I'm surprised you're sceptical of what statement analysis can reveal, Iain.
Do you not agree that Peter Hyatt's examination of Kate and Gerry McCann's key interviews show a remarkable level of insight and understanding?
Many of the statements made by several of the alleged Manchester bomb victims, on the occasion of the Queen's visit to the hospital where they were being treated, contain a number of glaring inconsistencies that in no way tally up with the kinds of injuries supposedly inflicted. I think Richard Hall was right to subject these statements to the level of scrutiny outlined in his book.
Statement analysis, when conducted rigourously, is a crucial tool for helping us see what we might otherwise too readily gloss over. Peter Hyatt has certainly taught me to listen very attentively to the exact words people use. It's quite an eye opener to learn just how blatantly people betray their true feelings, through even the most innocuous sounding utterances.
I don't think there is any empirical evidence underpinning statement analysis and I think Lewis made some basic errors. But I do not thing Hall was wrong to be suspicious of some of the statements made by people. I'll get to that.
There is a lot to be said for statement analysis, although the key thing (especially in interrogations) is to have more than one interview to analyse. This is why interrogators do repeated interrogations of subjects, asking the same questions (often with different wording) and then analyse each recording for discrepancies and differing responses to the questions. You also have the 'good cop bad cop' routine, with very quick question switches between good cop and bad cop (i.e. two interviewers essentially). So the subject is kind of playing head tennis.
Second, this is where 'enhanced interrogation' comes in - you make the subject so physically uncomfortable that they simply can't concentrate and focus on the wording of their responses, forcing them to answer immediately (or else you give them an electric shock or something). So without the brain's defences working, and attempting to undermine the 'method acting' approach to IRT (interrogation resistance training), you are more likely to generate the inconsistencies of a false statement (i.e. lying) or cover story.
Having said that, obviously there are ethical concerns in applying this to victims of terrorist attacks...
Not that ethical concerns particularly bother members of the intel services these days.
Maybe I shouldn't have had a third mug of coffee this morning.
Statements are mere concatenations of words and therefore, by their very nature, cannot be subjected to laboratory testing.
But empirical also means 'verifying through observation' and this is where SA is most useful, in revealing observable weaknesses, inconsistencies and contradictions in a person's account, of which the Manchester bombing victims offer many.
Statement Analysis could be researched to get empirical evidence of its reliability. The outcome measure would simply be did the Analyst get it right? However, what could be difficult might be the variability between Analysts' abilities. Also people vary enormously in the way they react and speak especially under stress. For example, some people laugh when something terrible such as the death of a loved-one happens.
I do agree that the competence of the analyst is a crucial factor.
However, I think your last statement is wide of the mark, because trained statement analysts only focus on the words themselves, not the manner in which the words are delivered, or any other accompanying behaviour.
If you haven't done so, I'd highly recommend you watch Peter Hyatt's interviews with R D Hall, for a thoroughly professional demonstration of what statement analysis is capable of revealing.
I think it is better kept as a distinct discipline in its own right.
As I've stressed, I see statement analysis as but one tool in a range of methodologies. It isn't infallible, but it has yielded very useful results in a number of cases, as Peter Hyatt explains in his interviews with R D Hall.
I'm not sure I'd place it in the same category as body language interpretation, however, where I think there is far too much room for subjective bias to influence proceedings.
I agree with Iain here. It's not a criticism of statement analysis per se but more that it cannot be proved and that it can more easily look as though the Interpreter is falling for Researcher Bias. I felt it didn't do Richard many favours, mainly because it's unfamiliar to many people. Also these techniques are not set in stone. They may be popular in the USA, but like the Lie Detector, they are not reliable enough to be used as evidence in court in the UK. For example the Lie Detector at best has a 5% failure rate. That is high. One in 20! So of course it cannot be trusted.
I've just visited richplanet.net and the videos in question won't play, for some reason.
You could try searching on platforms like Rumble, Odyssey, etc, or do what I did and purchase all of Richard's video documentary output on a USB stick. I think I paid around £15. It's well worth the expense and you'll be supporting the ongoing efforts of the man himself.
