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Who smeared Richard Feynman?

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Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#51

Post by hydroxylGroup »

i_cannot_hack wrote: post #48
hydroxylGroup wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But that's how smears work. The whole point is to cause deep consternation, because dangerous questions might reflect poorly upon the person that asks them. So, when confronted with a delicate social scenario that threatens our better intentions, an awkward silence is produced, and everyone's mind races at the grey areas, and 12 people will diverge in 12 directions, guided by assumptions based on personal experiences…

To imply that she accused Feynman of cruelty because she enjoyed getting spanked sexually and then 'changed her mind' is not "asking the dangerous questions"... it is just weird and uncalled for. You're not doing a hero's work, you're just being mildly chauvinistic, and on top of it all trivializing sexual abuse. Be critical of the basis of her claims all you like. I encourage scepticism. But learn from the others in…

You're not doing a hero's work either. Don't claim to be instructing me with shame.

Why encourage silence in the scenarios where it's safe to conjecture. They're both dead, and history is written. Recognize the lack of detail now, and where there's an opportunity for misdirection. When no one discusses the safe scenarios, we are less prepared for the hazardous ones.

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#52

Post by ams6110 »

mpyne wrote: post #38
pling wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well you'd think but I worked for an org back in 2005 that decided to completely optimise that step away. They were an aerospace/defense company building IFF units no less...

I think that was still a year or so before news stories started coming out about government "redacted" documents that were not actually redacted. A lot of the NSA-related documents released after redaction were certainly run through the "redact,print,scan" routine, and I know the Navy does the same as a best practice now. Maybe that hasn't made it out to the defense industrial base by now, but I'd be surprised if 9 y…

Wouldn't "redact, print-preview, save" be good enough?

Or redact, screen-shot.

Does that preserve anything that an actual paper print and rescan would remove?

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#53

Post by yareally »

cperciva wrote: post #49
yareally wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Considering what happened with Robert Oppenheimer[1], I doubt Feynman would smear himself. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oppenheimer_security_hearing

Considering that Feynman neither needed nor wanted any role which would require him to hold a security clearance, I think the case of Robert Oppenheimer would, if anything, have encouraged Feynman to thumb his nose at the establishment. He was always one for doing what he thought was right and ignoring the potential fallout -- witness his willingness to testify to spending time in a strip club.

Hmm, that's a good point. Oppenheimer had much more to lose with his clearance/position and far more baggage they eventually used against him than Feynman (aside from some extremely personal vendettas against Oppenheimer). Maybe it was plausible after all, since Oppenheimer was known to encourage his colleagues to do what they thought was right.

Guessing if comparing the two, it would hurt Oppenheimer's rep more than someone like Feynman, since they blamed Oppenheimer more than anyone when many of the Manhattan Project scientists refused to work on the H-Bomb project with Edward Teller.

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#54

Post by [deleted] »

mpyne wrote: post #38
pling wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well you'd think but I worked for an org back in 2005 that decided to completely optimise that step away. They were an aerospace/defense company building IFF units no less...

I think that was still a year or so before news stories started coming out about government "redacted" documents that were not actually redacted. A lot of the NSA-related documents released after redaction were certainly run through the "redact,print,scan" routine, and I know the Navy does the same as a best practice now. Maybe that hasn't made it out to the defense industrial base by now, but I'd be surprised if 9 y…

[deleted]

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#55

Post by BigTuna »

sitkack wrote: post #42
cloudwalking wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> threw pieces of bric-a-brac about and smashed the furniture.

That could be polite speak for, "totally lost his shit when when I interrupted a derivation" If someone trashed my knick-knacks and smashed my furniture for what would be normal personal interactions, I too would ask for a leave of absence.

It's important to remember that before the days of no-fault divorce false allegations of cruelty were commonly made to justify the split to a judge. Both parties to the divorce would agree on the story in advance and testify to the same under oath. It amounted to widespread ritualized perjury and was one of the major deciding factors in the passing of no-fault statutes.

This is all to say, take the allegations of extreme cruelty with a grain of salt.

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#56

Post by c_c_c »

wavefunction wrote: post #15
firstOrder wrote: post #7

> Through the years that he has been at the California Institute of Technology (REDACTED) he has in my opinion made a definite point of knowing well and cultivating such persons as the president of California Institute of Technology, the dean of the school of physics, department heads (including REDACTED and Linus Pauling), regents of California Institute of Technology, as well as REDACTED. Well it shouldn't be too m…

Why would someone working at Caltech be interviewed in Idaho? The ex-wife theory seems a whole lot more credible.

I have no idea but as long as we're speculating there is this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idaho_National_Laboratory and this: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Experimental_Breeder_Reactor_I

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#57

Post by rurban »

hydroxylGroup wrote: post #27
ewoodrich wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That quote omits the actual alleged "extreme cruelty": "...the appointee's wife was granted a divorce from him because of appointee's constantly working calculus problems in his head as soon as awake, while driving car, sitting in living room, and so forth, and that his one hobby was playing his African drums. His ex-wife reportedly testified that on several occasions when she unwittingly disturbed either his calculu…

> during which time he attacked her Still sounds kind of vague. What, precisely, does the word "attacked" refer to?

Reading the letters would help. A physical attack. "Choking"

But I would highly doubt her credibility having read her smear letter and the questioning methods they did those times, and the four years needed for the divorce.

p64: from an "Los Angeles Times" report 7/18/56 "His ex-wife reportedly testified that on several occasions when she unwittingly disturbed either his calculus or his drums he flew into violent rage, during which time he choked her, threw pieces of bric-a-brac about and smashed the furniture."

The other citations left out the choking part literally: "...the appointee's wife was granted a divorce from him because of appointee's constantly working calculus problems in his head as soon as awake, while driving car, sitting in living room, and so forth, and that his one hobby was playing his African drums. His ex-wife reportedly testified that on several occasions when she unwittingly disturbed either his calculus or his drums he flew into a violent rage, during which time he attacked her, threw pieces of bric-a-brac about and smashed the furniture."

I wonder what she wrote on the deleted 13 consecutive pages attachment at the end about his "Evidence of Disloyalty" and "Personality and Character", that the even the FBI decided to delete it. And a second questioning about 2 specific points brought nothing specific, so it was only this famous single letter. I find it interesting how she made up the numbered list of arguments which sound like FBI wordings, probably influenced by the questioning method.

She is summarized by the FBI as "She said that her personal feeling is that FEYNMAN is without character or acceptable moral fiber. She ... emphatically he is not acceptable to her as an appointment to any position with the U.S. Government which would require moral character and emotional stability." (p188) And she refused to furnish a signed statement on these allegations.

Re: Who smeared Richard Feynman?

#58

Post by mpyne »

ams6110 wrote: post #52
mpyne wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that was still a year or so before news stories started coming out about government "redacted" documents that were not actually redacted. A lot of the NSA-related documents released after redaction were certainly run through the "redact,print,scan" routine, and I know the Navy does the same as a best practice now. Maybe that hasn't made it out to the defense industrial base by now, but I'd be surprised if 9 y…

Wouldn't "redact, print-preview, save" be good enough? Or redact, screen-shot. Does that preserve anything that an actual paper print and rescan would remove?

Oh, there's tons of much better methods that would be more than good enough. Adobe even provides specific redaction features that drill down within the PDF data itself to make sure that nothing gets drawn under a redaction block, it works quite well.

But the government is about making procedures that are both easily understood by low-paid civil servants and unlikely to be screwed up in major fashion (e.g. our GS-7 scanning documents back in might use the wrong file name or reverse the pages or something, but they probably won't leak classified data if they do that).

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