Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

nytimes.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

301–310 of 484 posts

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#301

Post by shadowgovt »

sam0x17 wrote: post #262
mc32 wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh I agree companies should have greater interest in the well being of their communities and we should effect change that makes them beholden to the communities that allowed them to prosper and not sell the communities out to the lowest bidder overseas. But… tell China this same argument. That they should not protect their self interest and see how well it goes over.

> But… tell China this same argument. That they should not protect their self interest and see how well it goes over. Note that my argument is one of prioritization -- to protect our self-interest, we have a lot more pressing problems at home than Intel et al losing a few bucks because they let the wrong people see the secret formula, and wasting precious human and financial resources on the wrong problems can be wor…

The irony of all of this, of course, is that we already have a system in place for protecting secret formulae: you patent them.

But here we get on the issue of the question of international espionage and whether it matters if you patent something in the US if China will just refuse to enforce an international patent.

Perhaps there's a case to be made that in a world where superpowers don't obey each others' laws, this was never going to be Samsung's $1 billion to make...

It seems like when you sum it all up, this is a really good time to be a Chinese tech firm.

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#302

Post by posterboy »

bsenftner wrote: post #47
throwawayarnty wrote: post #10

The worst part of these accusations is that your reputation is tarnished whether you are guilty or not. This instilled a sense of fear in every person even if they are innocent because you can still be targeted and your career ruined. If this scientist was just stating out, rather than already established, he would likely have had to quit science. There should be some penalty for false accusations that can compensate…

The worst part is he spirit has been crushed; he can no longer work for fear of irrational and frankly random political views and actions detrimental to his health, his research, and his family. If he is to continue and regain an amount of his former life, I wager it can only occur after leaving the USA permanently.

Honestly, this is the type of response someone in the government (which?) would possibly pay good money for to mislead the prossecution – sounds like a good spy vs. spy movie except it's not funny.

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#303

Post by openknot »

javajosh wrote: post #284

As bad as this is, it could have been so much worse for him. The government does not usually correct itself like this, preferring instead to continue with prosecution, notch up another corrupt win, and call it a day. And in fact, for this reason, the (current) government needs to get major kudos! And Dr. Chen should get more hugs, and more support - as many as he needs to help him forget this nightmare and get back t…

>And in fact, for this reason, the (current) government needs to get major kudos!

From the article: 'The 15 postdoctoral students he worked with were transferred to other research groups, taking their knowledge with them. “We are all losers, right?” Dr. Chen said. “My reputation got ruined. My students, my post-docs, they changed their career. They changed to other groups. M.I.T., the country, the U.S., we lose. I can’t calculate the loss. That loss cannot be calculated.”'

It's a positive that the rule of law in the United States has been demonstrated to work in this case. But he could have easily accepted a plea deal earlier and have avoided the dismissed charges. He also lost his staff and may be stigmatized in the future for people who see that he was arrested by the FBI in his home, but don't read the full story behind the dismissal.

The dismissal of charges sounds like a bare minimum for a functional society, not an extraordinary response (and it should not be the norm to double down and press on with false charges). A fair response would be for him to be compensated so he's no worse off, and at least receive an official apology from the government.

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#306

Post by posterboy »

refurb wrote: post #213
otrahuevada wrote: post #49

Earlier quoted context omitted.

According to the article the State discovered, way late, that the kind of ties he had with China were not of the kind they assumed guilt of and heavily publicized when they went to destroy his professional life, but instead of the kind people have when they are born elsewhere. When they did find out about this, they instead tried to make him admit to some other non criminal kind of ties to justify their ruining of hi…

What people don’t realize is that a prosecutor is like any other job - pressure from the boss to deliver, long hours, “sunk cost fallacy” and all the other crap you see in big corporates. Not to excuse the behavior, but more highlighting what contributes to it. Once a prosecutor thinks he has a case against you, you’re pretty fucked to be honest because it rare for them to ever admit fault or back down.

I don't know how the senate is set up in the US, but prossecutors are supposed to decide freely. The "boss" is in the worst case just another layer in the prossecution, that's not just a job but an institution.

The general attourney from Germany denied the NSA case because he found no evidence. He's also bound by orders from the justice department ("weisungsgebunden")

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#307

Post by N1H1L »

throwawayarnty wrote: post #10

The worst part of these accusations is that your reputation is tarnished whether you are guilty or not. This instilled a sense of fear in every person even if they are innocent because you can still be targeted and your career ruined. If this scientist was just stating out, rather than already established, he would likely have had to quit science. There should be some penalty for false accusations that can compensate…

Yeah, this is like HUAC Vol 2. Hopefully, we do not repeat that shameful period again.

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#308

Post by pessimizer »

hiptobecubic wrote: post #163
jacobolus wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The purpose of the China Initiative was ostensibly to root out industrial espionage. Instead they ended up investigating and prosecuting a bunch of Chinese scientists for legally trying to advance their work and careers, and haven’t yet discovered much if any industrial espionage. The worst they’ve found so far, from what I can tell, is a few undisclosed grants and minor visa violations. Having incompetent, overzealo…

"The collateral damage from this error is a setback for the China Initiative, as it undermines public support for the program and discourages legitimate researchers from applying for government funding, hurting US scientific progress." Was that so hard?

Is your comment meant to be an improvement?

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#309

Post by Schiendelman »

perihelions wrote: post #287
Schiendelman wrote: post #174

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He can certainly sue the US government for accusing him publicly without enough evidence to prosecute, and the resulting loss of compensation. Now, it's not exactly affordable for him to do so. But that's a separate problem we should solve.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Absolute_immunity

It depends. From that article:

“However, the Supreme Court has held that prosecutors do not enjoy absolute immunity when they act as investigators by engaging in activities associated more closely with police functions.”

Re: In the end, you're treated like a spy, says MIT scientist

#310

Post by vishnugupta »

This is just such a sad situation. The scientist's reputation has taken a big beating and he will now be looked through the lease of these accusations for rest of his career, if not more.

The last paragraph stood out for me.

“My love is science. I did not want politics, right? I saw that, and I got away from it. I do my devotion to science. I help people, I support. But I learned that you can’t get away. Politics impacts everybody. So if there are things that are not right, we all need to speak out.”

Lot of times most of us, including me, don't speak out against wrong policies. We all think "let's just focus on our own thing" it won't affect us. But we are all wrong, "Politics impacts everybody".

Post reply on HN