Post by 8real on Aug 11, 2006 18:37:06 GMT -5
This is the new penultimate draft of a chapter that will appear in THE 9/11 CONSPIRACY (Chicago, IL: Catfeet Press/Open Court, forthcoming), which I am editing. Comments and criticism are welcome. Email jfetzer@d.umn.edu.
THINKING ABOUT "CONSPIRACY THEORIES": 9/11 and JFK
James H. Fetzer, Ph.D.
ABSTRACT
The phrase "conspiracy theory" harbors an ambiguity, since conspiracies are widespread and theories about them need not be mere speculations. The application of scientific reasoning in the form of inference to the best explanation, applied to the relevant evidence, establishes that the official account of the events of 9/11 cannot be sustained. Likelihood measures of evidential support establish that the WTC was brought down through the use of controlled demolition and that the Pentagon was not hit by a Boeing 757. Since these hypotheses have high likelihoods and the only alternatives have likelihoods that range from zero to null (because they are not even physically possible), assuming that sufficient evidence has become available and "settled down", these conclusions not only provide better explanations for the data but are proven beyond reasonable doubt.
1. "Conspiracy Theories"
We need to come to grips with conspiracies. Conspiracies are as American as apple pie. All they require is that two or more persons collaborate in actions to bring about illegal ends. When two guys knock off a 7/11 store, they are engaged in a conspiracy. Most conspiracies in our country are economic, such as Enron, WorldCom, and now Halliburton as it exploits the opportunities for amassing profits in Iraq. Insider trading is a simple example, since investors and brokers collaborate to benefit from privileged information. Ordinarily, however, the media does not describe them as "conspiracies".1 The two most important conspiracies in our history are surely those involving JFK and 9/11.
One fascinating aspect of 9/11 is that the official story involves collaboration between some nineteen persons in order to bring about illegal ends and thus obviously qualifies as a "conspiracy theory". When critics of the government offer an alternative account that implicates key figures of the government in 9/11, that obviously qualifies as a "conspiracy theory", too. But what matters now is that we are confronted by alternative accounts of what happened on 9/11, both of which qualify as "conspiracy theories". It is therefore no longer rational to dismiss one of them as a "conspiracy theory" in favor of the other. The question becomes, Which of two "conspiracy theories" is more defensible?
There is a certain ingenuity in combining "conspiracy" with "theory", because the word "theory" can be used in the weak sense of a speculation, conjecture, or guess to denigrate one account or another for political or ideological reasons without acknowledging that "theory" can also be used in the stronger sense of an empirically testable, explanatory hypothesis. Consider Newton's theory of gravitation or Einstein's theory of relativity as instances. The psychological ploy is to speak as though all "theories" were guesses, none of which ought to be taken seriously. Various different cases, however, can present very different problems. Evidence can be scarce, for example, or alternatives might be difficult to imagine.
Moreover, there are several reasons why different persons might arrive at very different conclusions in a given case. These include that they are not considering the same set of alternative explanations or that they are not employing the same rules of reasoning. The objectivity of science derives, not from transcending our human frailties, but from its inter-subjectivity.2 Different scientists confronting the same alternatives, the same evidence, and the same rules of reasoning should arrive at all and only the same conclusions about which hypotheses are acceptable, which are rejectable, and which should be held in suspense. And, in the search for truth, scientific reasoning must be based upon all the available relevant evidence, a condition called the requirement of total evidence, and is otherwise fallacious.3
2. Scientific Reasoning
Scientific reasoning characterizes a systematic pattern of thought involving four stages or steps, namely: puzzlement, speculation, adaptation, and explanation.4 Something occurs that does not fit comfortably into our background knowledge and expectations and thus becomes a source of puzzlement. Alternative theories that might possibly explain that occurrence are advanced for consideration. The available relevant evidence is brought to bear upon those hypotheses and their measures of evidential support are ascertained, where additional evidence may be obtained on the basis of observation, measurement, and experiment. The weight of the evidence is assessed, where the hypothesis with the strongest support is the preferable hypothesis. When sufficient evidence becomes available, the preferable hypothesis also becomes acceptable in the tentative and fallible fashion of science.5
Among the most important distinctions that need to be drawn in reasoning about alternative scenarios for historical events of the kind that matter here are those between different kinds of necessity, possibility and impossibility.6 Our language imposes some constraints upon the possible as functions of grammar and meaning. In ordinary English, for example, a freshman is a student, necessarily, because to be a freshman is to be a student in the first year of a four-year curriculum. By the same token, it is impossible to be a freshman and not be a student. The first is a logical necessity, the second a logical impossibility. Since a conspiracy requires at least two conspirators, if there were not at least two conspirators, it is not logically possible that a conspiracy was involved; if there were, then necessarily there was.