I see statement analysis as a useful tool, among a wide variety of other methods of enquiry.
In the wrong hands, I'm sure it can yield wildly inaccurate results, just as if you were to give an arc welder to a monkey, in the hope of getting a priceless sculpture in return.
All tools rely on the competence of the user for their optimum effect.
They'd have never tried this shit on at a Pink Floyd or Talking Heads Concert, for very obvious reasons. Ariana Grande, FFS. She could easily be confused with an overpriced drink.
Brent and Neil couldn't debunk a child's assertion that it doesn't know where all the chocolates went whilst throwing them up over their shoes. We surely are living in a kakistocracy.
I had some doubts that Salman Ramadan Abed blew himself up.
But now I see that all though he was blown to bits that his bank card survived and you can see his name . What more proof can you need this is better than the passports that survived 9/11
How could I be so sceptical to doubt it.
As for the damage to the floor tiles this exactly matches the crater described in the media.
proof positive case closed. Nothing to see here move on.
The more I read, the more seething contempt I feel towards this pair of pathetic, despicable grifters! They are very unsuccessfully trying to convince us all that black is white. F*cking cheeky pricks!
Oh, I forgot to say, Iain, I very much enjoyed your little mention of the 'pubic' enquiry.
Obviously this wasn't a typo but an act of deliberate postmodern ironic mischief on your part.
I think the jury is still out on whether there are or aren't enough pubic enquiries these days.
Naturally, the idea of an independent pubic enquiry is yet another Establishment ruse. They may be held in public, but there ain't no independence about a pubic enquiry.
And most of the time, the purpose of such pubic enquiries is a whitewash.
They didn't bother with grandiose theatrics in the Soviet Union, like the spectacle of Public Enquires, because they didn't need to. At the rate things are moving at the moment, it won't be too long before the UK won't need to bother either!
As a kind of, I don't know, devil's advocate type thing (or 'what-if' hypothesis) how would it change the conclusion if the following were true: 1/ the photos and videos you refer to allegedly taken 4 minutes after a bomb were actually pre-recorded, but only transmitted 4 minutes after (thus explaining this timestamp data thing), and 2/ some of these people ('dead' and 'injured') are crisis actors (Murrell).
What I'm trying to rule out here is essentially 'if we remove all the manufactured evidence, does whatever remain still allow the possibility that there really was a bomb and that the official narrative is true?' I mean, once we strip it all down. If there is such a possibility then you're possibly looking at a hybrid thing where the 'fake event' evidence was added on to the real event (leaving aside speculation as to why). Meaning the images shown at the enquiry were, actually, genuine, not manufactured.
I'm saying this in terms of devil's advocate because after reading this series so far (without detailed prior knowledge other than some of the basics) I find myself getting much closer to your conclusion that it was a fake event. Mainly because the kind (and breadth) of evidence that you would expect to see after a bomb attack as per the official narrative either does not exist, or is not anywhere in the public domain. A more glaring piece of evidence in other words is not the anomalous stuff, but the lack of evidence.
That's leaving aside any psychological anomalies, of course. Which is another essay in itself...
This is kind of what I was saying though. Either 1/ there was a genuine TATP bomb in which case no genuine images have been made public and there must've been far fewer people in the City Room and the images/video we do have are false, or 2/ there never was a bomb and all the images/video are false, or 3/ (which is what I was speculatively suggesting) there was a bomb, but not a TATP one, some of the images/video we've seen are false but some of them are true, but there is something more devious going on here (like an entrapment for conspiracy theorists - fake events narrative - cognitive dissonance and the like).
Personally, I am like you in the sense that if there had been a real bomb we'd have at least some evidence in the public domain that didn't break down on analysis. It's the absence of evidence that is intriguing. We can analyse 'fake evidence' till the cows come home but all we're doing is analysing fake evidence, not 'the thing itself' - in the end, the existence of fake evidence only proves the existence of fake evidence. Someone should tell Mathis that.
Anyway, maybe what I was doing was a process of elimination - take all the different possible hypotheses and whatever remains is the truth. Note I did say I was doing a devil's advocate thing and only speculating.
