Why HRW is untrustworthy

[Don2 (Don1 Revised)]

But this wasn't wind, this was a shockwave. Whatever you argue about wind has no bearing on the situation, the important thing is a shockwave kills at a far lower energy than it takes to throw you.

Being right next to the explosion (i.e. like say a foot away) isn't going to allow a victim to be alive provided they are in the path of the explosion, but being further away increases likelihood of survival. Within the range of surviving wind speeds, there is a sweet spot that can be inferred from above and CDC tables where speed is fast enough to hold a person up but doesn't necessarily kill them.

There is no relevant wind speed.

The CDC report is about explosion blasts!

 

[barbos]

One of the other odd things about this is that there is skepticism because the odds of an individual surviving are less than probable. But the thing is that this is not about an individual, but a whole group of people--this guy's relatives etc--and those people, presumably who were closer or in some other position more prone to being killed, actually were killed...so when we look at probability, we should consider something more like, what are the odds one guy survives with wounds and another 4 (or whatever) are killed. And that is a very viable scenario.

Odds of being thrown into the air by the blast and surviving are zero.

One the one hand, I understand the frustration. Palestinian leadership is notorious for big lies to the media and using their own people as cannon fodder to keep garnering support for their wealth and power. I get that.

But, when it comes to human beings, blanket absolutes like this post are nearly always false. People survive things that should have killed them. Traumatic events like bomb blasts often leave inaccurate memories. Doesn't mean all of it's wrong.
Tom

I am talking about physics, not inaccurate memories.

 

[barbos]

Google says shockwave with 1 bar overpressure is most likely gonna kill you.
But well before that it will cause significant damage to lungs and well before that it will blow your ear drums.
And 1 bar overpressure will accelerate human body to less than 1 meter/sec. So it would not even be able to stop you walking toward explosion.

Nuclear explosions and so called vacuum bombs do produce winds but they are really different type with orders of magnitude higher energy yield. In Vacuum bombs they basically mix air with fuel and then ignite it. it produce a lot of expanding outward gas and wind, which then cools and creates lower pressure and inward wind. This works well on clearing up land. These are not supersonic detonation as in HE (ordinary bombs)

 

[laughing dog]

The club of people who are mistaken about this is greater than you think.

Look at this video - a man standing on a grate is blow into the air by an explosion.
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/shocking-video-shows-man-survive-sidewalk-explosion-in-queens/3177378/

Huh? There's a blast of fire, he pulls back and falls. He's not thrown anywhere.

No, he is clearly thrown.

 

[laughing dog]

One the one hand, I understand the frustration. Palestinian leadership is notorious for big lies to the media and using their own people as cannon fodder to keep garnering support for their wealth and power. I get that.

But, when it comes to human beings, blanket absolutes like this post are nearly always false. People survive things that should have killed them. Traumatic events like bomb blasts often leave inaccurate memories. Doesn't mean all of it's wrong.
Tom

I am talking about physics, not inaccurate memories.

No, you are talking about memories because the evidence does not support your memory.

 

[marc]

The club of people who are mistaken about this is greater than you think.

Look at this video - a man standing on a grate is blow into the air by an explosion.
https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/shocking-video-shows-man-survive-sidewalk-explosion-in-queens/3177378/

Huh? There's a blast of fire, he pulls back and falls. He's not thrown anywhere.

No, he is clearly thrown.

Either way, if the guy was asked what happened he might give a description similar to what was in the HRW article. And of course the HRW article was quoting an eye witness, not digging into the minutia of his account, debating how far one must "flew into the air" for it not to be labeled a lie and therefore discount everything in every article on the site.

 

[barbos]

No, he is clearly thrown.

Either way, if the guy was asked what happened he might give a description similar to what was in the HRW article. And of course the HRW article was quoting an eye witness, not digging into the minutia of his account, debating how far one must "flew into the air" for it not to be labeled a lie and therefore discount everything in every article on the site.

Posted video has literally nothing in common with how military explosives explode.
It's a freaking gas burn in a confined space.
I don't know why LM got all worked up about this particular case instead of staged chemical attack videos where it's clear that people are acting.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

Google says shockwave with 1 bar overpressure is most likely gonna kill you.
But well before that it will cause significant damage to lungs and well before that it will blow your ear drums.
And 1 bar overpressure will accelerate human body to less than 1 meter/sec. So it would not even be able to stop you walking toward explosion.

Nuclear explosions and so called vacuum bombs do produce winds but they are really different type with orders of magnitude higher energy yield. In Vacuum bombs they basically mix air with fuel and then ignite it. it produce a lot of expanding outward gas and wind, which then cools and creates lower pressure and inward wind. This works well on clearing up land. These are not supersonic detonation as in HE (ordinary bombs)

The lower the energy density of the bomb the less shockwave and the more wind becomes an issue. Fuel-air is the ultimate example of this. Note that the military use these only against large, soft targets because that's all they're good at.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No, he is clearly thrown.

