Skeptic Project

The rancher should have repaired the fence, and we dont know if he left the gate open himself either. There are potentially two things the rancher could have done wrong.

We dont know which direction the train was heading in or if the cow was hit by a train, even though it may look like it had been, there are no witnesses to the incident therefore without actual evidence the train did the damage we can not claim the railroad is responsible for its death in the first place.

We dont know if the railroad had actually closed the gate or not, maybe they had, maybe someone else opened it ?
We also dont know if the incident took place in the morning or the night, the gate may have been closed on the night.

I think the railroad could be found innocent here ?

Are you sure there really is a cow? Maybe the rancher doctored it to make the railroad look bad.

the railroad.

Anticultist and Omni win. In this scenario the railroad wins, because the evidence shows it was more likely that the cow game out of the break in the fence than the open gate.

If the cow was found closer to the gate than the fence, the railroad would lose.

In case you didn't catch on, this is the logic exercise I was referring to in the VTV topic. Is there a possibility that the cow could have come out of the open gate? Yes, of course. But in the absence of evidence that that is more likely to have happened than the cow coming out of the break in the fence, the evidence that we have--that the cow was found closer to the fence break than the gate--is conclusive despite the bare possibility of something else happening.

So it came down to the positioning of the body, that was quirky.

So basically the evidence we have is that VTV made the post, his IP and his email are on it, he does not deny making the post, but denies its content.

Meanwhile there is no evidence at all that James Kush edited the post so because of this the evidence that VTV made the post in its original form outweighs it not being his original post.

All of the evidence points to VTV having disclosed Merola's parents' identity. Not just some of it. ALL of it. It is uncontroverted.

VTV claims Kush did it and swears it's possible. Yes, it's possible. But the acknowledgement that that possibility exists doesn't substitute for evidence that can controvert the conclusion that the only evidence we have irrevocably leads to--that VTV made the disclosures himself.

This is where VTV's argument is faulty. He wants to claim that the possibility that the evidence we have could be falsified by Kush means that that evidence shouldn't be considered. Nothing could be further from rationality.

What VTV is doing here is confusing "could happen" with "did happen." Conspiracy theorists often make this error. I got into this issue in part of my "Sept. 11: What Do We Know?" article:

Could Happen vs. Did Happen

Another reason why the sequence of events proven here should be compelling, as opposed to alternative claims (conspiracy theories), is evidentiary: not just that this sequence of events is supported by evidence, but that proponents of alternative claims usually spend much of their time making the case that something could happen--whereas this account demonstrates that the events presented here did happen.

Example: take the Steven Jones "controlled demolition" hypothesis considered in Part 2 above. The entire thrust of Dr. Jones's arguments is that the "official story" could not have happened, and that his version could have happened. This, however, is not the same as claiming that it did happen. For a theory like controlled demolition, in order to demonstrate that it is likely enough to have happened to be accepted as truth (or at least as potential truth), one must (1) explain away all the evidence presented here; (2) establish, scientifically and factually, that controlled demolition in those circumstances is possible; and (3) present evidence that it actually happened in this specific case. To date, Dr. Jones and his supporters have focused only on point (2), giving perfunctory and selective attention to point (1) and ignoring point (3) completely. Controlled demolition supporters sometimes venture into speculation as to how the explosives might have been planted--but they cannot present a shred of evidence to show that these speculated scenarios actually occurred.

By contrast, the sequence of events presented here is not merely a supposition of what could have happened, but what actually did happen. It is not a conjectural theory along the lines of, "Well, it's possible that Al Qaida hijackers could have taken over planes and crashed them into the WTC towers." The evidence presented here affirmatively indicates that this is actually what happened--not potentially, which is the realm in which "controlled demolition" theories operate, but actually, which is the level of fact needed in order to declare something the probable truth.

http://conspiracies.skepticproject.com/articles/911/what-do-we-know/page/5/#part5

Domokato:

No, the case wouldn't be thrown out. How could it be? If you have a lawsuit that is valid as a matter of law--meaning, it's not a frivolous suit or based on erroneous legal principles--a court can't just throw up their hands and say, "We have no idea who should win." You have to come to some decision--somebody has to win and somebody has to lose.

