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Comment by jandrese | Hacker News Reader

I thought the “jet fuel can’t melt steel beans” guys were way off base from day 1. You don’t have to get steel fully melted to weaken it. Anybody who has messed around with a blowtorch and a section of rebar knows this. Plus the building had just been hit by a fully loaded jumbo jet and several of the supports were damaged in the impact.

The idea that someone snuck in hundreds of explosives and attached them to the building without any of the thousands of people who work in it noticing as a backup to an already elaborate air hijacking plan makes no sense.

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What does make sense is that in an attention economy it is pretty easy to grab people’s attention by taking a significant event and trying to convince people that the common narrative is false is very profitable. You get a lot of attention and if you do a good job the idea grows all on its own and becomes something you can capitalize on the attention for a long long time.

What I don't understand is what value do people get out of promoting this type of conspiracy theory? Who profits? Is it just attention seeking or is there some profit motive? If so what?

I'm all for exposing corruption and I think there is enough to keep any anti government person occupied, but why do we get people inventing conspiracies in the most improbable of places? 9/11, Covid19 etc.

Thinking you've found a hidden truth is unreasonably fun. And then you can form a community and have some fun with your fellow nutbars too.

People also want the world to make more sense than it actually does. There being a secret group running things is at least _an_ explanation for the weird shit that happens, even if it doesn't really hold together.

There's a bunch of profit motives and politics involved as well usually.

If your goal is to erode trust in institutions then pushing any and all conspiracy theories is worth your time. Anywhere you see people trying to undermine the local government you see conspiracy theories.

Conspiracy theories are great because they're so efficient. Once started they are self reinforcing.

Presumably, those “Loose Change” frat guys made some money off it…

> What I don't understand is what value do people get out of promoting this type of conspiracy theory? Who profits? Is it just attention seeking or is there some profit motive? If so what?

They must really believe that what they're saying is true.

One interesting point some "truthers" make is that the welded steel lattice frame of the buildings should have been an efficient heat sink transfering heat away from hotter areas to colder areas. So warpage is unlikely to have been significant. On the other hand thermal expansion of relatively straight beams is likely what brought the towers down.

But you do have to get steel melted to have molten steel.

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