pulverization of materials happens during the actual collapse, not when the explosives detonate. Also, Thermite is not an explosive, it is an accelerant, if you think this can pulverize anything you are mistaken. I believe I have shown that my opponent has done very little research on this subject and therefore his claims are easy to refute. Still not a single shred of evidence that would prove 9/11 was an inside job. I await your response.