A few people have written to me over the past few months regarding an article by Mr. Trevor Self, from Albuquerque I believe, styling himself Newton’s Bit. Rather than continue to answer these individually it will save time and effort if this reply is placed on the web and freely available. I have not previously bothered to answer this article because I did not believe that anyone would be taken in by his rubbish, riddled as it is with very basic errors, but for those who have not studied the subject it may prove beneficial to have some of these errors explained. Firstly I will deal with the arithmetical errors, then I will explain the engineering errors.

First of all the conversion from degrees to radians used by Mr Self is incorrect. There are pi (3.142) radians in 180 degrees, except apparently in New Mexico. This introduces an error of 200%.

There are four rotations in a three point buckle except in the mind of Mr Self who believes there are only three. A further error of 133%.

Mr Self uses a slenderness ratio which assumes that the columns in the towers were fitted with hinges on every storey. A casual glance at the towers proves this false, and the very fact that they stood for many years would help to confirm the non existence of these hinges. The error in slenderness ratio is 200%.

Mr Self chooses to call himself Newton’s bit for some reason but his refusal to accept Newton’s laws would have that famous man turning in his grave. Isaac Newton, or “whirling Isaac” as he is now known told us that each action has an equal and opposite reaction, but Mr Self chooses to ignore this fact conveniently allowing him to understate the energies involved by half. An error of 200%.

Mr. Self ignores the strengthening and bracing effect of the spandrel plates, core bracing, etc. The error is more difficult to quantify but is clearly significant. Why else would they have been included in the original design?

These errors when combined add up to ridiculous. It is easy to see therefore why I have previously dismissed this article without much comment. The only interesting part of this episode has been the manner in which supporters of the official story have latched onto it. There are those without the specialised knowledge to judge, who have betrayed their own unthinking bias by adopting Mr Self’s article without question. More importantly there are those who are or claim to be engineers and who do or should have that specialised knowledge and yet they have allowed the article to stand and allowed Mr. Self to continue to embarrass himself, even when these most basic errors have been pointed out.

I hope that this clears up a few issues for some people, but if questions continue then please do not hesitate to contact me.

As an aside, I have always thought that the custom on the web of allowing everyone to choose their own nickname is a little bit strange. If this were the case in real life then all the Porkys and Kiffys of this world would be calling themselves Ace or Tiger. Mr Self, or Newton’s Bit, as he appears to prefer, is a definite case in point.