Actually this case was interesting because it was decided on summary judgment, meaning, it's so obvious, legally, who will win that it's pointless to have a trial. If your side's evidence is uncontroverted, for instance, you can petition the judge to declare you the winner on the grounds that there's no possibility that the other side could win. If the cow was found 48 feet from the fence break and 52 from the gate, the railroad wins on summary judgment because there's no possibility that the rancher could win. Conversely, if it was the other way around--if the cow was found 52 feet from the fence break and 48 from the gate--the rancher wins on summary judgement, because there is no possibility that the railroad could win.

I know it seems a little strange, but this is how it works, logically and legally. Could the cow have come out of the gate instead of the fence break and still have been found where it was? Of course, but because no one saw it happen and there's never going to be any more evidence than what we know we have, the only choice, logically, is to call it "more probable than not" that the cow was hit closer to where it emerged from the pasture than farther away.

I brought up this example as a way to show that, in order to be conclusive, evidence does not have to foreclose absolutely ALL possibility of being explainable by some other means. All it has to be is uncontroverted.

I agree with you that the evidence that VTV leaked the Merolas' details is MUCH stronger than the evidence of where the cow was found in this example. But the principle is the same. VTV insists we're unfair in concluding he's guilty because there is the technical possibility that Kush could have forged the posts. But in the absence of evidence that that is actually what happened, the conclusion that seems to follow from what we know--that it was VTV who made those posts--is inescapable, uncontroverted, and absolutely conclusive.

Let me give you another example.

Mrs. X is found dead with her throat slashed. Mr. X, who is known to be a violent individual and recently had an argument with his wife, is arrested with the knife in his car. His fingerprints are on the knife, Mrs. X's blood is on the knife, and Mrs. X's blood is all over his clothes. Mr. X claims he was elsewhere at the time of the murder and suggests that someone planted the knife in his car, but there's no evidence to support this theory.

Under VTV's rationale, you could not find Mr. X guilty of Mrs. X's murder based on this evidence. As long as there was a technical possibility that someone could have planted the knife in Mr. X's car, this, in VTV's view of evidence, is grounds for excluding both the knife and the blood from evidence entirely.

This is the principle VTV is asking you to adopt. Doesn't make sense, does it?

"Innocent until proven guilty" is the rule only in criminal cases. In civil cases it's different, but that doesn't really matter in the cow case anyway.

We're not figuring the raw probability of scenario A versus scenario B. In the cow case you are constrained by:

1. You have to make a decision--you can't not decide for one side or the other.
2. You have to make a decision on some rational basis.
3. You don't have, and never will have, any more evidence than what you see here.

In the cow case #2 is the linchpin. The only rational basis available from the limited evidence is the suggestion that the cow is more likely to have been killed closer to the spot where it left the pasture. Since that suggestion is logical, when it meshes with the evidence we have in this case, that small bit of evidence proves 100% conclusive simply because there is no other evidence to go on.

VTV's case is much more clear cut than that--let's make no mistake about that lest VTV cite this topic as some sort of admission by us that the evidence damning him for exposing Merola's parents is somehow scanty or speculative, which it isn't. I know you, Domokato, agree with me on this point, but I'm just saying it again because VTV will twist anything we say.

Neil is a master at spinning fabrications and he never owns up to a single one.

Tell me Mr. 'Logic' If the cow was hit by a train, WHY WAS IT THAT FAR AWAY FROM THE TRACKS?!

James Kush moved the cow farther away from the tracks than where VTV left it.

Zombie cow!

I think the NWO was at fault for the death of the cow!!!

Inside Job, it's not really about what's possible, it's about what conclusion takes the least number of inferential jumps to reach from the evidence available.

No one disputes that it's certainly possible that the cow emerged from whatever exit it was farther away from. But that's not the point. Your analysis is certainly possible, but it takes more jumps to get there than the simplest analysis--that the cow came out of the exit it was closest to.