More interesting than logical necessities, possibilities and impossibilities, however, are physical necessities, possibilities and impossibilities.7 These are determined in relation to the laws of nature, which, unlike laws of society, cannot be violated, cannot be changed, and require no enforcement. If (pure) water freezes at 32° F at sea level atmospheric pressure, for example, then it is physically necessary for a sample of (pure) water to freeze when its temperature falls below 32° F at that pressure. Analogously, under those same conditions, that a sample of (pure) water would not freeze when its temperature falls below 32° F is physically impossible. And when a sample of (pure) water is not frozen at that pressure, it is justifiable to infer that it is therefore not at a temperature below its freezing point of 32° F.8
Laws of nature are the core of science and provide the principles on the basis of which the occurrence of events can be systematically explained, predicted, and retrodicted.9 They therefore have an important role to play in reasoning about specific cases in which those principles make a difference. In legal reasoning, for example, the phrase, "beyond a reasonable doubt", means a standard of proof that requires subjective conviction that is equal to "moral certainty".10 In the context of scientific reasoning, the meaning of that same phrase is better captured by the objective standard that an explanation is "beyond a reasonable doubt" when no alternative is reasonable. Notice that the falsity of hypotheses that describe the occurrence of events that are physically impossible is beyond a reasonable doubt.11
3. Probabilities and Likelihoods
An appropriate measure of the weight of the evidence is provided by likelihoods, where the likelihood of an hypothesis h, given evidence e, is determined by the probability of evidence e, if that hypothesis were true.12 Hypotheses should be tested in pairs, h1 and h2, where the relationship between the hypotheses and the evidence may be regarded as that between possible causes and effects. Thus, suppose in a game of chance, you were confronted with a long series of outcomes that would have been highly improbable if the coin were symmetrical (if the dice were fair, or if the deck was normal). If such a run would be far more probable if the coin were bent (if the dice were loaded, if the deck was stacked), then the likelihood that the coin is bent (the dice are loaded, the deck is stacked) is much higher than the likelihood the coin is symmetrical (dice are fair, deck is normal).
A better grasp of probabilistic reasoning follows from distinguishing between two kinds of probabilities as properties of the world. The first is relative frequencies, which simply represent "how often" things of one kind occur in relation to things of another kind. This includes averages of many different varieties, such as the average grade on a philosophy exam in a course on critical thinking. The second is causal propensities, which reflect "how strong" the tendencies are for outcomes of a certain kind to be brought about under specific conditions.13 Frequencies are brought about by propensities, which may differ from one case to another. When the class averages 85 on the first exam, that does not mean every student scored 85 on the exam. It might even be the case that no student actually had that score. But each students' own score was an effect of his propensity to score on that exam.
It can be easy to confuse "how often" with "how strong", but some examples help to bring their difference home. Canoeing on the Brule River in Wisconsin is not a hazardous pastime, but a 76-year old woman was killed on 15 July 1993 when a tree that had been gnawed by a beaver fell and landed on her. The tree fell and hit the woman on the head, as she and her daughter paddled past it.14 The tree was about 18 inches in diameter and 30 to 40 feet tall and stood about 10 to 20 feet up the river bank. So while hundreds and hundreds of canoeists had paddled down the Brule River before and escaped completely unscathed, this woman had the misfortune to be killed during "a freak accident". It was improbable in terms of its relative frequency of occurrence yet, given those particular conditions, the causal propensity for death to result as an effect of that specific event was great.