I am so glad you have written this painstaking and full analysis of Lee and Sanders' attempt to denounce Richard D Hall's expurgation of the 'Night of the Bang' concerning the alleged Manchester Bombing in the Manchester arena
When I heard Neil Sanders was writing his version, I admit I wrote it off as his attempt to reclaim his name after his shameful disloyalty to Richard and his obvious knee jerk response to show the PTB, particularly the MSM and those who run social media such as Face Book, that he is a good servant for their cause and there to spread any and all of the official narrative (and to say 'please keep sending me jobs, especially BBC'). His speed at turning against Richard to wave his loyalty flag for the government/cabal was instant. I saw him on Richplanet and liked him, I met him at Richard's tour talk in Nottingham. But the moment he dumped Richard so publicly, when all Richard had ever done for him was promote his career and sell his books, well, then, I just saw him as the true conniving self-seeking, gutless, back-stabbing little snake he actually is. I don't call such people rats because we had pet ones that were so sweet. This attempt to shore-up his huge 'et tu Brute? moment' of public denial of a decent and honorable man does not surprise me at all. That the written attempt is filled with massive holes does not surprise me either.
I am so glad you have gone through it in your scholarly and scrupulous way. I too was not taken with the Statement Analysis and would have preferred Richard did not use it, although the visit from the Queen was met with strange responses considering the horror the patients had allegedly so recently suffered. A short clip of these, leaving the Viewer to draw their own conclusions, with maybe a phrase saying a person who works in Statement Analysis had found many responses to be incongruent, suggesting inauthenticity, might have been more effective.
Unfortunately I can't stop to discuss the many excellent points you make. I hope to return. Meanwhile, I need to say, I truly admire the work you are doing on this Iain, and am very grateful.
I'm surprised you're sceptical of what statement analysis can reveal, Iain.
Do you not agree that Peter Hyatt's examination of Kate and Gerry McCann's key interviews show a remarkable level of insight and understanding?
Many of the statements made by several of the alleged Manchester bomb victims, on the occasion of the Queen's visit to the hospital where they were being treated, contain a number of glaring inconsistencies that in no way tally up with the kinds of injuries supposedly inflicted. I think Richard Hall was right to subject these statements to the level of scrutiny outlined in his book.
Statement analysis, when conducted rigourously, is a crucial tool for helping us see what we might otherwise too readily gloss over. Peter Hyatt has certainly taught me to listen very attentively to the exact words people use. It's quite an eye opener to learn just how blatantly people betray their true feelings, through even the most innocuous sounding utterances.
I don't think there is any empirical evidence underpinning statement analysis and I think Lewis made some basic errors. But I do not thing Hall was wrong to be suspicious of some of the statements made by people. I'll get to that.
There is a lot to be said for statement analysis, although the key thing (especially in interrogations) is to have more than one interview to analyse. This is why interrogators do repeated interrogations of subjects, asking the same questions (often with different wording) and then analyse each recording for discrepancies and differing responses to the questions. You also have the 'good cop bad cop' routine, with very quick question switches between good cop and bad cop (i.e. two interviewers essentially). So the subject is kind of playing head tennis.
Second, this is where 'enhanced interrogation' comes in - you make the subject so physically uncomfortable that they simply can't concentrate and focus on the wording of their responses, forcing them to answer immediately (or else you give them an electric shock or something). So without the brain's defences working, and attempting to undermine the 'method acting' approach to IRT (interrogation resistance training), you are more likely to generate the inconsistencies of a false statement (i.e. lying) or cover story.
Having said that, obviously there are ethical concerns in applying this to victims of terrorist attacks...
Not that ethical concerns particularly bother members of the intel services these days.
Maybe I shouldn't have had a third mug of coffee this morning.
Thanks Iain.
The key word here is 'empirical'.
Statements are mere concatenations of words and therefore, by their very nature, cannot be subjected to laboratory testing.
But empirical also means 'verifying through observation' and this is where SA is most useful, in revealing observable weaknesses, inconsistencies and contradictions in a person's account, of which the Manchester bombing victims offer many.
