U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani • Hacker News Board

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#521

Post by wpietri » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 5:11 PM UTC

api wrote: post #185

wpietri wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One of the patterns that interests me a lot is supernormal stimulus. An organism is evolved to deal with a stimulus in a certain range, and something comes along that is so far outside it that things break. The classic example is Niko Tinbergen, who created models of fish that were rounder and redder than the real fish, who would ignore other real fish and focus on the models. The human ability to refine things produ…

Wow. That is by far the most realistic and rational hypothesis for this phenomenon I've heard. It's simple, elegant, and seems testable. Thanks! I think this may also offer some explanation for the appeal of the utterly absurd, like flat Earth or galactic emperor Xenu. Its supernormally ridiculous, which invokes a sense of fascination. In any case if this is true I think this effect is being weaponized today to an un…

Yeah. If I were to cast it into this framework, you could look at fundamentalist systems of thought as delivering a supernormal sense of understanding. Which causes supernormal confidence, making their views easier to spread.

An actual universe doesn't pack well into the 3 pounds of meat we use for thinking. A system of thought that lets us discard most natural ambiguity and nuance would be unnaturally comfortable. I think this is true both for obvious fundamentalism (e.g., Bible thumpers) and for single-explanation frameworks of thought. Freudianism, Marxism, and capitalism all have groups that are effectively fundamentalist adherents. And I think there's a species of Bitcoin fanatic that is also effectively fundamentalist.

I guess I shouldn't be surprised that this appears to be on the rise at the same time the Internet has brought us into contact with all the information and all the people.

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#522

Post by telchar » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 6:13 PM UTC

csomar wrote: post #513

telchar wrote: post #482

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which makes every single person with insurance a (diffuse) victim. Let's not pretend that exorbitant pricing doesn't have any relation to the high cost of medical insurance/care, which in turn of course indirectly kills people.

Drop the tone. All I said is his pharmaceutical practices were 1. legal 2. didn't have direct effect on the consumers of the medicines. Skherli said he gave the medicine free to those who have no insurance. I don't think by good heart but rather to avoid a major bad publicity from the inability of non-insured to pay.

I won't. The notion that Shkreli did next to nothing wrong because he only gouged insurance companies is one I have seen echoed too much. It bears refuting when it comes up lest people see such assertions go unchallenged and don't consider the implications.

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#523

Post by glangdale » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 10:25 PM UTC

ryan-allen wrote: post #505

glangdale wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Actually, rich people in Sydney just paid their employees to say "oh, I was driving that car at the time". Pretty scandalous.

Not even rich people do this, but I wouldn't want to be party to either side of such an arrangement. Between the cameras and tracking of phones, if someone's out to get you they can get you on fraud.

It was in the news a while back, so I'm not sure why the skepticism. It's not super-widespread - I don't think you can just do it with any car. Maybe the rort was set up to involve a company car.

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#524

Post by Kluny » Sun, Jun 17, 2018, 10:44 PM UTC

api wrote: post #518

Kluny wrote: post #347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, exactly. Psychopaths don't empathize, so they don't understand why social conventions exist, so they sometimes get it wrong and something seems "off". When someone seems "off" you don't trust them.

Problem is that also ensnares sincere people on the autistic spectrum, recent immigrants, and anyone else different for any reason.

Yeah, and it's very much a moving target. It's a tough thing.

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#525

Post by wlesieutre » Mon, Jun 18, 2018, 3:00 AM UTC

gaius wrote: post #357

yourapostasy wrote: post #232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> ...they have false confidence about areas they have zero expertise in, purely because they feel they can figure it out. The antidote to this effect: pick any object around you, and set out to make it yourself from scratch. Or just set out to make the precursors. An object as prosaic as say, a window. A lot of people who suffer from this effect dismissively wave away such a challenge, saying in more words that it's…

An object as prosaic as say, a window I think about this alot, starting from absolutely nothing I doubt I could even make a nail, let alone a screw, let alone a nut and bolt. I have no idea what iron ore looks like in the wild or where to find it. I could probably make charcoal and a furnace... if I had the tools, which I wouldn’t. It’s quite humbling.

You might find this interesting: https://www.ted.com/talks/thomas_thwaites_how_i_built_a_toas...

