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From: mstein@access1.digex.net (Michael P. Stein)
Newsgroups: alt.revisionism
Subject: Re: Well designed mass gassing chambers
Date: 29 Jun 1996 22:51:05 -0400
Organization: Express Access Online Communications, Greenbelt, MD USA
Lines: 98
Message-ID: <4r4q2p$agb@access1.digex.net>
References: <4r0uep$8f4@access5.digex.net> <4r127b$1kj@newsbf02.news.aol.com>
NNTP-Posting-Host: access1.digex.net

In article <4r127b$1kj@newsbf02.news.aol.com>,
Ehrlich606  wrote:
>In article <4r0uep$8f4@access5.digex.net>, mstein@access5.digex.net
>(Michael P. Stein) writes:
>
>>    Assertion.  No support with documentation, rates and computations. 
>>As usual.  Therefore nothing to discuss.
>
>I disagree. Matt raises a number of issues about the condensation and
>evaporation of HCN that even you admit are probably valid.  The fact that
>he does not do a set of calculations to _prove_ they are valid is
>irrelevant.  He is raising legitimate points.  Respond to them on that
>level.

    Let's leave aside for the moment that this would only be true in the
winter - in the summer, things would work very well in Kremas II and III,
because they were underground rooms and the incoming air would tend to be
warmer.  Spring and fall days would be a wash.  The most active period of
gassing, according to the witnesses, was in May, 1944, when the Hungarian
Jews were arriving en masse.  No heating needed, and no prolonged
temperature difference problems during the day, at least. 

    The short answer is that since the witnesses reported no problems, the
effects were not enough to cause problems - or they did not conduct
gassings under conditions which would cause problems.  Imagine if I
questioned whether you were telling the truth about seeing a catcher catch
a baseball because it had been thrown at 90mph.  "It would break his
wrist!"  Do you really need to compute the force of a baseball at 90mph,
the characteristics of a catcher's mitt, and the strength of the bones in
the wrist in order to prove to the world that you are not lying about
seeing a fastball caught?  According to one theory, bumblebees could not
fly.  Should we revise the theory, or declare that all observation of
flying bumblebees are lies or hallucinations?

    He did not question whether there would be problems.  He made specific
assertions of fact - not just that there would be certain phenomena to
some degree, but that these phenomena would cause problems (with the
insinuation that the witnesses were lying).  Therefore he has the burden
of proof for backing up his claims, and of proving that the witnesses
lied.  Besides, in order to make a claim, he must have certain knowledge. 
Therefore he ought to give an accounting of the source of that knowledge
so that others may evaluate it.

    He is playing a very dishonest game: he demands that everyone else
provide proof of their claims, but that everyone else must also provide
supported rebuttal of his unsupported assertions.  And then he will
reject technical references as being invalid Because!  He!  Says!  So!

    If you have not noticed this, you are blind.  And if you have noticed
this, you are aiding and abetting intellectual dishonesty.

    I have attempted to address claims about energy requirements for
cremation.  And he has weaseled, dodged, evaded, used false and deceptive
computations, and then outright lied about having posted detailed,
supported computations of the amount of energy needed to heat the water in
a 70kg corpse to the point necessary to permit ignition.  The closest he
ever got involved numbers pulled from his demonstrably unreliable memory
and backed up by a book that was still packed away somewhere.  Sorry, that
doesn't cut it.

    If I were to post numbers, he would simply say they were wrong
Because!  He!  Says!  So!  Anything he doesn't like, he simply accuses the
other poster of lying.  Rich Green is a doctoral student in chemistry. 
Richard Schultz is a chemistry professor.  Yet they have both been told by
a person that has _no_ credentials in chemistry that they are wrong about
a number of items - but no documentation is offered to support that
assertion.

    Therefore I have insisted that he be the first to produce the figures
he says he knows how to compute - and besides, it was his claim and he
bears burden of proof for claims which he makes.  Once he gives properly
supported figures, _then_ it is for me to either accept them or bring
equally well-supported rebuttal to show where he went wrong. 

    In case you hadn't figured it out, he is not acting as a scientist
engaged in a dispassionate search for truth.  He is acting as a defense
lawyer, looking for any means he can to produce "reasonable doubt."  If he
were interested in the truth, he would provide the computations he says he
knows how to do rather than engaging in game-playing.

    And what about you?  Are you interested in the truth?  Or are you here
to aid and abet intellectual dishonesty?  Why don't _you_ investigate this
matter if you are interested?  Why is it always _my_ responsibility not
only back up my own claims, but to provide proof that everyone else's
unsupported assertions are false, and to do all the work only to be told
that my evidence is not good enough (Because!  I!  Say!  So!).

    Because, you see, that is the final bit of intellectual dishonesty
going on here: like Greg Raven before him, he is surreptitiously playing
both defense attorney and judge.

    And what are you playing? 

    Posted/emailed.
-- 
Mike Stein                      The above represents the Absolute Truth.
POB 10420                       Therefore it cannot possibly be the official
Arlington, VA  22210            position of my employer.

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