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Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

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691–700 of 770 posts

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#691
post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm confused by the blacklisted donor thing. The first questions I had when reading about it was "when did he end up on this list?", "why did he end up on it?, and "how big is this list?" It doesn't seem like any of the journalists even asked. That sounds like a very interesting story in and of itself.

The original New Yorker article says he was blacklisted after his 2008 felony conviction. I've been told that the CRM software used by university development offices is pretty phenomenal. It was hinted to me that it automatically annotates donor records with SEC stock transaction disclosures, and I wouldn't be surprised if it also annotates donor records with public criminal court proceedings.

>It was hinted to me that it automatically annotates donor records with SEC stock transaction disclosures

I assume this is so they can hit you up for money right after you sell a bunch of stock? Clever.

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#692
post #589

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Paragraph said nothing about the girls being under 18. It says "young women". Also didn't say anything about his reputation (at the time the story took place).

So you made an account 8 days ago just to defend Epstein? Go do your pr somewhere else, that pedo is exactly where he should be.

You could easily click my account to see it wasn't created for the Epstein discussion.

I am not defending Epstein. It's crazy that you read that into my comments.

I use throwaway accounts on HN because of people like you who seem to have zero reading comprehension.

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#693
post #679

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not an expert in ligaturing. Everything I've read though backs up what I wrote above, that it is possible that bones in the neck are broken in suicide by hanging, but more likely that they are broken by homicidal strangulation. This news source [1] goes over multiple academic papers that attempt to measure the likelihood of neck bone fractures in suicide versus homicide victims. On my own, I've searched and found…

[I was fantastically rude the first time I wrote this reply. Sorry. I've edited it to be much less rude, but I might have missed some.] > Are neck bone fractures equally likely in suicidal hanging and homicidal strangulation? It's not a question I'd ask. We don't need to know which is more likely. We only need to know that it's perfectly possible and normal to break bones in the neck from ligaturing. > Regarding your…

You're free to ask, or not ask, the questions you like. If you want to discuss a topic though, it would seem reasonable to answer the questions asked of you. As I asked before, are fractures of neck bones equally common in homicide versus suicide?

This is actually a meaningful question. We know that Epstein died and had bone fractures and are trying to determine whether the cause of death was murder, or suicide. How likely is the homicide conclusion given bone fractures? How likely is suicide? This strikes me as a time to apply Bayes Theorem and update our beliefs about certain explanations.

To put the situation into a metaphor involving urns - suppose you have drawn a red ball from an unlabeled urn. You know the urn is either an urn containing 80% red balls, or an urn containing 20% red balls. Are you ambivalent about which the urn you've just drawn from is? Statistically speaking, you should not be - having drawn a red ball, while possible to do from either urn, is more likely done from the 80% red urn.

To explain the metaphor - the red ball is a bone fracture, the 80% red urn is homicide, and the 20% red urn is suicide.

I'm surprised to see you disagree about the definition of suicide. The example you gave doesn't seem to be compelling evidence of ambiguity in the term. In your example, an inmate has taken an action that resulted in his death and this is clearly suicide. The fact that your notional inmate didn't intend to die may make for a philosophical debate about the definition of suicide - but given that nobody could know what the true intentions of the recently deceased were - it seems perfectly obvious that, yes, a man who has killed himself by taking too many pills has committed suicide.

I think this is a poor line of argument. The idea you are advocating, as I understand it, is that, there are possible alternative meanings for the words "suicide" and "at the MCC", and though you don't have any evidence that those alternative definitions exist or are in use, you're willing to offer that possibility as a criticism of what is reported in major news outlets. I agree that news outlets may have gotten confused about possible non-standard definitions of terms like "suicide" or "at the MCC" - but I disagree that we should assume this is the case without any evidence to think so.

You also write that the four circumstances I've presented are "very common". Without knowing how you mean the term "very common" I can't agree with that characterization. I'm also not at all convinced you have any idea how common it is for multiple video cameras on the same subject to fail, for guards to sleep through their rounds, for guards to falsify their records, for multiple neck bones to break during sheet strangling suicides, or for prisoners at the MCC to truly commit suicide. If I'm wrong, and you do know how likely these things are, kindly share a reputable source that explains the likelihood. I'd find that enlightening.