When the same causally relevant conditions are subject to replication, then the relative frequencies that result tend to be reliable evidence of the strength of the causal propensity that produced them. But when those conditions can vary, how often an outcome occurs may not indicate the strength of that tendency on any specific trial. We commonly assume smoking diminishes life spans, which is usually true. But a 21-year old man was confronted by three thugs who, when he failed to respond quickly enough, shot him. He might have been killed, but a metal cigarette lighter deflected the .25-caliber bullet and he lived.15 Once you appreciate the difference, three principles that relate probabilities of these kinds become apparent, namely: that propensities cause frequencies; that frequencies are evidence for propensities; and that propensities can explain frequencies. But it depends on the constancy of the relevant conditions from one trial to another.16
4. The Case of JFK
Conspiracy theories have to be assessed using principles of scientific reasoning. In the case of JFK, the difficulty has not been a dearth of evidence but sorting through the superabundance of conflicting and even contradictory physical, medical, witness, and photographic "evidence" to ascertain which is authentic and which is not. Something qualifies as evidence in relation to an hypothesis just in case its presence or absence or its truth or falsity makes a difference to the truth or falsity of that hypothesis. But "evidence" can be planted, faked, or fabricated to provide a false foundation for reasoning.17 That has proven to be true here. Once the task of sorting things out has been performed, it becomes relatively simple to draw appropriate inferences about the general character of the assassination on the basis of what we have learned about the cover-up,
Early studies by Harold Weisberg, Mark Lane, and Sylvia Meagher, for example, were instrumental in establishing that The Warren Report (1964) could not be sustained on the basis of evidence available even then (Weisberg 1965, Lane 1966, Meagher 1967). According to the official account, a lone assassin fired three shots from the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depositor Building, scoring two hits. One of those hits is supposed to have entered at the base of the President's neck, passed through without hitting any bony structures and exited just above his tie. It then entered the back of Governor John Connally, who was seated in front of him, shattered a rib, exited his chest and injured his right wrist before being deflected into his left thigh. The bullet alleged to have followed this trajectory was later "found" in virtually pristine condition.
This sequence of events appears so improbable that the missile that caused all of this damage has come to be known as the "magic bullet".18 The jacket and the shirt JFK was wearing both have holes about 5 1/2 inches below the collar. An autopsy diagram verified by the President's personal physician shows a wound at that same location. A second diagram prepared by an FBI observer shows the wound to the back below the wound to the throat. The death certificate executed by the President's personal physician also places that wound at the level of the third thoracic vertebra, about 5 1/2 inches below the collar. Even photographs taken during re-enactments of the shooting show patches on stand-ins for the President at that location.19
Although The Warren Report tries to imply that the "magic bullet" theory is not indispensable to its conclusions, that is a gross misrepresentation. No less an authority than Michael Baden, M.D., who chaired the forensic panel that reviewed the medical evidence when the case was reinvestigated by the House Select Committee on Assassinations in 1977-78, has remarked that, if the "magic bullet" theory is false, then there had to have been at least six shots from three different directions.20 An especially disturbing aspect of this situation is that all the evidence described here was not only available to the HSCA in 1977-78 but had been discussed quite extensively in those early books by Weisberg, Lane, and Meagher (Weisberg 1965, Lane 1966, Meagher 1967). The government has simply ignored their discoveries.21
5. Recent Scientific Studies
Since the release of Oliver Stone's film, "JFK", in 1992, research on the assassination evidence (conducted by the best qualified persons who have ever studied the case)22 has revealed that the autopsy X-rays have been altered in several ways, that another brain was substituted for that of JFK during its examination, and that the home movie ostensibly taken by a spectator named Abraham Zapruder has not only been extensively edited but actually recreated by reshooting each of its frames (Fetzer 1998, 2002, 2003).23 The film was redone using techniques of optical printing and special effects, which allow combining any background with any foreground to create any impression that one desires, which included removing series of frames that would have given the plot away, such as that the driver pulled the limousine to the left and stopped after shots began to be fired.24
The alterations of the medical evidence include "patching" a massive defect in the back of the head caused by a shot from in front, in the case of the lateral cranial X-ray, and adding a 6.5 mm metallic slice to the anterior/posterior X-ray, in an evident attempt to implicate a 6.5 mm weapon in the assassination, which have been exposed by means of optical density studies.25 Adapting a simple technique from physics, David W. Mantik, M.D., Ph.D., on the basis of objective measurements and repeatable experiments, has been able to prove that the JFK autopsy X-rays are not authentic. And, by even simpler comparisons between descriptions from experienced and professional physicians at Parkland Hospital describing extensive damage to the brain of JFK, Robert Livingston, M.D., a world authority on the human brain, has concluded that the diagrams and photographs of a brain that are stored in the National Archives must be of a brain other than that of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.26