Either way, if the guy was asked what happened he might give a description similar to what was in the HRW article. And of course the HRW article was quoting an eye witness, not digging into the minutia of his account, debating how far one must "flew into the air" for it not to be labeled a lie and therefore discount everything in every article on the site.

HRW chose that as an example. It is clearly at best a bad description of what happened--which implies the rest of their "evidence" is of very low quality, also. You're going to use your best stuff to make your point.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

No, he is clearly thrown.

Either way, if the guy was asked what happened he might give a description similar to what was in the HRW article. And of course the HRW article was quoting an eye witness, not digging into the minutia of his account, debating how far one must "flew into the air" for it not to be labeled a lie and therefore discount everything in every article on the site.

HRW chose that as an example. It is clearly at best a bad description of what happened--which implies the rest of their "evidence" is of very low quality, also. You're going to use your best stuff to make your point.

It occurs to me that this report actually makes a lot more sense if what he's seeing is not Israeli at all, but a piece of a Hamas rocket thrown up by an Israeli bomb. It would be moving an awful lot slower and the explosion of a rocket motor wouldn't produce anything like the shockwave that high explosives would.

 

[bilby]

No, he is clearly thrown.

Either way, if the guy was asked what happened he might give a description similar to what was in the HRW article. And of course the HRW article was quoting an eye witness, not digging into the minutia of his account, debating how far one must "flew into the air" for it not to be labeled a lie and therefore discount everything in every article on the site.

HRW chose that as an example. It is clearly at best a bad description of what happened--which implies the rest of their "evidence" is of very low quality, also. You're going to use your best stuff to make your point.

It occurs to me that this report actually makes a lot more sense if what he's seeing is not Israeli at all, but a piece of a Hamas rocket thrown up by an Israeli bomb. It would be moving an awful lot slower and the explosion of a rocket motor wouldn't produce anything like the shockwave that high explosives would.

Well I am glad that you have finally been able to invent a sufficient number of baseless premises to be able to persuade yourself that your implausible conclusions can be derived via reason and logic. I'm sure it makes you feel far more comfortable in your blind and unfounded bias. Well done.

Just don't expect your "reasoning" to persuade anyone who didn't start out from a position of sharing your biases, and everything will be fine.

It's a very effective technique; All the major irrational beliefs use it quite extensively.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

HRW chose that as an example. It is clearly at best a bad description of what happened--which implies the rest of their "evidence" is of very low quality, also. You're going to use your best stuff to make your point.

It occurs to me that this report actually makes a lot more sense if what he's seeing is not Israeli at all, but a piece of a Hamas rocket thrown up by an Israeli bomb. It would be moving an awful lot slower and the explosion of a rocket motor wouldn't produce anything like the shockwave that high explosives would.

Well I am glad that you have finally been able to invent a sufficient number of baseless premises to be able to persuade yourself that your implausible conclusions can be derived via reason and logic. I'm sure it makes you feel far more comfortable in your blind and unfounded bias. Well done.

Just don't expect your "reasoning" to persuade anyone who didn't start out from a position of sharing your biases, and everything will be fine.

It's a very effective technique; All the major irrational beliefs use it quite extensively.

You still haven't actually addressed any of the issues.

 

[bilby]

HRW chose that as an example. It is clearly at best a bad description of what happened--which implies the rest of their "evidence" is of very low quality, also. You're going to use your best stuff to make your point.

It occurs to me that this report actually makes a lot more sense if what he's seeing is not Israeli at all, but a piece of a Hamas rocket thrown up by an Israeli bomb. It would be moving an awful lot slower and the explosion of a rocket motor wouldn't produce anything like the shockwave that high explosives would.

Well I am glad that you have finally been able to invent a sufficient number of baseless premises to be able to persuade yourself that your implausible conclusions can be derived via reason and logic. I'm sure it makes you feel far more comfortable in your blind and unfounded bias. Well done.

Just don't expect your "reasoning" to persuade anyone who didn't start out from a position of sharing your biases, and everything will be fine.

It's a very effective technique; All the major irrational beliefs use it quite extensively.

You still haven't actually addressed any of the issues.

Yes I have. I have addressed it all (there's literally only one issue in this thread):

No, but it is a Hollywood scene.

The blast force to kill is less than the blast force to throw you through the air.

These are not fixed quantities. A blast can easily kill only some of a group of people. People frequently survive overpressures that are fatal to others. Blast overpressure injuries are some of the least predictable events out there, and depend on a vast number of variables including (but not limited to) the orientation of victims relative to the explosion; reflected blast wave interference; whether victims have their mouths open or closed; and the victim's body type and muscle to fat ratio. And all of that is before considering impact injuries.

