Live data from Hacker News

Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

news.mit.edu

151–160 of 353 posts

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't understand. They knew in 2013. What exactly does "in response to revelations" mean then? What was the revelation? They've known. That sentences is bullshit and misleading at best.

MIT is not one person. The report details exactly who knew what, when. According to the report, the President of the institute (Reif) did not know until the reporting linking MIT with Epstein.

According to Reif himself, he signed a "letter thanking Jeffrey Epstein for a gift to Seth Lloyd ... on August 16, 2012, about six weeks into my presidency."

So it would stand to reason that Reif knew about the relationship with Epstein, dating back to at least 2012.

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#152
post #79

> In September, in response to revelations about engagements between MIT and Jeffrey Epstein... This isn't true, right? MIT knew about those engagements from as far back as 2013. This is the first sentence in the first answer to the first question and it just isn't correct. What _actually_ happened in September is a bunch of fucking terrible press for MIT. This whole thing is just so sad and at the end of all this is…

The point is revelation outside MIT. The report is pretty clear that Epstein's presence was discussed frequently internally -- and okayed. The amount of money he donated is infinitesimal by MIT's standards. They must have been convinced there was tons more to come.

I'm not denying the report is clear, as that wasn't written by MIT, but an independent 3rd party. The FAQ is written by MIT and I believe the first sentence is not clear to someone who isn't familiar with the history. The FAQ should stand on its own without the report or else what good is it.

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#153

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Kind of impressive, and nice in a way - - since it is so obviously corrupt and we become aware of it because the case is so high profile. Makes you wonder who pulled it off and how often things like it occur.

The attorney general confirmed it was a suicide, so if we're to believe it was actually a surreptitious murder, it goes all the way to the top.

You mean AG Barr, whose father hired Epstein as a 20-year-old college dropout to teach calculus and physics at a prestigious prep school? https://hillreporter.com/the-ties-that-bind-jeffrey-epstein-...

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cctv footage existed, it has now been ‘accidentally deleted’. The chances of this happening on a high profile case are infinitesimally small. So on the contrary the great claim requiring evidence is that this was a completely normal suicide in prison. Where is the evidence this video was deleted by mistake? https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2020/01/10/us/09reuters-peop...

I hear you. But the absence of evidence is not evidence of a crime. You've got your reasoning inverted. "Show me the evidence that there isn't a giant space walrus on the far side of Neptune. Otherwise we must conclude there is one. " I'd like links to sensible aggregate sources and discussion. I don't want to have the discussion here.

A giant space walrus is not in question. What is in question is why video showing a suicide was deleted.

Do you have any explanation for that?

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#155
post #7

Why they hired a law firm to begin with?

Often times outside law firms handle investigations like this. MIT clearly had some failed policies where they were laundering the reputation of a despicable person for donations, which shouldn't happen. An internal investigation would be strongly biased to find no wrong-doing. Ostensibly, an outside investigation is more neutral (even though MIT is still paying for it so they're clearly biased to be soft too...)

Well, the law firm in this case is basically an extension of MIT's in-house counsel. MIT has a long, long history with them, including whistleblower intimidation and other cover-ups.

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#156

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Professor Lloyd also visited Epstein’s private island, though for only a few hours for lunch, I live a fairly privileged life as a U.S. West Coast techie...and stopping at a private island for a few hours sounds crazy. Do non-billionaire people (active academics at that) really lead lives like this? `

It is typical for academics to visit both potential and current sponsors to discuss research funding and collaborations. It is not typical for sponsors to own private islands, and I think visiting for a day is common but a few hours sounds short (but for a one-day visit, the discussions themselves would only be a few hours). These visits are generally paid for by the sponsor (flights, hotels).

That's pretty interesting, my only experience of the sort was the sponsor (DARPA) visiting the academic's ocean-overlooking mansion (with two teslas in the garage) with very nice hors d'ouvres. Of course this academic was very well known for owning a yacht and doing "experiments" on the yacht (to be fair the project I was on used the results of one of those experiments).

To be fair, my entire life story has been rather topsy turvy in many ways (went to an undergrad with more grad students, went to a grad school with no undergrads).