The evidence establishing the recreation of the Zapruder film comes from diverse sources, including that frame 232 was published in LIFE with physically impossible features; that a mistake was made in introducing the Stemmons Freeway sign into the recreated version; that the "blob" and blood spray was added on to frame 313; that the driver's head turns occur too rapidly to even be humanly possible; that the Governor's left turn has been edited out of the film; that Erwin Swartz, an associate of Abraham Zapruder, reported having observed blood and brains blown out to the back and left when he viewed the original film; that several Secret Service agents observed brains and blood on the trunk of the limousine; that others have viewed another and more complete version of the film; and that Homer McMahon, an expert at the National Photographic Interpretation Center, studied a very different film on that very night.27
Other evidence that has long been available to serious students of the death of JFK includes multiple indications of Secret Service complicity in setting him up for the hit.28 There was no welding of the manhole covers; no coverage of open windows; the motorcycles were placed in a non-protective formation; agents did not ride on the limousine; an improper route, including a turn of more than 90°, was utilized; the vehicles were in an improper sequence; the limousine slowed nearly to a halt at Houston and Elm; the limousine was actually brought to a stop after bullets began to be fired; the agents were non-responsive; brains and blood were washed from the limousine at Parkland before the President was even pronounced dead; the autopsy X-rays and photographs were taken from the morgue; and the limousine was sent to Ford Motor Company, stripped down and completely rebuilt, on 25 November 1963.29
6. Patterns of Reasoning
Records released by the ARRB have shown that Gerald Ford (R-MI), a member of the commission, had the description of the wound changed from "his uppermost back", which was already an exaggeration, to "the base of the back of his neck" to make the "magic bullet" theory more plausible (Fetzer 1998, p. 177). And Mantik has now proven that no bullet could have taken the trajectory ascribed to the "magic bullet" because cervical vertebrae intervene (Fetzer 2000, pp. 3-4). So the vastly influential accounts of the death of JFK that take it for granted as their foundation— The Warren Report, The House Select Committee on Assassinations Report, and Gerald Posner's Case Closed—are not only false but provably false and not even anatomically possible.
The wound to his throat and the wounds to Connally have to be explained on the basis of other shots and other shooters. We now know that JFK was hit four times—in the throat from in front; in the back from behind; and twice in the head: in the back of the head from behind and then in the right temple from in front.30 We know Connally was hit at least once and another shot missed and injured a bystander. It thus turns out that Michael Baden, M.D., was correct when he observed that, if the "magic bullet" theory is false, then there had to have been at least six shots from at least three different directions. The theory is not even anatomically possible and, with at least one to Connally and one miss, there had to have been at least six shots.31
Anatomical impossibility, of course, is one kind of physical impossibility, insofar as human are vertebrates with vertebrae, including those of the cervical variety. The wound observations of the attending physicians at Parkland and at Bethesda were cleverly concealed by Arlen Specter, now a United States Senator from Pennsylvania, but then a junior counsel to the Warren Commission. Specter did not ask the doctors what they had observed or what they had inferred from what they had observed, but instead posed a hypothetical question: "If we assume that the bullet entered the base of the back of the neck, traversed the neck without impacting any bony structures, and came out just above the level of the tie", he asked, "would that be consistent with describing the neck wound as a wound of exit?" In response to this trivial question, they dutifully replied that it would be, but Malcolm Perry, M.D., who had performed a tracheostomy through the wound and had described it three times as a wound of entry during a press conference, added that he was not in the position to vouch for or to verify the assumptions he had been asked to make, which of course was true.32
The discoveries about the X-rays, the brain, and the Zapruder film are also powerful. What makes these discoveries so significant as evidence is that none of these things could possibly have been done by Lee Harvey Oswald, the alleged assassin, who was either incarcerated or already dead. Other theories, moreover, can be rejected on similar grounds. The Mafia, for example, could not have extended its reach into the Bethesda Naval Hospital to alter X-rays under the control of agents of the Secret Service, medical officers of the United States Navy, and the President's personal physician. Neither pro nor anti-Castro Cubans could have substituted one brain for another. Nor could the KGB, which probably had the same ability as Hollywood and the CIA to fabricate movies, have been able to gain possession of the Zapruder film to subject it to alteration. Which raises the question, Who had the power to make these things happen? Given what we know now, the answer is no longer difficult to discern. It required involvement at the highest levels of the American government.
Insofar as the "magic bullet" theory describes the occurrence of events that are not only provably false but actually physically impossible, that it cannot possibly be true is beyond reasonable doubt. Moreover, the discovery that the autopsy X-rays have been altered, that another brain has been substituted, and that the Zapruder film has been recreated imply a very meticulous and carefully planned cover-up in which the alleged assassin could not have been involved. The identification of more than a dozen indications of Secret Service complicity means that the evidence has "settled down".33 The probability of the evidence on the lone-assassin hypothesis does not even rise to zero, since it posits a physically impossible sequence, whose value is better set at null.34 The probability of the evidence on a conspiracy scenario, by comparison, is extremely high, depending upon the competence and the power of those who carried it out. There is in fact no reasonable alternative to a fairly large-scale conspiracy in the death of our 35th President, which means that it has been established beyond a reasonable doubt.35
Continued Below....
