Originally Posted by Mutton-Head
Yes, evidence is very important. However, it is important to START with the evidence and allow it to lead you where it will. If you START with a pre-conceived notion (such as "explosives were used in the WTC") then the evidence could lead you astray.
Here's a hypothetical example: Supposing I believe that a giant purple salamander is going out every morning and eating all the newspapers off the neighbor's driveways. I want to test this hypothesis by going out at 5:30 AM, right after they are delivered, and confirming that the newspapers are in fact lying on the driveways. An hour later, I go check them again. If my hypothesis is true, then the newspapers will be gone. Thus, the purple salamander hypothesis is proven.
See the problem here? I am so focused on my pre-conceived belief about what is happening, I fail to consider other, more mundane explanations.
That is why falsifiability is so important. If the purple salamander hypothesis were wrong, how would I know? Certainly not by watching the newspapers and finding that, in fact, the neighbors themselves are picking them up and taking them into their houses. I could simply say, "They beat the purple salamander to it", or "the purple salamander was sick today".
If your explosives hypothesis were wrong, how would you know?
If EVERY eyewitnesses impressions of what MIGHT have happened were included as evidence in the report, then it would be a very thick and largely meaningless document.
Let me tell you why every single conspiracy theory was not addressed in the report: It's because the authors never dreamed that anyone would have a problem with the idea that two airliners loaded with jet fuel crashed into the buildings at crusing speed, and as a result the buildings fell down.