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#694
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think that thread shows that Hoffman defended Ito, despite the author's claims. I'm basically willing to take Hoffman's responses at face value. Clearly there was an ongoing investigation, as demonstrated by Ito's resignation today. When news broke about Ito and Epstein last month, Giriharadas was pretty far down on the list of people who Ito needed to answer to (since he was just part of what I imagine to be…

This isn't the only dodgy behavior that's been reported about Hoffman in regards to Epstein. It's also been reported that he hosted a well attended party in Silicon Valley where Elon Musk introduced Epstein to Mark Zuckerberg. We will probably not see much more on this thanks to the plutocratic wagon circling that baron_harkonnen talks about, but it's naive to take Hoffman's statements at face value here.

Do you have a source for this?

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#695
post #689

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Specifically, the most charitable Minsky interpretation which we're being persuaded to take here seems to go something like: * in 2002, Minsky asks Epstein to host an AI conference for him on his island * while there, is apparently angry to discover that Epstein is prostituting girls * later in the 2000s, presumably discovers that Epstein has now been convicted of prostituting girls * in 2011, Minsky asks Epstein to…

Where are you getting the idea that Minsky knew any of it was at Epstein's direction or that she was underage? The description by Benford was that at Epstein's event a young woman explicitly propositioned Minsky, he rejected her advance and was put off by the experience enough to remark to Benford about it. It might well be that there were additional details-- that the offer was "Hi, I'm 17 and my boss says I need to…

[deleted]

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#696

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Mental gymnastics to avoid assuming bad intent without evidence is the only way to avoid becoming a deranged mob. This is a healthy instinct and you damage our ability to have rational discussions by attacking it. Until we get more evidence, and given that there is plenty of actual evidence of wrongdoing in other areas, let's focus our attention there, shall we?

So not taking donations from a felon convicted of sex trafficking and not going to his dinner parties and showing concern for young women from poor countries he keeps around him is being a deranged mob now?

No. I was trying to make a broader point about how we should conduct public discussions. We have a responsibility to about jumping to unwarranted conclusions, and devil's advocates help with that.

Now, making straw men of anyone who dares espouse anything less than full belief in the guilt of the accused, that's definitely a deranged mob kind of thing to do. People assuming the worst about others' motives is the dominant reason we can't have nice things.

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#697
post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is absolutely, very much a problem to take money from an unrepentant abuser and predator who is still publicly flaunting his abusive and predatory ways. You could argue that, perhaps, such institutions should also not cater to the merely wealthy and vain. But you can enable vanity without enabling sex trafficking.

What if the money could be accepted in a way that could not possibly convey any status or glory back to the donor - something permanently anonymous - and also did not allow the donor any guidance over the use of the money? I’m asking as a philosophical question, not suggesting that Ito’s actions might be justified.

It's certainly a complex and worthy philosophical question but what does it have to do with a child rapist contributing to MIT? My take is 'nothing'. Like, you shouldn't have child rapists contributing to your institution. It seems morally and philosophically trivial.

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#698
post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not what it is about. It is about the story at a certain point of time in the past. Nobody is assuming Epsteins innocence today.

At point in time in the story Epstein had already pled guilty to solicitation of a minor for prostitution as part of a sweetheart plea agreement avoiding sex trafficking charges. This was a well known fact. Noone should have been assuming his innocence then.

Then why didn't the story break sooner?

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#699

This seemed inevitable after the New Yorker article yesterday detailing how Ito and his team hid Epstein's involvement from the university, which had disqualified Epstein as a donor. Taking money from a dirty source is one thing; hiding it from the university because they've blacklisted that person in particular is about as unforgivable a crime as you'll find in academia

Lawrence Lessig just asserted on Medium [0] (without specific evidence) that the anonymization of Epstein's donations was done at the direction of MIT. If true, that loops the Institute generally into the whole scandal, where previously they had an almost bulletproof defense. [0] https://medium.com/@lessig/on-joi-and-mit-3cb422fe5ae7

The general argument of 'it's okay to take money from bad people as long as that money isn't blood money and you take it anonymously' is hard for me to sympathize with. At the very least it gives that person leverage over you in two ways: firstly by the threat of ceasing donations if you become dependent on them and secondly by the threat of revealing their involvement in your institution.

Re: Joi Ito Resigns from M.I.T. Media Lab After Outcry over Jeffrey Epstein Ties

#700

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This isn't the only dodgy behavior that's been reported about Hoffman in regards to Epstein. It's also been reported that he hosted a well attended party in Silicon Valley where Elon Musk introduced Epstein to Mark Zuckerberg. We will probably not see much more on this thanks to the plutocratic wagon circling that baron_harkonnen talks about, but it's naive to take Hoffman's statements at face value here.

Do you have a source for this?

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2019/07/jeffrey-epstein-case...
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