THINKING ABOUT "CONSPIRACY THEORIES": 9/11 and JFK
James H. Fetzer, Ph.D.
ABSTRACT
The phrase "conspiracy theory" harbors an ambiguity, since conspiracies are widespread and theories about them need not be mere speculations. The application of scientific reasoning in the form of inference to the best explanation, applied to the relevant evidence, establishes that the official account of the events of 9/11 cannot be sustained. Likelihood measures of evidential support establish that the WTC was brought down through the use of controlled demolition and that the Pentagon was not hit by a Boeing 757. Since these hypotheses have high likelihoods and the only alternatives have likelihoods that range from zero to null (because they are not even physically possible), assuming that sufficient evidence has become available and "settled down", these conclusions not only provide better explanations for the data but are proven beyond reasonable doubt.
1. "Conspiracy Theories"
We need to come to grips with conspiracies. Conspiracies are as American as apple pie. All they require is that two or more persons collaborate in actions to bring about illegal ends. When two guys knock off a 7/11 store, they are engaged in a conspiracy. Most conspiracies in our country are economic, such as Enron, WorldCom, and now Halliburton as it exploits the opportunities for amassing profits in Iraq. Insider trading is a simple example, since investors and brokers collaborate to benefit from privileged information. Ordinarily, however, the media does not describe them as "conspiracies".1 The two most important conspiracies in our history are surely those involving JFK and 9/11.
One fascinating aspect of 9/11 is that the official story involves collaboration between some nineteen persons in order to bring about illegal ends and thus obviously qualifies as a "conspiracy theory". When critics of the government offer an alternative account that implicates key figures of the government in 9/11, that obviously qualifies as a "conspiracy theory", too. But what matters now is that we are confronted by alternative accounts of what happened on 9/11, both of which qualify as "conspiracy theories". It is therefore no longer rational to dismiss one of them as a "conspiracy theory" in favor of the other. The question becomes, Which of two "conspiracy theories" is more defensible?
There is a certain ingenuity in combining "conspiracy" with "theory", because the word "theory" can be used in the weak sense of a speculation, conjecture, or guess to denigrate one account or another for political or ideological reasons without acknowledging that "theory" can also be used in the stronger sense of an empirically testable, explanatory hypothesis. Consider Newton's theory of gravitation or Einstein's theory of relativity as instances. The psychological ploy is to speak as though all "theories" were guesses, none of which ought to be taken seriously. Various different cases, however, can present very different problems. Evidence can be scarce, for example, or alternatives might be difficult to imagine.
Moreover, there are several reasons why different persons might arrive at very different conclusions in a given case. These include that they are not considering the same set of alternative explanations or that they are not employing the same rules of reasoning. The objectivity of science derives, not from transcending our human frailties, but from its inter-subjectivity.2 Different scientists confronting the same alternatives, the same evidence, and the same rules of reasoning should arrive at all and only the same conclusions about which hypotheses are acceptable, which are rejectable, and which should be held in suspense. And, in the search for truth, scientific reasoning must be based upon all the available relevant evidence, a condition called the requirement of total evidence, and is otherwise fallacious.3
2. Scientific Reasoning
Scientific reasoning characterizes a systematic pattern of thought involving four stages or steps, namely: puzzlement, speculation, adaptation, and explanation.4 Something occurs that does not fit comfortably into our background knowledge and expectations and thus becomes a source of puzzlement. Alternative theories that might possibly explain that occurrence are advanced for consideration. The available relevant evidence is brought to bear upon those hypotheses and their measures of evidential support are ascertained, where additional evidence may be obtained on the basis of observation, measurement, and experiment. The weight of the evidence is assessed, where the hypothesis with the strongest support is the preferable hypothesis. When sufficient evidence becomes available, the preferable hypothesis also becomes acceptable in the tentative and fallible fashion of science.5
Among the most important distinctions that need to be drawn in reasoning about alternative scenarios for historical events of the kind that matter here are those between different kinds of necessity, possibility and impossibility.6 Our language imposes some constraints upon the possible as functions of grammar and meaning. In ordinary English, for example, a freshman is a student, necessarily, because to be a freshman is to be a student in the first year of a four-year curriculum. By the same token, it is impossible to be a freshman and not be a student. The first is a logical necessity, the second a logical impossibility. Since a conspiracy requires at least two conspirators, if there were not at least two conspirators, it is not logically possible that a conspiracy was involved; if there were, then necessarily there was.