Looking forward to the next instalment!
Statement Analysis could be researched to get empirical evidence of its reliability. The outcome measure would simply be did the Analyst get it right? However, what could be difficult might be the variability between Analysts' abilities. Also people vary enormously in the way they react and speak especially under stress. For example, some people laugh when something terrible such as the death of a loved-one happens.
I do agree that the competence of the analyst is a crucial factor.
However, I think your last statement is wide of the mark, because trained statement analysts only focus on the words themselves, not the manner in which the words are delivered, or any other accompanying behaviour.
If you haven't done so, I'd highly recommend you watch Peter Hyatt's interviews with R D Hall, for a thoroughly professional demonstration of what statement analysis is capable of revealing.
I think it is better kept as a distinct discipline in its own right.
As I've stressed, I see statement analysis as but one tool in a range of methodologies. It isn't infallible, but it has yielded very useful results in a number of cases, as Peter Hyatt explains in his interviews with R D Hall.
I'm not sure I'd place it in the same category as body language interpretation, however, where I think there is far too much room for subjective bias to influence proceedings.
(Am I blinking too much, as I write this?)
I agree with Iain here. It's not a criticism of statement analysis per se but more that it cannot be proved and that it can more easily look as though the Interpreter is falling for Researcher Bias. I felt it didn't do Richard many favours, mainly because it's unfamiliar to many people. Also these techniques are not set in stone. They may be popular in the USA, but like the Lie Detector, they are not reliable enough to be used as evidence in court in the UK. For example the Lie Detector at best has a 5% failure rate. That is high. One in 20! So of course it cannot be trusted.
Did you know the guy who invented the lie detector also created Wonder Woman?
Plus he was a swinger. And a feminist.
I like this guy.
Do you have a link to Hyatt's examination of the McCann thing?
I think you'll find it all at richplanet.net
I've just visited richplanet.net and the videos in question won't play, for some reason.
You could try searching on platforms like Rumble, Odyssey, etc, or do what I did and purchase all of Richard's video documentary output on a USB stick. I think I paid around £15. It's well worth the expense and you'll be supporting the ongoing efforts of the man himself.
Yes, good points.
I see statement analysis as a useful tool, among a wide variety of other methods of enquiry.
In the wrong hands, I'm sure it can yield wildly inaccurate results, just as if you were to give an arc welder to a monkey, in the hope of getting a priceless sculpture in return.
All tools rely on the competence of the user for their optimum effect.
They'd have never tried this shit on at a Pink Floyd or Talking Heads Concert, for very obvious reasons. Ariana Grande, FFS. She could easily be confused with an overpriced drink.
Brent and Neil couldn't debunk a child's assertion that it doesn't know where all the chocolates went whilst throwing them up over their shoes. We surely are living in a kakistocracy.
I had some doubts that Salman Ramadan Abed blew himself up.
But now I see that all though he was blown to bits that his bank card survived and you can see his name . What more proof can you need this is better than the passports that survived 9/11
How could I be so sceptical to doubt it.
As for the damage to the floor tiles this exactly matches the crater described in the media.
proof positive case closed. Nothing to see here move on.
The more I read, the more seething contempt I feel towards this pair of pathetic, despicable grifters! They are very unsuccessfully trying to convince us all that black is white. F*cking cheeky pricks!
Oh, I forgot to say, Iain, I very much enjoyed your little mention of the 'pubic' enquiry.
Obviously this wasn't a typo but an act of deliberate postmodern ironic mischief on your part.
I think the jury is still out on whether there are or aren't enough pubic enquiries these days.
Naturally, the idea of an independent pubic enquiry is yet another Establishment ruse. They may be held in public, but there ain't no independence about a pubic enquiry.
And most of the time, the purpose of such pubic enquiries is a whitewash.
Especially in Brazil.
They didn't bother with grandiose theatrics in the Soviet Union, like the spectacle of Public Enquires, because they didn't need to. At the rate things are moving at the moment, it won't be too long before the UK won't need to bother either!
I've tried a pubic whitewash.
It isn't long before the roots start to show.