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#526

Post by lsc » Mon, Jun 18, 2018, 3:06 AM UTC

wpietri wrote: post #471

lsc wrote: post #390

Earlier quoted context omitted.

my outsiders view of management training is that they work so hard at cultivating confidence that they start thinking that confidence, not competence, is what they need to select for in roles outside of leadership. As far as I can tell, "leader types" are far more vulnerable to confident people than the rest of us because of this.

I also think falling for this is implicit in the notion of the MBA. Previously, management was mainly company founders, founder families, and people who had come up through the ranks. That is, all people who spent years learning the specifics of the business. But the theory of the MBA is there's some universal set of "business skills" that makes actually understanding the business domain irrelevant. In practice, I th…

I personally think the MBA system is a big step up from just choosing leaders based on how closely related to a powerful person they are. (I mean, I understand there is a lot of overlap between the two... I'm just saying that the MBA system is a step forward, not that it's good)

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#527

Post by wpietri » Mon, Jun 18, 2018, 5:03 PM UTC

lsc wrote: post #526

wpietri wrote: post #471

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I also think falling for this is implicit in the notion of the MBA. Previously, management was mainly company founders, founder families, and people who had come up through the ranks. That is, all people who spent years learning the specifics of the business. But the theory of the MBA is there's some universal set of "business skills" that makes actually understanding the business domain irrelevant. In practice, I th…

I personally think the MBA system is a big step up from just choosing leaders based on how closely related to a powerful person they are. (I mean, I understand there is a lot of overlap between the two... I'm just saying that the MBA system is a step forward, not that it's good )

Unfortunately I think the MBA enables a power-and-politics system. If people have to work their way up and learn an industry, competence and a long-term focus are more rewarded than if a credential makes you a supposedly universal expert.

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#528

Post by dralley » Mon, Jun 18, 2018, 7:27 PM UTC

cat199 wrote: post #469

dralley wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Read the book. The timeline is easily explainable without needing conspiracy theories.

What 'book'? AFAIK not nearly all the information has been discovered or presented, and much of this never will. How about the 'convenient' intervention of mattis into military trials of the technology? Just because it sounds like tinfoil hat doesn't mean it's not true (see also: snowden)

https://www.amazon.com/Bad-Blood-Secrets-Silicon-Startup/dp/...

One chapter talks about Mattis, including various emails that were sent. He comes across as genuinely wanting to do the best thing for his men and hoping that Theranos could save lives in the field. There never were any field tests, because Mattis listened to his underlings when they said it would need to get FDA approval first. They then offered to let Theranos test random blood samples to validate the results but Theranos never took them up on that offer.

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#529

Post by spopejoy » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 12:14 AM UTC

emiliobumachar wrote: post #270

mhneu wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There’s one other REALLY important reason why Holmes was able to raise money. Remember venture firms with blood test knowledge like Google V were turning her down. Holmes was close family friends with George Schultz, and that allowed her to do two things. First, get a bunch of military and government guys on the board. And second, sell to the military. That was Theranos’ real ace in the hole. Holmes knew top military…

That mid level DoD employee should get a bonus, a promotion, and a medal.

Instead, he was forced into retirement or reassignment, as 4-star Dickwad Mattis was head over heels for Theranos: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/wonk/wp/2016/12/01/trump...

(Note that doesn't mention his retirement, I can't find a link for that, I read it in Carreyrou's book)

Re: U.S. Files Criminal Charges Against Theranos’s Elizabeth Holmes, Ramesh Balwani

#530

Post by dnautics » Tue, Jun 19, 2018, 4:33 AM UTC

telchar wrote: post #522

csomar wrote: post #513

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Drop the tone. All I said is his pharmaceutical practices were 1. legal 2. didn't have direct effect on the consumers of the medicines. Skherli said he gave the medicine free to those who have no insurance. I don't think by good heart but rather to avoid a major bad publicity from the inability of non-insured to pay.

I won't. The notion that Shkreli did next to nothing wrong because he only gouged insurance companies is one I have seen echoed too much. It bears refuting when it comes up lest people see such assertions go unchallenged and don't consider the implications.

Shkreli is not in jail for that. The "shkreli case" specifically refers to a securities case, unrelated to retrophin. And it is that, specifically, where there were no damages.