More interesting than logical necessities, possibilities and impossibilities, however, are physical necessities, possibilities and impossibilities.7 These are determined in relation to the laws of nature, which, unlike laws of society, cannot be violated, cannot be changed, and require no enforcement. If (pure) water freezes at 32° F at sea level atmospheric pressure, for example, then it is physically necessary for a sample of (pure) water to freeze when its temperature falls below 32° F at that pressure. Analogously, under those same conditions, that a sample of (pure) water would not freeze when its temperature falls below 32° F is physically impossible. And when a sample of (pure) water is not frozen at that pressure, it is justifiable to infer that it is therefore not at a temperature below its freezing point of 32° F.8
Laws of nature are the core of science and provide the principles on the basis of which the occurrence of events can be systematically explained, predicted, and retrodicted.9 They therefore have an important role to play in reasoning about specific cases in which those principles make a difference. In legal reasoning, for example, the phrase, "beyond a reasonable doubt", means a standard of proof that requires subjective conviction that is equal to "moral certainty".10 In the context of scientific reasoning, the meaning of that same phrase is better captured by the objective standard that an explanation is "beyond a reasonable doubt" when no alternative is reasonable. Notice that the falsity of hypotheses that describe the occurrence of events that are physically impossible is beyond a reasonable doubt.11
3. Probabilities and Likelihoods
An appropriate measure of the weight of the evidence is provided by likelihoods, where the likelihood of an hypothesis h, given evidence e, is determined by the probability of evidence e, if that hypothesis were true.12 Hypotheses should be tested in pairs, h1 and h2, where the relationship between the hypotheses and the evidence may be regarded as that between possible causes and effects. Thus, suppose in a game of chance, you were confronted with a long series of outcomes that would have been highly improbable if the coin were symmetrical (if the dice were fair, or if the deck was normal). If such a run would be far more probable if the coin were bent (if the dice were loaded, if the deck was stacked), then the likelihood that the coin is bent (the dice are loaded, the deck is stacked) is much higher than the likelihood the coin is symmetrical (dice are fair, deck is normal).
A better grasp of probabilistic reasoning follows from distinguishing between two kinds of probabilities as properties of the world. The first is relative frequencies, which simply represent "how often" things of one kind occur in relation to things of another kind. This includes averages of many different varieties, such as the average grade on a philosophy exam in a course on critical thinking. The second is causal propensities, which reflect "how strong" the tendencies are for outcomes of a certain kind to be brought about under specific conditions.13 Frequencies are brought about by propensities, which may differ from one case to another. When the class averages 85 on the first exam, that does not mean every student scored 85 on the exam. It might even be the case that no student actually had that score. But each students' own score was an effect of his propensity to score on that exam.
It can be easy to confuse "how often" with "how strong", but some examples help to bring their difference home. Canoeing on the Brule River in Wisconsin is not a hazardous pastime, but a 76-year old woman was killed on 15 July 1993 when a tree that had been gnawed by a beaver fell and landed on her. The tree fell and hit the woman on the head, as she and her daughter paddled past it.14 The tree was about 18 inches in diameter and 30 to 40 feet tall and stood about 10 to 20 feet up the river bank. So while hundreds and hundreds of canoeists had paddled down the Brule River before and escaped completely unscathed, this woman had the misfortune to be killed during "a freak accident". It was improbable in terms of its relative frequency of occurrence yet, given those particular conditions, the causal propensity for death to result as an effect of that specific event was great.