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#157
post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yah-- Epstein did something nice for Hawking -- unknown if before or after the conviction-- therefore one can reasonably expect that Hawking knew Epstein was raping underage girls on his island and that Hawking participated. /s

There were definitely young women around when Hawking was there. I don't know if they were underage, but it I don't think it's safe to say Hawking knew nothing. By all accounts the island was full of girls and decorated with photographs of nude photos of them (some underage). You can see Hawking surrounded by women on the island here: https://cloverchronicle.com/2019/07/24/stephen-hawking-pictu...

> You can see Hawking surrounded by women on the island here:

I assumed from the description this was going to look like Stephen Hawking at the Playboy Mansion, but instead it's him at a bbq with two middle aged men and two middle aged women, and him in a submarine with a woman whose back is to the camera so you can't tell her age apart from not being gray-haired.

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The cctv footage existed, it has now been ‘accidentally deleted’. The chances of this happening on a high profile case are infinitesimally small. So on the contrary the great claim requiring evidence is that this was a completely normal suicide in prison. Where is the evidence this video was deleted by mistake? https://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2020/01/10/us/09reuters-peop...

What surprises me is that said CCTV system/sever is not currently in the hands of a IT forensics specialist. It's hard enough to wipe data intentionally, it much be even harder to loose it irrevocably by accident. I would be quite surprised if the footage cannot be at least partially recovered given the right resources.

I don’t know what happened, but do find it very odd cctv was wiped, and is not recoverable.

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you. But the absence of evidence is not evidence of a crime. You've got your reasoning inverted. "Show me the evidence that there isn't a giant space walrus on the far side of Neptune. Otherwise we must conclude there is one. " I'd like links to sensible aggregate sources and discussion. I don't want to have the discussion here.

So if, for example, a crime happens with 10 witness, and all 10 witness start dying one by one, will you simply say that there is no evidence the crime and forget about it? In this case, there may not be any bulletproof evidence, but everything around the case that could've gone wrong has gone wrong, to the point where it's no longer statistically plausible to be a mistake. Everything in the system had redundancy yet…

You greatly overestimate the competency of the modern bureaucracy if your best evidence is presenting a series of lapses as a well executed conspiracy. You cannot honestly use the phrase ‘statistically implausible’ because you most likely have no statistics nor idea how often such lapses occur. You’re trying to dress up a weak theory with much more rigor than is actually present.

Re: Jeffrey Epstein and MIT: FAQs

#160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you. But the absence of evidence is not evidence of a crime. You've got your reasoning inverted. "Show me the evidence that there isn't a giant space walrus on the far side of Neptune. Otherwise we must conclude there is one. " I'd like links to sensible aggregate sources and discussion. I don't want to have the discussion here.

So if, for example, a crime happens with 10 witness, and all 10 witness start dying one by one, will you simply say that there is no evidence the crime and forget about it? In this case, there may not be any bulletproof evidence, but everything around the case that could've gone wrong has gone wrong, to the point where it's no longer statistically plausible to be a mistake. Everything in the system had redundancy yet…

> They were supposed to check him every 30m yet they didn't check him for hours exactly when he killed himself.

"Hours" means at least 4x longer than the normal period Epstein would have waited for the guards check in on him. Even at the 45 minute point it would be clear to Epstein that the guards were late.

Basic logic would dictate that a guy desiring to commit suicide would make an attempt exactly when it seemed likely to him the guards weren't going to show up for awhile.

So we have two options-- either Epstein was intent on committing suicide (in which case the timing is unremarkable) or he wasn't (in which case the timing is highly suspect). Given that we don't know Epstein's state of mind, and as you point out we don't have much of anything as corroborating evidence, we cannot make heads or tails of the timing. And this is the problem with conspiracy theories. It's simply too tempting to overlook that and jump to the branch that adds more intrigue to the conspiracy.

I find it useful to build a simple gate before jumping to unlock further contemplation. For example, perhaps I read about a statement from a guard claiming they were told not to check on Epstein during that time. Or even a report of some suspicious activity or event at the location that happened around the same time the regular checking procedure got interrupted. Having that gate there ensures that I don't accidentally let unrelated yet intriguing facts fill in for the corroborating evidence I desire.

Post reply on HN