While I'm not sure if Mark himself was the solution (hard for him to be on multiple flights simultaneously), I do think that more people with his attitude and the balls, talent and luck to back it up certainly could have at least saved the towers and the people in them. Flying/landing a plane with no experience would likely still result in all the planes being lost, but that would have cut down the death count tremendously.
I can only hope that the people on those planes despite not knowing their destination were proactive in the end and were not meek little sheep that allowed themselves to be herded quietly and obediently to their doom. Maybe they did put up an epic fight and those terrorist guys were just uber close combat specialists who defeated everyone on the way to the cockpit, including folks with as much or more experience than Mark. We'll never know. Gotta say if that's how it went down then those terrorist guys certainly earned the win, but I think they simply didn't meet much/enough resistance. And when good men do nothing, well ... you know the rest.
It's a bit of a change in the way most people think these days though. For example, in every single self-defence course I've been to and heard of they always advise in the event of a robbery to give the robber what he wants and hope he backs off. To avoid conflict. To keep yourself safe and basically let someone else deal with the problem. Gas station attendants when held up (here anyway where they aren't packing shotguns under the counter) just give the money and report the incident. It almost sounds like an every day transaction. "Oh, are you here for your weekly robbery mr. robber? That's excellent as I had already prefilled the forms". This sort of attitude is basically saying, yup. If you are going to get screwed, just bend over and take it then complain to someone later.
I suppose it comes down to how much you value what you are losing, and if you have enough conviction to fight for it. I know there are crazies who would probably fight to the death for $10 dollars, while others would just sit idly by and lose things (material and otherwise) of much greater value (in my mind anyway). In the case of the gas station I can clearly see they don't want to be sued by dying employees. The amounts in one register would be miniscule compared to a successful legal action involving a serious injury/fatality. The whole legal thing comes into play too - just how far do you go to "win" against an opponent? Injure? Maim? Kill? Kill then mutilate and put on a display? All little things that hold people back from what they ought to do.
My examples of robbery really seem out of place since life generally outweighs "other stuff", but when it is your life being robbed that's when things become interesting. Everyone only gets one life (apart from those of you who get reincarnated apparently). How many does yours outweigh? If you have been on one of the planes and you somehow figured out the plan to ram it into the tower (unlikely), would you have killed those terrorists knowing they were the only pilots left on the plane (which was quite likely)? If it was in your power would you have put the plane's passengers to certain death by killing the pilots but saving the people in the towers (one of them anyway)? Or if given the chance would you have simply used the only available parachute on yourself / a loved one because you felt that life was worth more than everyone else's combined?
That's a pretty broad what-if scenario. Maybe I should cut it down to this: If the terrorists told you that you were just hostages for a few hours would you believe them and let them control the plane unchallenged, regardless if they held hostages?
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