When the same causally relevant conditions are subject to replication, then the relative frequencies that result tend to be reliable evidence of the strength of the causal propensity that produced them. But when those conditions can vary, how often an outcome occurs may not indicate the strength of that tendency on any specific trial. We commonly assume smoking diminishes life spans, which is usually true. But a 21-year old man was confronted by three thugs who, when he failed to respond quickly enough, shot him. He might have been killed, but a metal cigarette lighter deflected the .25-caliber bullet and he lived.15 Once you appreciate the difference, three principles that relate probabilities of these kinds become apparent, namely: that propensities cause frequencies; that frequencies are evidence for propensities; and that propensities can explain frequencies. But it depends on the constancy of the relevant conditions from one trial to another.16
4. The Case of JFK
Conspiracy theories have to be assessed using principles of scientific reasoning. In the case of JFK, the difficulty has not been a dearth of evidence but sorting through the superabundance of conflicting and even contradictory physical, medical, witness, and photographic "evidence" to ascertain which is authentic and which is not. Something qualifies as evidence in relation to an hypothesis just in case its presence or absence or its truth or falsity makes a difference to the truth or falsity of that hypothesis. But "evidence" can be planted, faked, or fabricated to provide a false foundation for reasoning.17 That has proven to be true here. Once the task of sorting things out has been performed, it becomes relatively simple to draw appropriate inferences about the general character of the assassination on the basis of what we have learned about the cover-up,
Early studies by Harold Weisberg, Mark Lane, and Sylvia Meagher, for example, were instrumental in establishing that The Warren Report (1964) could not be sustained on the basis of evidence available even then (Weisberg 1965, Lane 1966, Meagher 1967). According to the official account, a lone assassin fired three shots from the sixth floor of the Texas School Book Depositor Building, scoring two hits. One of those hits is supposed to have entered at the base of the President's neck, passed through without hitting any bony structures and exited just above his tie. It then entered the back of Governor John Connally, who was seated in front of him, shattered a rib, exited his chest and injured his right wrist before being deflected into his left thigh. The bullet alleged to have followed this trajectory was later "found" in virtually pristine condition.
This sequence of events appears so improbable that the missile that caused all of this damage has come to be known as the "magic bullet".18 The jacket and the shirt JFK was wearing both have holes about 5 1/2 inches below the collar. An autopsy diagram verified by the President's personal physician shows a wound at that same location. A second diagram prepared by an FBI observer shows the wound to the back below the wound to the throat. The death certificate executed by the President's personal physician also places that wound at the level of the third thoracic vertebra, about 5 1/2 inches below the collar. Even photographs taken during re-enactments of the shooting show patches on stand-ins for the President at that location.19
Although The Warren Report tries to imply that the "magic bullet" theory is not indispensable to its conclusions, that is a gross misrepresentation. No less an authority than Michael Baden, M.D., who chaired the forensic panel that reviewed the medical evidence when the case was reinvestigated by the House Select Committee on Assassinations in 1977-78, has remarked that, if the "magic bullet" theory is false, then there had to have been at least six shots from three different directions.20 An especially disturbing aspect of this situation is that all the evidence described here was not only available to the HSCA in 1977-78 but had been discussed quite extensively in those early books by Weisberg, Lane, and Meagher (Weisberg 1965, Lane 1966, Meagher 1967). The government has simply ignored their discoveries.21
5. Recent Scientific Studies
Since the release of Oliver Stone's film, "JFK", in 1992, research on the assassination evidence (conducted by the best qualified persons who have ever studied the case)22 has revealed that the autopsy X-rays have been altered in several ways, that another brain was substituted for that of JFK during its examination, and that the home movie ostensibly taken by a spectator named Abraham Zapruder has not only been extensively edited but actually recreated by reshooting each of its frames (Fetzer 1998, 2002, 2003).23 The film was redone using techniques of optical printing and special effects, which allow combining any background with any foreground to create any impression that one desires, which included removing series of frames that would have given the plot away, such as that the driver pulled the limousine to the left and stopped after shots began to be fired.24
The alterations of the medical evidence include "patching" a massive defect in the back of the head caused by a shot from in front, in the case of the lateral cranial X-ray, and adding a 6.5 mm metallic slice to the anterior/posterior X-ray, in an evident attempt to implicate a 6.5 mm weapon in the assassination, which have been exposed by means of optical density studies.25 Adapting a simple technique from physics, David W. Mantik, M.D., Ph.D., on the basis of objective measurements and repeatable experiments, has been able to prove that the JFK autopsy X-rays are not authentic. And, by even simpler comparisons between descriptions from experienced and professional physicians at Parkland Hospital describing extensive damage to the brain of JFK, Robert Livingston, M.D., a world authority on the human brain, has concluded that the diagrams and photographs of a brain that are stored in the National Archives must be of a brain other than that of John Fitzgerald Kennedy.26
