🚀 go-pugleaf

Scott Gilbert wrote:

>   Even the reasons for the attack are not entirely clear, in spite of what some people have said.
> > >
> > > Do this or we will do that to you is very clearly a "negotiation".
> > >
> > >
> >
> > Do what?  No correlation between a demand and the attack has been asserted.
>
> That's absurd.
>

Well, let me rephrase that, then.  Lots of people have tried to point to a correlation between a demand and the attack, but nobody that I'm aware of
has claimed credit for the attack, or made any demands in connection with the attack.  Do you know something that you're not telling?

> > Sure, we know what Bin Laden wants, but he denied being involved in
> > the attack, remember?
>
> Even he didn't expect (or want) that denial to be believed.
>
>

So we're supposed to engage in mindreading?  Or was he winking broadly when he denied it?
  While I realize that he may still be involved, and that his denial may be a lie,  it is quite hard to deny an action on one hand and yet make
demands on the other hand.

> > He never claimed that the attack had anything to do with his demands.  Nobody > else has, either.
>
> right.  Whatever.
>
> >
> > > Changing policy in response to murder only encourages ever increasing
> > > body counts as every little splinter group with an agenda decides to
> > > manipulate policy via terrorist acts.  Changing policy in response to
> > > good faith negotiation on the other hand, is a viable option.  It's
> > > simple behavioural theory: you positively reinforce those actions of
> > > which you approve.
> > >
> > > Positively reinforcing mass murder is lunacy.
> >
> > Negatively reinforcing bad foreign policy sounds like a good thing to me.  You're forgetting, the attack on the WTC was a *response* to previous
> > actions, not a demand.  If anything, it seems to be more of an act of vengeance than anything else.
>
> Your attempt to separate the issue of what they want from the issue
> of... err... what they want, is noted and dismissed.

Vengeance is not a demand.