As a kind of, I don't know, devil's advocate type thing (or 'what-if' hypothesis) how would it change the conclusion if the following were true: 1/ the photos and videos you refer to allegedly taken 4 minutes after a bomb were actually pre-recorded, but only transmitted 4 minutes after (thus explaining this timestamp data thing), and 2/ some of these people ('dead' and 'injured') are crisis actors (Murrell).
What I'm trying to rule out here is essentially 'if we remove all the manufactured evidence, does whatever remain still allow the possibility that there really was a bomb and that the official narrative is true?' I mean, once we strip it all down. If there is such a possibility then you're possibly looking at a hybrid thing where the 'fake event' evidence was added on to the real event (leaving aside speculation as to why). Meaning the images shown at the enquiry were, actually, genuine, not manufactured.
I'm saying this in terms of devil's advocate because after reading this series so far (without detailed prior knowledge other than some of the basics) I find myself getting much closer to your conclusion that it was a fake event. Mainly because the kind (and breadth) of evidence that you would expect to see after a bomb attack as per the official narrative either does not exist, or is not anywhere in the public domain. A more glaring piece of evidence in other words is not the anomalous stuff, but the lack of evidence.
That's leaving aside any psychological anomalies, of course. Which is another essay in itself...
I get you.
This is kind of what I was saying though. Either 1/ there was a genuine TATP bomb in which case no genuine images have been made public and there must've been far fewer people in the City Room and the images/video we do have are false, or 2/ there never was a bomb and all the images/video are false, or 3/ (which is what I was speculatively suggesting) there was a bomb, but not a TATP one, some of the images/video we've seen are false but some of them are true, but there is something more devious going on here (like an entrapment for conspiracy theorists - fake events narrative - cognitive dissonance and the like).
Personally, I am like you in the sense that if there had been a real bomb we'd have at least some evidence in the public domain that didn't break down on analysis. It's the absence of evidence that is intriguing. We can analyse 'fake evidence' till the cows come home but all we're doing is analysing fake evidence, not 'the thing itself' - in the end, the existence of fake evidence only proves the existence of fake evidence. Someone should tell Mathis that.
Anyway, maybe what I was doing was a process of elimination - take all the different possible hypotheses and whatever remains is the truth. Note I did say I was doing a devil's advocate thing and only speculating.
I am so glad you have written this painstaking and full analysis of Lee and Sanders' attempt to denounce Richard D Hall's expurgation of the 'Night of the Bang' concerning the alleged Manchester Bombing in the Manchester arena
When I heard Neil Sanders was writing his version, I admit I wrote it off as his attempt to reclaim his name after his shameful disloyalty to Richard and his obvious knee jerk response to show the PTB, particularly the MSM and those who run social media such as Face Book, that he is a good servant for their cause and there to spread any and all of the official narrative (and to say 'please keep sending me jobs, especially BBC'). His speed at turning against Richard to wave his loyalty flag for the government/cabal was instant. I saw him on Richplanet and liked him, I met him at Richard's tour talk in Nottingham. But the moment he dumped Richard so publicly, when all Richard had ever done for him was promote his career and sell his books, well, then, I just saw him as the true conniving self-seeking, gutless, back-stabbing little snake he actually is. I don't call such people rats because we had pet ones that were so sweet. This attempt to shore-up his huge 'et tu Brute? moment' of public denial of a decent and honorable man does not surprise me at all. That the written attempt is filled with massive holes does not surprise me either.
I am so glad you have gone through it in your scholarly and scrupulous way. I too was not taken with the Statement Analysis and would have preferred Richard did not use it, although the visit from the Queen was met with strange responses considering the horror the patients had allegedly so recently suffered. A short clip of these, leaving the Viewer to draw their own conclusions, with maybe a phrase saying a person who works in Statement Analysis had found many responses to be incongruent, suggesting inauthenticity, might have been more effective.
Unfortunately I can't stop to discuss the many excellent points you make. I hope to return. Meanwhile, I need to say, I truly admire the work you are doing on this Iain, and am very grateful.
That was a fun read! 😂
It certainly was!