The evidence establishing the recreation of the Zapruder film comes from diverse sources, including that frame 232 was published in LIFE with physically impossible features; that a mistake was made in introducing the Stemmons Freeway sign into the recreated version; that the "blob" and blood spray was added on to frame 313; that the driver's head turns occur too rapidly to even be humanly possible; that the Governor's left turn has been edited out of the film; that Erwin Swartz, an associate of Abraham Zapruder, reported having observed blood and brains blown out to the back and left when he viewed the original film; that several Secret Service agents observed brains and blood on the trunk of the limousine; that others have viewed another and more complete version of the film; and that Homer McMahon, an expert at the National Photographic Interpretation Center, studied a very different film on that very night.27
Other evidence that has long been available to serious students of the death of JFK includes multiple indications of Secret Service complicity in setting him up for the hit.28 There was no welding of the manhole covers; no coverage of open windows; the motorcycles were placed in a non-protective formation; agents did not ride on the limousine; an improper route, including a turn of more than 90°, was utilized; the vehicles were in an improper sequence; the limousine slowed nearly to a halt at Houston and Elm; the limousine was actually brought to a stop after bullets began to be fired; the agents were non-responsive; brains and blood were washed from the limousine at Parkland before the President was even pronounced dead; the autopsy X-rays and photographs were taken from the morgue; and the limousine was sent to Ford Motor Company, stripped down and completely rebuilt, on 25 November 1963.29
6. Patterns of Reasoning
Records released by the ARRB have shown that Gerald Ford (R-MI), a member of the commission, had the description of the wound changed from "his uppermost back", which was already an exaggeration, to "the base of the back of his neck" to make the "magic bullet" theory more plausible (Fetzer 1998, p. 177). And Mantik has now proven that no bullet could have taken the trajectory ascribed to the "magic bullet" because cervical vertebrae intervene (Fetzer 2000, pp. 3-4). So the vastly influential accounts of the death of JFK that take it for granted as their foundation— The Warren Report, The House Select Committee on Assassinations Report, and Gerald Posner's Case Closed—are not only false but provably false and not even anatomically possible.
The wound to his throat and the wounds to Connally have to be explained on the basis of other shots and other shooters. We now know that JFK was hit four times—in the throat from in front; in the back from behind; and twice in the head: in the back of the head from behind and then in the right temple from in front.30 We know Connally was hit at least once and another shot missed and injured a bystander. It thus turns out that Michael Baden, M.D., was correct when he observed that, if the "magic bullet" theory is false, then there had to have been at least six shots from at least three different directions. The theory is not even anatomically possible and, with at least one to Connally and one miss, there had to have been at least six shots.31
Anatomical impossibility, of course, is one kind of physical impossibility, insofar as human are vertebrates with vertebrae, including those of the cervical variety. The wound observations of the attending physicians at Parkland and at Bethesda were cleverly concealed by Arlen Specter, now a United States Senator from Pennsylvania, but then a junior counsel to the Warren Commission. Specter did not ask the doctors what they had observed or what they had inferred from what they had observed, but instead posed a hypothetical question: "If we assume that the bullet entered the base of the back of the neck, traversed the neck without impacting any bony structures, and came out just above the level of the tie", he asked, "would that be consistent with describing the neck wound as a wound of exit?" In response to this trivial question, they dutifully replied that it would be, but Malcolm Perry, M.D., who had performed a tracheostomy through the wound and had described it three times as a wound of entry during a press conference, added that he was not in the position to vouch for or to verify the assumptions he had been asked to make, which of course was true.32
The discoveries about the X-rays, the brain, and the Zapruder film are also powerful. What makes these discoveries so significant as evidence is that none of these things could possibly have been done by Lee Harvey Oswald, the alleged assassin, who was either incarcerated or already dead. Other theories, moreover, can be rejected on similar grounds. The Mafia, for example, could not have extended its reach into the Bethesda Naval Hospital to alter X-rays under the control of agents of the Secret Service, medical officers of the United States Navy, and the President's personal physician. Neither pro nor anti-Castro Cubans could have substituted one brain for another. Nor could the KGB, which probably had the same ability as Hollywood and the CIA to fabricate movies, have been able to gain possession of the Zapruder film to subject it to alteration. Which raises the question, Who had the power to make these things happen? Given what we know now, the answer is no longer difficult to discern. It required involvement at the highest levels of the American government.
Insofar as the "magic bullet" theory describes the occurrence of events that are not only provably false but actually physically impossible, that it cannot possibly be true is beyond reasonable doubt. Moreover, the discovery that the autopsy X-rays have been altered, that another brain has been substituted, and that the Zapruder film has been recreated imply a very meticulous and carefully planned cover-up in which the alleged assassin could not have been involved. The identification of more than a dozen indications of Secret Service complicity means that the evidence has "settled down".33 The probability of the evidence on the lone-assassin hypothesis does not even rise to zero, since it posits a physically impossible sequence, whose value is better set at null.34 The probability of the evidence on a conspiracy scenario, by comparison, is extremely high, depending upon the competence and the power of those who carried it out. There is in fact no reasonable alternative to a fairly large-scale conspiracy in the death of our 35th President, which means that it has been established beyond a reasonable doubt.35
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