The probability of surviving a blast that knocks you over is low, but certainly not zero.

There are no other issues.

Summary of the thread:

LP: HRW reported an account by a Palestinian who described his experience of being close to an explosion. That account includes a single physically impossible detail, therefore HRW is completely untrustworthy in every regard and should be ignored.

Bilby: What they reported is completely in keeping with similar accounts by other people in other war zones, and (while unlikely) is not at all impossible.

LP: <Invents increasingly convoluted set of fictional events that could cast the Palestinians in the worst possible light>

Bilby: That's ridiculous speculation that has no basis other than your desire to feel like you're not wrong

LP: You still haven't addressed any of the issues


There's one issue. Is the story as reported compatible with HRW being a reliable source? The answer is 'Yes'. There's no evidence to suggest that they are less credible than any other sources. /Thread.

Everything else is FUD in an attempt to obscure the simple fact that the thread title is wrong. "Why HRW is untrustworthy" - there's no evidence that they are, case closed. Why does LP think they are? They don't share his biases, and he's able, with some Olympic standard mental gymnastics, to shoehorn the facts into an alternate hypothesis in which his biases are supported.

The bigger question here is "Why would it matter?" If HRW were untrustworthy, that wouldn't change the fact that people are dying in a stupid conflict.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You still haven't actually addressed any of the issues.

Yes I have. I have addressed it all (there's literally only one issue in this thread):

No, but it is a Hollywood scene.

The blast force to kill is less than the blast force to throw you through the air.

These are not fixed quantities. A blast can easily kill only some of a group of people. People frequently survive overpressures that are fatal to others. Blast overpressure injuries are some of the least predictable events out there, and depend on a vast number of variables including (but not limited to) the orientation of victims relative to the explosion; reflected blast wave interference; whether victims have their mouths open or closed; and the victim's body type and muscle to fat ratio. And all of that is before considering impact injuries.

The probability of surviving a blast that knocks you over is low, but certainly not zero.

There are no other issues.

Summary of the thread:

LP: HRW reported an account by a Palestinian who described his experience of being close to an explosion. That account includes a single physically impossible detail, therefore HRW is completely untrustworthy in every regard and should be ignored.

Bilby: What they reported is completely in keeping with similar accounts by other people in other war zones, and (while unlikely) is not at all impossible.

LP: <Invents increasingly convoluted set of fictional events that could cast the Palestinians in the worst possible light>

Bilby: That's ridiculous speculation that has no basis other than your desire to feel like you're not wrong

LP: You still haven't addressed any of the issues


There's one issue. Is the story as reported compatible with HRW being a reliable source? The answer is 'Yes'. There's no evidence to suggest that they are less credible than any other sources. /Thread.

Everything else is FUD in an attempt to obscure the simple fact that the thread title is wrong. "Why HRW is untrustworthy" - there's no evidence that they are, case closed. Why does LP think they are? They don't share his biases, and he's able, with some Olympic standard mental gymnastics, to shoehorn the facts into an alternate hypothesis in which his biases are supported.

The bigger question here is "Why would it matter?" If HRW were untrustworthy, that wouldn't change the fact that people are dying in a stupid conflict.

You are looking at the fact that a blast can do different things to different people and using that to say a blast can do different things to the same person.

 

[bilby]

Yes I have. I have addressed it all (there's literally only one issue in this thread):

No, but it is a Hollywood scene.

The blast force to kill is less than the blast force to throw you through the air.

These are not fixed quantities. A blast can easily kill only some of a group of people. People frequently survive overpressures that are fatal to others. Blast overpressure injuries are some of the least predictable events out there, and depend on a vast number of variables including (but not limited to) the orientation of victims relative to the explosion; reflected blast wave interference; whether victims have their mouths open or closed; and the victim's body type and muscle to fat ratio. And all of that is before considering impact injuries.

The probability of surviving a blast that knocks you over is low, but certainly not zero.

There are no other issues.

Summary of the thread:

LP: HRW reported an account by a Palestinian who described his experience of being close to an explosion. That account includes a single physically impossible detail, therefore HRW is completely untrustworthy in every regard and should be ignored.

Bilby: What they reported is completely in keeping with similar accounts by other people in other war zones, and (while unlikely) is not at all impossible.

LP: <Invents increasingly convoluted set of fictional events that could cast the Palestinians in the worst possible light>

Bilby: That's ridiculous speculation that has no basis other than your desire to feel like you're not wrong

LP: You still haven't addressed any of the issues


There's one issue. Is the story as reported compatible with HRW being a reliable source? The answer is 'Yes'. There's no evidence to suggest that they are less credible than any other sources. /Thread.

Everything else is FUD in an attempt to obscure the simple fact that the thread title is wrong. "Why HRW is untrustworthy" - there's no evidence that they are, case closed. Why does LP think they are? They don't share his biases, and he's able, with some Olympic standard mental gymnastics, to shoehorn the facts into an alternate hypothesis in which his biases are supported.

The bigger question here is "Why would it matter?" If HRW were untrustworthy, that wouldn't change the fact that people are dying in a stupid conflict.

You are looking at the fact that a blast can do different things to different people and using that to say a blast can do different things to the same person.

I am really not.

But I am sure that your beliefs make you feel better.

 

[KeepTalking]

One interesting thing is that Loren seems perfectly willing to concede that the attack happened, given that he has posted pictures ostensibly from this attack (no direct link, so no way to tell where the pictures came from). He just isn't willing to accept that a civilian may have been witness too, injured by, or otherwise in a position to relate experiences from this attack to the media. Nope, other than the Israeli ordinance causing minor damage to a street in Gaza, and completely obliterating secret bunkers underneath that street to the point that even the Israelis themselves can show no evidence that they were there, nothing else could possibly have been damaged by 1000 kilo bombs being dropped in a civilian area.

Nobody is denying that Israel bombed Gaza that day, the dispute is only over the details.

While a civilian certainly could have witnessed and been injured in the attack there are major problems with this guy's report--I was posting it because of what it says about HRW.

The thing it says about them is that they went to the site of the attack, and reported what witnesses told them. That is what HRW are there to do, it does not say anything bad about them.

As for the existence of the bunkers--that picture of the road I posted is pretty good evidence they were down there.

You did not source your picture, it could be any road anywhere in Gaza, or even elsewhere in the ME.

A bomb hitting a road isn't going to cause subsidence like that, but a bomb collapsing a hollow under the road certainly could. It's not limestone formations where you get sinkholes, a hollow is going to be man-made.

You mean like a sewer? Israel said they could not provide any evidence that there were underground bunkers that were attacked. You would think that if the picture you provided showed what you say it shows, they would have pointed to that as evidence of underground bunkers.

And any place with a military facility is a military area, even if it also has civilians.

Yes, however, claiming there were secret bunkers underground in that location, and then providing no evidence of that claim, does not help their case.

 

[Jarhyn]

The thing it says about them is that they went to the site of the attack, and reported what witnesses told them. That is what HRW are there to do, it does not say anything bad about them.

As for the existence of the bunkers--that picture of the road I posted is pretty good evidence they were down there.

You did not source your picture, it could be any road anywhere in Gaza, or even elsewhere in the ME.

A bomb hitting a road isn't going to cause subsidence like that, but a bomb collapsing a hollow under the road certainly could. It's not limestone formations where you get sinkholes, a hollow is going to be man-made.

You mean like a sewer? Israel said they could not provide any evidence that there were underground bunkers that were attacked. You would think that if the picture you provided showed what you say it shows, they would have pointed to that as evidence of underground bunkers.

And any place with a military facility is a military area, even if it also has civilians.

Yes, however, claiming there were secret bunkers underground in that location, and then providing no evidence of that claim, does not help their case.

To me, it just seems like a fig leaf over an attempt to "mow the grass", as I have seen it put in the past. Or in other words, another step in a slow genocide.

 

[Loren Pechtel]

You mean like a sewer? Israel said they could not provide any evidence that there were underground bunkers that were attacked. You would think that if the picture you provided showed what you say it shows, they would have pointed to that as evidence of underground bunkers.

It would have to be a hell of a big sewer to cause that kind of collapse. Remember, rubble takes more volume than intact--the holes we see on the surface are a lot smaller than the cavity below.

And any place with a military facility is a military area, even if it also has civilians.

Yes, however, claiming there were secret bunkers underground in that location, and then providing no evidence of that claim, does not help their case.

You think Israel is going to reveal their intel sources?!?!

 

[KeepTalking]

It would have to be a hell of a big sewer to cause that kind of collapse. Remember, rubble takes more volume than intact--the holes we see on the surface are a lot smaller than the cavity below.

So the fact that we see small holes means that it must have been a large cavity underneath?

Why don't you go ahead and let me know the exact size of those holes, and then let me know what size hole would have been created if there were a sewer there instead. I won't hold my breath.

Yes, however, claiming there were secret bunkers underground in that location, and then providing no evidence of that claim, does not help their case.

You think Israel is going to reveal their intel sources?!?!

Do you think those photos are from an Israeli intel source? If so, how did you get ahold of them.

In fact, I think we need to know how you got ahold of them regardless, since you have not provided a source for those photos, and therefor no evidence that those photos are from the incident in question. I won't be holding my breath waiting for that either.

 

[laughing dog]

You think Israel is going to reveal their intel sources?!?!

This is equivalent to a Christian fundamentalist saying "God works in mysterious ways".

There is no evidence to support your claim of fact. Your belief in the infallibility and morality of the IDF is not evidence of fact. But then, why should you start producing evidence of fact now?